lesson learned. really.

Last year, I posted about Aron Ralston, the man who lost his hand in a hiking accident. Well, he didn't lose it, exactly. He knew where it was because he had cut it off himself, but it was gone either way. I posted about how I had learned a lesson from his mistake, and I was going to do a better job of letting people know where I'd be hiking. And, for a while, I did. But like most lessons that you don't learn through personal experience, it didn't stick.

I've been hiking a lot since the weather changed, and I have been sloppy as can be about it...parking my car, strapping on my ipod, and heading alone into the hills. Or worse. No ipod, but a kid or three, with no cell phone, no first aid kit, and no note to let anyone know where we've gone. And, let us not forget: I am a trained Girl Scout leader. I would never do this with my troop but, somehow, with my own kids, I've been entirely laissez faire.

On Friday, I took Jonah, Emily, and Emily's friend Monica to the Nature Center. I have been eating a lot, and wanted some extra exercise. Plus, Jonah had been inside all morning, and needed some good old fashioned tuckering out. So we started on the red trail and then, rather than cutting over to the Jonah-friendly light blue trail like usual, we headed up the yellow trail. Now, I do the yellow trail myself all the time. It's about a mile and a half, gently rising and falling, only moderately challenging. I had confidence in Jonah's ability to handle it. But I forgot about the streams, which are narrow and not too full, even after the runoff, and which often have log bridges for crossing, but which sometimes have to be crossed by hopping from rock to rock. Jonah found those a bit unnerving, but he handled them with my help.

Then the girls found the treasure hunt. Someone had placed a series of ribbons on trees with pushpins. Ostensibly, the first person to find all of them would win a prize. The first pin was at the head of the green trail, which forks off from the yellow trail that we were hiking. I'd never hiked the green trail before, but the girls were really excited about looking for some of the ribbons, the day was beautiful, and Jonah was still going strong. So we headed off on the green trail, and walked and walked and walked. We found one ribbon and, by the time we got back to the yellow trail, we were tired, and glad to be near the end of the loop.

We had only one more stream to cross. Emily was showing me a way to pick across it, but Jonah was nervous and cranky and suddenly, trying to watch Emily and my own feet while simultaneously holding Jonah's hand and showing him where to step, I brought my foot down on a patch of slimy moss, and pitched into the stream, taking Jonah with me. I got wet; Jonah got wetter. He had bruised his knee; I had sliced a neat piece of flesh from the ball of my thumb and was bleeding, although not too badly.

I was about a half mile deep in the woods. Jonah was crying, but there was no one around to hear us. I could do nothing for my thumb but stick it in my mouth. I had no band-aid for me, no instant ice pack for him. Nothing. I managed to get us both up, carried him across the stream, and gently led us all back home.

Ultimately, we were fine but, all weekend, thinking about how much worse it could have been has been terrifying. What if he had hit his head? What if I had really cut myself badly?

I've dug out my old fanny pack, and I'll be keeping it in the car with some bandages, a tube of neosporin, my swiss army knife, a small bottle of water, and a cold pack inside. If I go alone, I'll let someone know where I am or, at least, leave a note in the car. If I take the kids and I'm the only adult, I'll be sure not to head that deep into the woods without a phone again.

Hiking is such a wonderful way to get some motion in my day and to spend time with the kids. I've been enjoying both the effort and the result, and going for longer and more challenging experiences, both alone and with my family. It's been easy to forget that, even on a marked trail close to home, it's not a danger-free endeavor.

From now on, I need to work harder at remembering.

Posted by volfie at April 23, 2006 08:43 PM