Chirky

A black widow spider hovered on the dromedary, taunting me. I stopped moving, staring at it, and several seconds later I realized I wasn't breathing. Questions flew through across my mind as I carefully watched the spider: Can these things fly? Or jump? And, how fast do they run? Will it hurt when it bites me? I know they're poisonous, but just how poisonous are they? Will I die on the spot, or will it happen after I've limped my way out of this God-forsaken forest?

It was my second near-death experience in a twelve hour period and it was getting kind of old. This was supposed to be our anniversary trip, afterall. I picked up the platypus, which somehow made sense at the time, and started beating it against a tree. It didn't occur to me until afterward that the spider could have flown backward at me, attaching itself to my face and stinging me repeatedly. Or it could have nested in my hair.

[Incidentally, the venom carried by both a black widow spider and a copperhead snake are exactly the same. Convenient, no? And what happens if one attacks the other? Is the venom cancelled out?]

Back at camp Roger and I discovered that we were not only battling poisonous snakes and spiders, but also fleas and ticks and flies and horseflies. They were everywhere, flying about our heads and limbs. I started to flail my arms continuously about my body, uneventfully shooing them away.

With tweezers, I removed four ticks from Roger's calves, but somehow managed to personally get more than a hundred insect bites during the trip (Flea? Tick? Spider? Chihuahua? No one is certain.), and I have photographic evidence. In fact, I counted them. One Hundred Twenty Eight. No, seriously.

This is from a small section of my hamstring.

The flies alone were literally dripping with maggots, and by that I mean Roger actually witnessed several flies pooping maggots. They must have already been very, very pregnant with them, because he watched the flies land and lay thirty or more tiny maggots in a matter of seconds. And he didn't even freak out or squeal like I would have. Where's the fun in that? Men.

Instead of going to inspect them myself, I stood around peeling fingernail polish off of my fingers because it was so hot outside that the heat was actually melting. The surface was very sticky, and I wasn't prepared to give the flies an opportunity to land on my fingers and lay their eggs on the landfill that was collecting on my sticky, melting nails.

Back on the trail, my knees still felt like daggers were twisting about, and I could actually feel the soreness of each tendon that wrapped around my kneecap. I kept imagining scenarios of my demise, in which A) Roger would have to create a stretcher and drag me through the woods, which: Owwww or B) Roger would have to leave me, retrace his steps and flag down a car at the highway, which also would have meant that I would be alone with the snakes and spiders and bears. All I'm saying is, if we're going to die, don't you think it's sort of romantic for us to die together? Maybe holding hands while our bodies are slumped in a pool of our blood?

Roger could tell I was in pain and asked me take the lead so that I could set the pace. I think he regretted doing that because I couldn't have possibly gone any slower unless I simply stopped walking. My steps (uphill, downhill or on flat land) were so small that I Roger would wait for me to go forward five paces, then he would take one step and wait for me to take another five before he could move forward again.

Naturally, because I was leading the way, we got lost while on the trail. This meant that I took about four hundred more steps than my feet were willing to take, what with all the pain I was experiencing. Once we realized that we might have missed the turn-off, Roger doubled back to locate where we should have turned, while I moped about and entertained myself by chanting:

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? A woodchuck would chuck as much wood as a woodchuck could chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood.

(I repeated this over and over and over again until I was in a fit of hysterics, laughing at myself because: this? This is what is funny when surrounded by snakes and spiders and tall grass masking other venomous creatures.)

Back on the trail, minding my own business, I happened to look ahead about six feet and I saw a stick lying in the center of the trail. A stick that was about five feet long, and very dark. And black. And kind of curly-ish. And the stick was blinking at me. Maybe.

I screamed. Rather loudly. I did the only thing I could think to do, which was turn around and run, except Roger was right behind me, so I effectively smacked him in the face with my backpack as I whipped around, flung my arms around him, and quivered as my eyes welled up with tears. He started laughing because he could feel my heart racing, so I turned back around, saw the snake still lying there, and that's when the tears began to fall. I was obviously succeeding in my plan to prove to Roger how tough I am.

The snake flung its entire body off the trail and disappeared down the side of the embankment. I scurried up the trail and followed the switchback, afraid the snake would come back. I did console myself, however, by deciding that the snake was just a water moccasin (just a water moccasin? like, the poisonous kind?) because it went in the direction of the stream, which we had just crossed.

It was not until I got home and researched the snake that I discovered that a water moccasin and a cottonmouth are the same thing, which made my third near-death experience in less than twenty four hours, and why, again, didn't we head back to Dallas after we got that speeding ticket?

I abandoned the tough-girl act and kept crying, lamenting to Roger, "Why do we have to keep going? We're not even a third of the distance we need to go. We only have two days left. We're not going to make it in time because I can't walk with my knees and arches in this condiiton. I'm tired of the run-ins with the snakes and spiders and ticks and fleas. It's so hot outside that my elbows are sweating and my fingernail polish is melting." And then I wailed: "I just can't do this anymore!"

We stopped for a picturesque lunch at a stream, where we sat on rocks and rested. The resting was nice, except I was compulsively checking for snakes. When we began hiking again, we entered a new section of the forest. I immediately noticed a large, twisty vine going up a tree, and I was thinking to myself how scary it would be if that vine was actually a snake when I heard the leaves rustle behind me. I turned around in time to see something launching itself toward my face.

Again, I screamed, while simultaneously jumping and backing away from it.

It was only a twig that Roger had accidentally stepped on. We both started laughing, but mine was more like an "I WANT TO DIE" laugh mixed with an "I AM SO PITIFUL" laugh. At that moment, both were equally true. And so I started crying, again. By this point we were averaging less than one mile each hour and still had twenty five miles to go. In a day and a half.

A few hours later we found ourselves at a large campsite and trailhead. Roger studied the map and discovered that the trailhead would be the last public area we would cross: it was our point of no return. We could stop then, or we could continue hiking the remaining distance (with a 1,000 foot climb up to the highest point on the Ouachita Trail at the end). I sat down, shoved my head in my hands, and cried for a solid thirty minutes.

When I stopped and looked up, I realized a horsefly was trying to pick the perfect realty on my scalp. I stood up, hysterically waving my arms and hurling my body around, trying to rid myself of the fly, while shrieking at it. Roger witnessed the entire thing and made the final decision that we shouldn't try to go further. I was miserable and in too much pain, physically (ankles, knees) and emotionally (snakes, snakes, sssnnnnaaaaakkkeeeesssss) to continue.

Nevermind the mental breakdown.

We decided to hike out to the road the next morning and try to hitchhike back to the trailhead, where our car was parked. [Yes, it may sound unsafe to you, but when you're irrational from ticks and fleas and deadly snakes and spiders, chancing your life with humans seems a much more pleasant affair.]

We talked about how ideal it would be for someone to drive down to the campsite, someone with a cell phone that worked in the wilderness. Then we heard gunshots. I freaked out (again), because A) it is not open hunting season and B) it's illegal to hunt in a national forest and C) freaking out seems to be the only thing I can do well on this trip.

A scraggly man walk out of the woods, shotgun slung over his shoulder. I stared at him, and Roger and I stayed quiet so he wouldn't notice us. That is, we stayed quiet until Roger started talking about the movie Deliverance, which just sent me over the edge again.

Several hours later, Roger was building a fire and I was looking for firewood when I saw a shiny white truck rounding the corner toward our campiste. I yelled for Roger, because he's The Man Who Protects. An older couple hopped out of the truck and said they were just "checking out the area" to see if they want to hike there some day. They had a cell phone, and it worked in the wilderness, and after we used it they wished us well and just drove away. Roger and I stood there, staring at each other, like, "Did that just happen?"

But you know what I think? I totally think they were angels. I think God sent them to us because He knew that I just couldn't handle any more. I mean, who just randomly drives down a backwoods highway and happens to turn down a three-mile gravel road from that highway, a gravel road that doesn't even have an exit sign -- or any sign for that matter -- a gravel road that seems like it leads nowhere and seems like it will never end until you actually get to the end and you realize, "Oh, it does end," just to look at a trailhead to see if one day they want to hike it? Who? And who also happens to have a cell phone that gets coverage where we were?

Angels, that's who.

So we made a call, arranged for the shuttle service to pick us up the next morning, and the rest of the afternoon we lounged about, fretting over whether the bears would come into our campsite.