I am sore.
Saturday last was my birthday, and I decided that I would take my twin brother Douglas with me on a three-day backpacking trip to celebrate.
We drove nine hours in a van to the trailhead of the Wenaha backpacker's trail. We climbed out, shouldered our packs, and stretched our legs by hiking six miles up the Wenaha canyon, with the river on our left and the canyon walls on either side.
When we found our campsite, at the convergence of the Wenaha River and Crooked Creek, we set up our tents, settled down against some logs, and ate homemade macaroni and cheese.
We slept soundly that night, tired from the long ride and the long walk, full of dinner, and lulled downward by the constant rush of water.
In the morning, I had the first opportunity to finally appreciate the valley in which we were camping.
Because the Wenaha River curves as the Crooked Creek flows into it, the three bodies of water--the Wenaha before and after Crooked Creek, and the Creek itself--converge at perfect angles.
Roughly 120 degrees of land lie between each body of water. And the three valleys that stretch off into the distance cradle water with grace.
On Sunday, we climbed up into the Crooked Creek valley.
I saw a bright green tree frog, we stepped lightly by a rattlesnake, and we smelled nearly every wildflower we could find. All in all, we hiked four miles with the Crooked Creek winding on our left side.
When we turned to hike down to our campsite, we were facing a rainstorm. Within seconds it was pouring rain.
It was warm enough that I simply took off my t-shirt. Skin is the best water-repellent material known to man, and when it is warm, it is rather refreshing to hike with no shirt on.
My shorts were soaked, but the rain stopped, and about an hour after we arrived back at camp, they were dry.
In the evening, I played two Irish ballads on my tin whistle.
I have never been deep in the wilderness without having meaningful conversation.
Whether it is the power of the surroundings or the separation from the mechanical world, or some other force that drives us to think deeply, I always end up talking about the meaning of life or the nature of spiritual belief or some other thing.
This trip, we discussed the nature of science. We were concerned with people who blindly believe everything they read/hear/learn. Attitudes ranged from absolutely trusting to an x-files level of mistrust.
But lucky for us, in all cases, we were happy to share with each other, rarely if at all offended by what we had to say, and gracious about our differences.
In the van on the way home, we discussed marriage between people with drastically different beliefs. I submitted that it is somewhere ranging from difficult to impossible for two people with different core beliefs to marry and stay married happily.
Others were troubled by this, reasonably, suggesting that it was limiting and exclusive.
In the end, we didn't really find an answer, but we did draw closer together in the midst of our struggle to understand each other.
And just for now, that is enough.
