Trip Day

© Shawn Kielty, 2005, all rights reserved.

Remember, "Super Glue^TM is good for cracked skin."

Enter the wilderness. Some things, you gotta do alone. Be healthy, keep your wits, be smart, carry a flashlight and use your sense of smell. Protect yourself at all costs. Pay attention, because the pre-game show is over. As I pack the final items, I worry because this is the first guided tour I have ever taken of the wilderness, I might bring the wrong drinks, or the wrong kind of soap. It's a mediated experience of the wilderness, not my first. But my first like this. I usually go into the wilderness alone or with a disciple. It's easier that way. If I screw up, I suffer the consequences (my poor disciple). I hope I'll know what to look at, when to take a picture. I have the perfect luggage and a purple shirt -- so I think I'll be ok.
As my father always said in every case when things were uncomfortable, "It's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick." Hopefully, the river gods will be benevolent. Maybe, later I'll have a good story to tell.

I'll see you on the other side.