ticks

“We need to check the kids for ticks.” One of my favorite activities is also my most dreaded: the family hike. The hike starts as it ends, cheerful and reminiscent of the many times Dad under-reported the trail’s mileage. The middle is chaotic, and the point where my family’s personalities emerge in the face of perceived adversity. Our hike in Panthertown Valley the summer before my senior year was no different.

“Let’s take this opening to the right, that’s where the views are,” Dad calls out. In perpetual search of the perfect vista to enjoy our PB&Js, he leads us up a windy path. We follow not so blindly, the barrier shrubs poking ankles. The trail is rather a footpath overgrown with thorny vines, downed trees, and low limbs, halting the forward progress of any normal family. Not ours.

I’ve hiked enough to know that a hiker should never leave the marked trails, and “Ghost Blazing” is not for a family of five. After we reach the summit of Green Mountain, what goes up, must come down, and our descent becomes anything but straightforward. The Nantahala ground is slippery, a perfect habitat for snakes, but the decline is manageable.

My brother leads the charge, protector of family and labrador retrievers, his hiking stick doubling as a machete. Every branch he hits ricochets back and slaps me in the face. The “Safety Sallys” (my brother’s way of calling my sister, mom, and me “slow”) follow behind. My sister is painfully silent, which is unusual for her. Surely she is considering the end of her promising soccer career as she fears rolling down the mountain, leaving intact ACLs and MCLs behind.

“Dad, can you still see us on the GPS?” My palms, like the forest floor, are thick and sweaty. The utter lack of control I have over the situation unsettles me. Each wrong turn increases my fear of never escaping the wooded forest. Lost in a cycle of doubt and frustration, I hesitantly follow Dad’s directions before insisting we turn around and find a safer route with an actual established trail. However, nobody is interested in reclimbing the steep hill. Every thirty seconds, I rudely ask my father to check the GPS in hopes my tone will lead him to reconsider our path. He always replies that we’re fine, but the feeling of an impending bear attack intensifies with each step.

When I don’t think I can feel any more fear than I do right now, my brother violently screams my dad’s name. The bear must have finally made its move. I hasten toward his voice with tears welling in my eyes, only to see my dad’s bald head, unscathed. False alarm.

Finally, our ghost path merges with a warmly familiar place, Granny Burrell Falls. I see my now 16-year-old sister as an eight-year-old, in a pink tank top dancing barefoot on these bald and slippery rocks. Mom remembers it, too. She says that day I wore a yellow t-shirt with French braided hair. Eight years ago, we’d taken the marked trail, but today’s hike has been anything but predictable, a reflection of emotions I’d felt all summer that were warped with the unknown and the insecurity of where I would be the following year. Forever I’ve needed familiarity, predictability, and harmony. “Trusting the process” is a saying I have loathed but am coming to understand. Standing by the waterfall that day, watching the water relentlessly pound the rocks below and finally settle into a peaceful pond, I knew I would land somewhere.

Once on familiar ground with Dad’s car in sight, I look up at him. One lens is missing from his prescription glasses. “You have to admit, that was pretty fun,” he says. “Yes, it was,” I reply, reaching up to scratch the back of my neck, retrieving a little insect encased in a tiny black shell.

The other day I was texting someone As they were pushing to have a serious conversation Are you free Friday for a movie

He asked Really? I thought Over text?

…so that’s what I said.

Over a screen, from two separate places

It was nerve racking enough to try and make sure my tone was clear But then came the three little dots He was responding…

To ME

…Oh god.

I weighed the outcomes. Will he laugh? Be dismissive? Be sarcastic? Be realistic? Be weird or be weirded out? I anticipated what clearly my whole future depended on Based on the signal of these three little dots, Then, the worst possible outcome happened: The three little dots disappeared.

…Oh god!

Did he think I was weird? Did he forget what he was going to say? What the heck was he GOING to say?

Dot dot dot.

Should I unsend my text? Did I come on too strong? Or too weak? Or— Dot dot dot.

And now basically my whole life and well being in this moment depends on these Three little dots.

My mind wandered... should I have said this face-to-face? What if people carried around three little dots in real life? Can you imagine summoning the courage

To be vulnerable, be honest, and they start to respond, only to whip out three little dots and toss them like frisbees? These three little dots felt like a wave crashing over me And yet the sounds of the future refused to be drowned out Dot dot dot.

I gave them my truth, my feelings, my vulnerability, And they gave me three little dots. I gave them honesty through my long response The response that I thought about for what felt like an eternity I offered myself and my being through a paragraph And they gave me three little dots That eventually went away.