Thorn’s eyes search mine. “How can I help?”
“Carrying my pack for me isn’t an option?” I ask, even though I already know the answer. “Or throwing it off the side of the cliff, maybe?”
The corner of his mouth quirks up. “I strongly suspect you’d regret that later. And even though Icouldcarry your pack, I think you’d regret that, too, yeah?”
He’s right. Unfortunately. If I’m going to do this,Iam going to do this—not in a half-assed way, but with every bit of strength I can muster.
“Distract me instead, then?” I suggest. “Keep my mind off how hard it is until we get to the top?”
“ThatI can do.” He grins.
“So,” I start, once we’re finally moving again. “How’d you decide you wanted to do this for a living?”
He gestures out at the expansive view. “I mean, look at it!”
I squint, try to figure out exactly what I’m supposed to be appreciating—from this height, we can see for miles. “At what?”
He scoffs. “Ateverything.”
“I see rocks. And mud. And lots and lots of trees.”
He bites down on a smile. “You’re thinking too small, focusing too much on the details,” he says. “Think of it like one of those Magic Eye puzzles—look at all of it together. What stands out? What does it make youfeel?”
I inhale the damp afternoon air, trying to look at the world through his eyes. When I look beyond the rocks and the mud and the trees—at the cut of the landscape, the far-off mountains carving a jagged line into the distant sky; at the butterfly that flutters past, and the hawk that swoops low across the horizon—I think, maybe, I see it.
“It makes me feel woefully powerless and small,” I finally say.
His eyes light up. “Yes! Yes. That’sexactlyit.”
I laugh. “You do this for a living because it makes you feel powerless and small?”
He laughs now, too. “Okay, well, no. But also kind of yes? It makes me feel powerless in agoodway—it’s freeing to think about how big the world is and how small I am. That no matter how big my problems feel, I’m just a tiny speck in the universe.”
I consider it. I think I know what he means, at least on some level—it’s a distraction from the real world, if nothing else. But also, I feel calmer than I’ve felt in months. Maybe it’s the fresh air? Maybe it’s the fact that I’ve done something that scares me, something so far outside of my comfort zone that I almost don’t recognize myself, all bug-bitten and sweaty and muddy-shoed. I didn’t even put mascara on this morning, I realize.
For all the ways I’ve been miserable out in the wilderness, it’s been at least a little bit healing, too.
“So you feel, I guess…peace out here?” I ask. “Or maybe just simplicity?”
I try to imagine what it would be like to be someone like Thorn, whose entire home is probably less full than my backpack. For all the crap he gave me aboutWildandEat Pray Love, it seems like Thorn lives his own version of nature-heals-the-soul on a daily basis.
“Always have,” he says. “My dad used to take me on hikes when I was young—it was our thing. Orienteering, camping, everything. When Matteo moved in, he picked it up, too.”
“I bet your dad loves that you turned your adventures together into a career.”
He gives a sad smile. “He does, yeah. He misses being able to do it himself.”
“Wait, why can’t he do it himself anymore?” I ask, then immediately regret it—what if this is the sort of thing Thorn only talks about with people he’s known formorethan one week?
But he doesn’t close himself off, doesn’t act like I’ve crossed some sort of personal boundary.
“Lots of reasons,” he says. “The biggest is his lung disease—he just can’t physically be out here like he used to, and it’s frustrating for him. And because of the lung stuff, he had to take an office job in downtown San Francisco instead of all the welding and woodworking he used to do, so he’s also not nearby like he was before.”
“Wow…that sounds like a lot of change.” Thorn seems to take after his dad, and I can’t imagine him being cooped up in an office. “Is he doing okay?”
Thorn shrugs. “Okayis a good word for it,” he says. “He’s learned how to manage. He likes the job itself even if he’s never loved living in the city.”
I watch as Thorn navigates a patch of mud in the path, his steps so quick and natural: the landscape isn’t an obstacle for him like it is for me—for all of us amateurs.
