Fall Musings

I stand in the driveway on a gray and rainy day. I was taking out the trash, but am momentarily distracted. The sound of the rain on the hood of my rain jacket, the chilly fall air, and the brilliant display of fall colors in the trees makes me wish I were far away from the comforts of my warm, dry home. I close my eyes. The rain sounds the same here and I can almost feel the trail beneath my feet.


Every fall I get the hit-the-trail itch. I want to be "up north", squishing my boots through the wet, muddy fall leaves covering the Superior Hiking Trail. I want to climb to the top of the Pincushion Mountains, and marvel at how many shades of orange there are on the trees laid out in the valley below. I want to watch the first snow fall from the open flap of my tent door. I want to drop my 40-pound pack on the ground of a campsite and feel the stiffness and blisters of 15 miles of rocky, rigorous hills; precarious log "bridges", and a couple of bruising missteps.

What is it that I find so desirous about these former treks of mine? After all, seven days of no showers, eating a steady diet of freeze-dried foods, and pooping in a hole I dug myself with a little shovel I will then shove back into my backpack until later is hardly glamorous. In fact, I can think of a moment on every hike I have ever taken where I thought, "I hate this! This is not fun and why do I insist on doing this to myself?!" And yet those moments of looking down a steep ravine and thinking, "Oh, yeah! You just about kicked my butt, but I'm up here and you loose!", are so incredibly rewarding! The ache of overworked muscles, quivering with fatigue, being pushed to make it to the top of the next hill in exchange for an amazing view of Lake Superior is well worth the effort. The pain of freezing fingers tearing down camp in the snow, hours of miserable sleet stinging my eyes, and soggy socks are all worth the days of sunshine and warm picnic lunches in some bright spot far away from freeway noise.

I open my eyes. Yep, still in the driveway, rain running down my face and the neighbor across the street looking at me with a rather worried expression on his face. And, in the background, my kids are yelling, "Mom! We need you!"

Then I grin. Today will hold plenty of challenges that will just about kick my butt. My two year old will knock over the dying bouquet on the kitchen table, spilling stinky water all over the clean clothes I had on the kitchen chair. I will try to sit down at a computer to write a blog that should take about 10 minutes, but will take an hour because my four year old NEVER stops talking to me. I will come close to crying over the laundry mountain in the laundry room because that is where I have continued to dump all the dirty clothes for the past two weeks, and if anything is ever going to really kick my butt it is going to be laundry! And at the end of today, and tomorrow, and the next day, I won't be able to look at a map and say, "Wow! I went a long way this week! I accomplished a lot." Because at the end of today I will still have as much to do as I did at the beginning of the day, and at the end of tomorrow and the next day, I will still have as much to do as I did at the beginning of today. And I will still be wiping up spills, carrying on exhausting conversations that last all day, and sighing over the laundry mountain that never goes away.

But, those moments of sunshine will be there too. There will be kisses, and giggles, and tickle fights. My son will say, "Mom, why is it taking so long for Jesus to come and let me live with him," and I will be glad that I am here to nurture that desire to spend eternity with his Savior. There will be snuggles by the fire place and hot chocolate to share. And at the end of the day, I will be just as exhausted as if I had hiked 15 miles with a 40-pound pack on my back, and I will feel rewarded.

This journey I am on now is a lot longer than those former fall trips of mine, and the rewards are longer lasting as well. Life has it stages, and I know that one day I will standing in the rain longing for the sound of little voices calling me to come inside for snuggles, and giggles, and stories by the fire.