Today’s hike had a goal. Well, they always have a sort of goal. To get fresh air. To get sunshine and vitamin D. To get my blood pumping and my body moving. To find some peace in nature. To hopefully see some deer friends. Sidenote, deer friends are what I call the deer that live in the park I frequent because I enjoy the fact that it sounds like I’m saying “dear friend”.

    But today I had another goal. I had invited my husband to come on a walk with me during the weekend. And he had said, “maybe. But. Can we maybe find a better way to walk? Like a loop we can do?”

    A bit miffed but in full understanding of where he was going I replied, “you mean, can we not get lost.”

    “Well. Yeah.”

    Fair enough. I’d walked a lot of the trails for years, but I was not anything close to an expert on them. Usually because I wasn’t really paying attention so much to where I was going, which I am aware is not ideal. For me, it was usually enough to know that I wasn’t exactly anywhere that would take me too far into anything that could really be called a proper wilderness, certainly not so far from any mapped park or road that google maps couldn’t be relied upon to get me back to somewhere reasonably within a place I recognized, from which I could walk back to my car.

    But I recognized too that my way of doing this was not for everyone. While I’d enjoyed several hikes this way, I’d also enjoyed several burns this way too, being out for far longer than I’d anticipated and not having had a chance to reapply sunscreen. And I was able to acknowledge that to my Eagle Scout husband, this was simply madness. What can I say? We’re your regular old chaos goblin and person who throws things out pairing.

    But, I’d figured, I had four more days (assuming the weather cooperated) to really make myself familiar with a path or two, and bonus points if the path could loop back around in a sense-making fashion. But without a great sense of direction, this sort of thing was hard. I had a path or two that I suspected let out in places I anticipated, but I wasn’t entirely sure. And today was a day to test those theories out.

    I set off reminding myself that I could turn around at anytime, that I’d never gotten so lost as to be desperate before, and that I was starting, thanks to more regular visits, to become more familiar with the park and its various paths. It wasn’t until I was headed down a path that I realized I had another thing going for me. Deciduous trees. Where in the summer I could walk ten feet and the road might disappear from view almost entirely, now I had clear views. Hell yes.

    Suddenly I had the confidence of someone much more outdoorsy and I traipsed along so much more swiftly than I usually did, barely surprised when the path let out exactly where I had suspected it would and then began to make my way back.

    I hadn’t come across any animals, but I had conquered some of my bad sense of direction, and that was pretty huge for me. I was elated. The sun was shining, I was getting good exercise, and maybe I was starting to develop a skill? It was iffy, like a child’s first plunks at piano keys, but I felt like I was solidly on my way to the hiking equivalent of knowing how to play a basic Ode to Joy. Never you mind that that is still the only song I can still place on the piano.

    I was feeling grateful for the chance to take these daily walks and grateful to the trees for allowing me the chance to learn a skill on easy mode, since their leaves were all on the ground. I was grateful to the trees for being there, and for being their most vulnerable selves, and I told them so as I passed.

    “Thank you for being here,” I told them. “Thank you all. I’m so glad you’re here.” Suddenly emotional, I continued, fully aware that if a stranger had happened upon me in that moment, they’d have probably run in the opposite direction away from the strange lady reverently thanking the trees, “You’re so important. I’m sorry I haven’t thanked you before. I hope you know how important you are. I need you. We need you.” I wasn’t sure exactly who “we” was, except for maybe the general “we” of humanity, being animals who need oxygen made by trees, but I didn’t feel it exactly mattered in that moment.

    I thought about how I didn’t always feel needed. How I’d started taking my walks having recognized how dark a mental place I’d been in and how desperately I’d needed something low-tech to feed my body and soul. I’d needed the walks and the trees. But I’d needed them because I’d been in a dark place thinking no one needed me.

    I’d been lucky to have family and doctors to help me while I struggled. But I still hadn’t always felt needed. I wondered if the trees felt needed. I hoped they did. I hoped they knew that every moment they flourished was a moment the world was better for their growth. I hoped they knew how much I appreciated their vulnerability, their beauty, and their literal giving nature.

    It can be easy, I think, sometimes to not feel needed. But every tree is important. As essential as air. I think my next goal will be to tell as many trees as I can that they are needed and loved and important. I hope it’s enough.