Never Alone, page 4
By the time we finished the very important woods portion of the assessment—top secret, of course—it was clear I had the respect of the group. I also had two tanned rabbit furs, seven ticks I had to dig out of my belly and armpits, and a half-dried fish fillet. I still felt like the token weirdo, but also felt appreciated for it. Regardless, there were more than a few raised eyebrows as, unwilling to let perfectly good food go to waste, I spent the next two days moving that half-dried fillet around the manicured hotel lawn to get it dry enough to take home on my return flight.
On one of the final nights of boot camp, we had a watch party for the premiere episode of Alone Season 5: The Redemption Season, in which they brought back prior participants for a new challenge in Mongolia. We ate an absurd quantity of pizza, not sure whether our willingness to gorge ourselves to pack on weight for the show might be one of the “subtle tests” of boot camp. We collectively gasped in horror when Carleigh Fairchild, runner-up on Season 3 and favored to win Season 5, got a fishhook lodged in her hand and was unable to remove it. Had she had a multitool, she could have used the wire cutters and pliers to remove it. Without them, try as she might, removing the hook wasn’t happening.
Note to self: never go on Alone without a multitool.
There were clinking beers at the hotel bar and fond farewells all around on the last night, and hopes we’d see each other again in a few months, but there was no way to predict who would be on this adventure and who would sit on the sidelines. The importance of secrecy about our potential participation in the show had been drilled into us over the last week, and we’d all signed non-disclosure agreements. Technically, we weren’t even supposed to be in touch until the moment the lucky ten of us were reunited for the week or two of basecamp that precedes the launch into the wilderness.
Still, I felt good, very good, about my chances. My return trip home from boot camp had nothing of the nervousness of the trip there. I settled back into the plush gray upholstery of the uncomfortably small airplane seat, ginger ale and tiny napkin in hand, and heaved a huge, satisfied sigh. I was pretty sure I had this thing, and the adventure was on.
It has happened more than once that just as I feel like things couldn’t be better in my life, something shifts and sends it all into a tailspin. You’d think by this point I’d have learned to see it coming, but I was blessedly naive about the fact that I would have only a handful of days of relative calm before the storm hit.
7
High Gear
The second my feet hit my front steps back in California, I swung into gear. Plans, ideas, and questions for Alone were running on a constant reel in my head. It would be some time before I’d hear whether I was selected, but if I waited until I knew for sure, I’d have nowhere near enough time to prepare.
Gear selection would be crucial. Each participant would be issued camera equipment, a tarp to keep it protected, and some basic safety and first aid equipment. Beyond that, we could bring our own clothing, garments specified in a list we would be issued, and ten survival items—not a basic kit plus ten items of our choosing, ten total. Each basic necessity, like a sleeping bag or a pot to boil water, counted as one item.
And it wasn’t just any ten; it was ten from a list of sixty or so items. Rifle and ammunition weren’t an option, nor were a modern fishing rod and reel. The idea was to make survival out there possible, but very challenging. It wasn’t the ten items you would bring if you were actually packing for a long-term wilderness stay—more like the ten things you might have time to grab before the explosion if your bush plane suddenly crashed. With only these limited items, I would have to be creative to get my needs met.
My clothing choices would be nearly as critical as my ten items. Living outside in harsh conditions, your clothing is your home, just as your calorie intake is your furnace. The problem was that I had no idea yet where I would be headed.
“Think something between the British Columbia season and the Mongolia season,” we’d been told at boot camp.
There is a huge difference between those climates. bc is an extremely wet climate, and Mongolia an extremely dry one. Each dictates different wardrobe choices, and the right clothing could make the difference between a long and comfortable stay or a brief and miserable one. This left me with an enormous question. I would be living on my own in a harsh winter climate, likely underfed, where my life would depend on the quality of my gear. Should I do what doubtless everyone else would and buy the best modern gear I could afford? Or do what I’ve based my life and livelihood around and make handmade gear of natural materials?
The indecision was terrible—a constant hamster wheel of what ifs and worries whirred in my brain during the day and refused to release me at night. Early mornings found me tangled in my sheets, unrested, a notebook in hand, scribbling patterns and plans on paper I could barely see in the dim light, then scratching them out again.
There were several issues. Not knowing where I was headed, I didn’t know if the gear I could make would be suited for the climate. Buckskin is fabulous in dry cold—it’s quieter to move in and more comfortable than synthetics, and it breathes but also cuts the wind, unlike most wools. In wet cold, however, it’s like wearing a sopping sponge—nearly as bad as cotton.
Time was also at a premium. Handmaking high-quality clothing takes a great many hours. Time was already short, and it wasn’t just my clothing I needed to focus on; I also had my ten items to select and procure, and a variety of metabolic, physiological, physical, and skills training to do.
Amongst those furiously scribbled, early-morning notes was a whole regimen I developed for myself. I would do cold training, plunging myself into cold water regularly to build up my tolerance. I needed to build strength so I would be as fit as possible and still able to pull my bow, even under starvation-imposed weakness. Building my core muscles and flexibility meant I would be more agile and less injury prone, and with my history of joint issues and muscle pulls and tears, that would be essential.
I decided I’d let go of my intermittent fasting practice and instead go in and out of a strictly ketogenic diet a few times, to get my body used to the transition to ketosis—a metabolic state where the body burns fats instead of sugars for energy. Ketosis would be inevitable when I was living on a wild foods diet in an undisclosed northern locale.
Ketogenic diets are slimming though, so while I wanted to get used to living on one, I also needed to spend the summer packing on weight to bolster my calorie reserves, plus loading up on vital nutrients, to be flush with them before launch and thus better able to handle deprivation of key vitamins and minerals. The challenges of accomplishing all this, and doing it without causing any harm or injury, made my head swim. I knew I was going to need support for it, so I looked for both a personal trainer and a healing professional, to help me get fit while adding fat and to address my long-standing joint pain and shoulder issues.
I felt confident about most of my skills, but while I was capable and knowledgeable on the subject, I wasn’t a very experienced hunter, and passive hunting strategies were a definite weak spot for me. I had some primitive trapping knowledge after so many years in the ancestral skills scene, but very little hands-on experience and no experience at all with modern snaring and snare wire. So here was my dilemma: if I made my own gear, I would have less time for all the rest of my preparations, and almost none for skills practice.
Should I scrap the idea of making my own clothing altogether?
Though I believe in the value of natural materials, trusting them and my skills as a seamstress enough to have my life depend on them was a risk. And that was if I had plenty of time to make the clothing, which I didn’t. But this was an opportunity to truly put my skills to the test and to share them with the world. Was it worth it, even if it might shorten my stay?
One morning, many days into wrestling with this conundrum, I sat bolt upright in the dawn light and threw the covers off. The crux of it was this—what was the Alone experience actually about for me? Was it about “winning,” or about being true to myself and having the most authentic experience possible?
Thus far, this whole journey had felt out of my hands and magically dictated. Was this the time to compromise on what I believe?
No, I decided. Hell no, it wasn’t!
I would go as myself, representing what I love and living according to my values, or not at all. I would stop this endless questioning and commit to making as much of my clothing as possible.
After the epiphany and solid commitment to my truth, I took my first deep breath since I got home from boot camp. I felt settled down in my gut. This was right.
I scrambled in the bedside cabinet for a lighter and lit a beeswax taper. This time my notes were less chaotic, more grounded. I made sketches of a fur parka and hat, an oversized wool shirt with a hood, buckskin pants, and insulated buckskin overalls. I was just finishing a drawing of a handknit wool sweater when the pen started listing to one side and my posture sagged. I tossed the covers back over me, straightening out the twists and tangles, and let my fatigue overtake me. I lay down and got my first solid hours of deep, restful sleep in days.
When I woke up, I left a message for the personal trainer my former housemate had worked with, then called a chiropractor a friend of mine raved about and booked an appointment. Perfect!
8
A Punch in the Gut
Sitting in the chiropractor’s office later that week, though, it didn’t feel perfect. I was uncomfortable even before he started to give me the once over. The lighting was too dark for my taste, and the vinyl of the adjustment table was too cold.
Had he ever heard of electric light? Or cracking a window?
I shared my many concerns with him—chronic shoulder pain since my early twenties that occasionally became debilitating, a hip that got tweaked on a long trail run and bothered me for years after, a cramp in my calf that regularly threatened my morning jogs, and a persistent tightness in both Achilles tendons that made me hobble like an old woman for my first fifteen minutes out of bed in the morning.
“I’ve got some thoughts on all of this,” he said, in a mysterious way that did anything but put me at ease.
He looked at how my feet fell to the side when I lay on my back on his table and made some notes.
“Just as I suspected,” he said, more mysterious by the second. He grabbed my hand. “See how far I can extend your thumb here?”
“I’m pretty flexible all around,” I answered. “I do a lot of yoga.”
“Someone with your condition shouldn’t be doing yoga,” he said.
My condition?
He rubbed his dry palms over my arms. “You’ve got nice skin, too,” he said. “Do people mention how soft it is?”
How could he know that? “They do, actually. Why?”
“None of these are isolated occurrences,” he said. “They are part of a bigger pattern. It’s nothing to do with your lifestyle; it’s genetic.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“It’s called Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, which means your body can’t produce collagen protein. It makes you hyper-mobile and injury prone. Even small injuries result in scar tissue that lasts forever and creates bigger problems.”
I felt like he had punched me in the stomach. What was this man talking about? Suddenly there wasn’t enough air in the room—it was stuffy and hard to breathe.
“That can’t be right,” I said. “I’m healthier than most people I know, and very active and strong. Besides the shoulder, these injuries are just a recent phenomenon in the last couple of years.”
Were they though? A block of ice settled into my stomach. I thought back to the groin pull fifteen years ago that had crippled me for weeks. The time my back went out at a skills gathering, when I’d had to depend on people coming by my wall tent several times a day to hoist me up so I could pee into a jar. The cold winter mornings when my ex-husband had helped me dress because my shoulders were so stiff and painful I couldn’t lift my arms over my head.
“Yes,” he said, “but you’ll see, they’re cumulative. They show up more as people age, and don’t go away. Have you noticed anything else?”
“No,” I said, refusing to own up to the snowball of incidents coming together in my mind. “And I’ve just had a very complete physical. They assessed everything about my health—blood work, ekgs, the full gamut. Everything looked great, except that my lung volume tested a little low. They said it was nothing to worry about.”
“I’d bet that’s related too. It also affects organs. Probably scar tissue in your lungs.”
He looked down at my chart. “You’re pretty active, huh? How do you exercise?”
“I run, ride my bike, do high intensity interval training, and practice yoga.”
“You probably like yoga because it gives you a sense of satisfaction. It comes naturally to you because you’re more flexible than most people, but you shouldn’t do it. And stop running. Humans aren’t meant to run.”
This was totally counter to my understanding of physiology and human evolution. Plus, I love running—watching trail disappear beneath my feet feeds my soul.
“That doesn’t make sense,” I told him. “I thought humans evolved to run and be persistence hunters. I grew up around running culture. It’s in my blood. My dad ran 100-mile races my whole childhood.”
“And how did that go for him? Does he still run?”
Now condescension, too?
“Well, no, actually. He has foot, knee, and back problems. He can’t run anymore.”
“Exactly. It’s genetic, remember? He’s probably who you got it from. Stop doing yoga, and no running, high intensity, or high impact anything for you. Slow, gentle movements and strength training, that’s it. Otherwise, you’ll be crippled in a few years.”
I sat numbly as he taped my ankle to keep it from bending “unnaturally far.” I wanted to wince away from his touch, but I didn’t. I vacillated between feeling grateful to him for illuminating mysteries about my body and feeling like he was the enemy.
I was so stunned by the news I could barely feel my body as I walked down the carpeted stairs. Crippled?
I thought I would get a few adjustments to help my shoulders and hip, and now I had a life changing diagnosis. It wasn’t only the way I exercise that it affected, it was my entire life. I’m a hide-tanning instructor, a craftsperson, a farmer, and, and, and…Almost everything I do is physically demanding. Never run again? I would hate that, but I could manage it. But change everything about what I do and who I am? I couldn’t begin to wrap my brain around what that would look like.
And what about Alone? I was supposed to live in the wilderness by myself, hopefully for many months. It would doubtless be enormously strenuous. Should a person in my condition even consider such a thing?
I drove straight from his office to the library. My internet research revealed he was right—people with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome are fragile, injury prone, and at risk for organ failure. If too much scar tissue builds up in organs, they can suddenly burst with no warning.
Sitting in front of the glowing laptop in the hushed library, I had to remind myself my organs weren’t actually collapsing at this moment, they just felt like they were. Only yesterday I had thought I was so healthy, but now I feared walking back to my car without a cane.
9
The Fall
I had plans to go surf fishing with friends the day after the appointment, and damn it, I was going to do it anyway! But on the beach fighting the pounding waves, I tweaked my thumb while pulling in the line. The next day it was worse—sharp pain when I made a fist—confirming all my darkest fears.
He was right! One fishing trip and I can’t use my hand!
I wondered if I was becoming a hypochondriac. A day later my digestion was off. The “don’t wander too far from the bathroom” kind of off. I didn’t know if it was the stress, the adjustment to ketosis, or my condition.
Luckily the thumb improved quickly, and the boiling in my guts calmed down in a couple of days as well. I was still concerned, but I wasn’t letting it own me. I would get a second opinion. I would carry on with my Alone preparation plans.
I was pulling a tote of homespun yarn off of my storage shelves, ready to dive into knitting the first of two sweaters I had planned, when my voicemail alert beeped at me. The call was from my hometown area code, but not a number I recognized.
I reached for the landline to check my message.
Cold seized my belly at the sound of my mother’s voice, a hollow echo of her normal tones.
“Honey, I need you to give me a call right away. I did a stupid thing.”
My fingers shook as I dialed the strange number. Something was definitely not right. If she wasn’t calling from home, where was she calling from?
The nurse in her room answered. “Oh, you’re her daughter? I’ll put her right on.”
She had left the message from her room. Her room in the hospital, where she had been admitted the night before, the nurse explained, when she’d fallen off a ladder and crushed her leg.
Time slowed and I watched as a dust mote floated past my face and caught a ray of sunlight. No, no, no! I took a sharp inhale, working to control my panic. When my mom came to the phone her voice was faint and slurred with painkillers.
My mother is an avid kayaker. On full moons, she and her friends load up their gear and head to the Sierras for a moonlit evening paddle. It had been late when she pulled her kayak out of the lake. Exhausted, she chose to leave the van where it was, rather than drive to level ground to set up the step ladder she used to load her kayak. She’d gotten the boat onto the roof rack, but when she leaned out to grab a strap to secure it, the ladder tipped on the slanted and uneven ground and threw her.
