A Walk

The weather was unseasonably warm last Monday so William and I decided to go hiking in a canyon about a hundred miles away from Lubbock. I was thinking about doing the two-mile trail, but a nice lady in the visitor center encouraged us to go on a six-mile walk instead. “Try the Light House Trail. It’s so beautiful.” For a while I suspended my knowledge of my age and physical condition and decided to take on the challenge. A six-mile walk down and up the canyon might not be a big deal for most people, but for a fifty-five year old man whose longest walk for a while has been no more than two miles in the neighborhood, it definitely presented a little bit of a challenge.

William and I drove down the Canyon and found the trail at the end of a winding road. Before we started, we saw a sign stating that we needed to take at least a gallon of water with us, and worse yet, it also said that one should not take the hike unless he is physically able. Self-doubt began to creep into my heart after I read the sign. “Shall I do it?” I asked myself.

“Let’s go, dad,” William urged as I was standing at the entrance, conjuring up the possible scenarios if something were to happen to me on the way, and the very thought stayed with me throughout the hike. I wasn’t concerned about my well being, really. I just did not want William to have to run all the way back to the car to get help from somewhere. We were in the middle of nowhere and our phones were out of range. I didn’t want to put my son through any kind of crisis. Such a nagging concern sort of robbed me of my joy of looking at the muti-colored walls of the Canyon glimmering in the afternoon sun.

It took us about three hours to finish the walk, and I survived to tell the story.

When the late Jimmy V found out he had terminal cancer and wasn’t given much time to live, he kept on saying, “I am so sorry” to his children. I had trouble understanding why he kept on making apologies to his daughters then, but I started to get it after I began to raise my boys. It mattered little if I had a stroke or heart attack in the midst of my walk, I just didn’t want to put son through that crisis, that anxiety and fright. Sounds irrational, doesn’t it?