From the Bottom Up: Post 2

Packing Up My Courage. T Minus 10 Weeks to launch.

I received the list of what I’m supposed to pack for my upcoming 14-day, 225-mile, rafting-hiking-photography adventure.

Photograph from Bright Angel Trail on my first trip to the canyon in 2013.

(If you want background information on how I settled on this ridiculous and fabulous travel plan, see my post dated February 1.)

Twenty articles of clothing are listed. The recommended items range from a swimsuit to wool socks. Most everything has the caveat “fast drying” in the description. A hat with a “retention strap” is on the list, as is a Gore-Tex rain suit for “when going through the rapids”.

For context on how I might feel about the need for fast-drying, strapped-on clothing, the trip application included the question, “What is your goal for the trip?” to which I answered, “To stay in the boat.”

The personal hygiene list contains adult-size wet wipes “for bathing”, insect repellent, and Mom’s Stuff All Purpose Piñon Salve, a product I had never heard of and which I now know contains “antibacterial and anti-fungal” ingredients and is safe to use “even on animals.” I don’t even know what to think about that.

I’m beginning to see why this list is not provided until one pays the non-refundable trip fee in full.

On a brighter note, I have started to break in my snazzy hiking shoes pictured here:

My new hiking shoes before undergoing any actual hiking.

I still need at least one, or better yet, two pairs of river shoes, aka shoes that can get very wet. An extra pair is recommended in order to alternate which inevitable blisters are aggravated by which shoes on any given day. My experience thus far with the footwear I’ve been sampling is that the comfort level is in exact opposite proportion to the fashion statement I’ll be making.

Here I am with some of my purchases: a “small” backpack, sunhat with aforementioned retention strap, hiking poles, gloves for hauling gear and doing something with ropes, a waterproof river guide/map, which I hope is for enjoyment and not actually mapping on my part, and two headlamps which you can’s see very well in this photo but that are hanging from my right arm. (They will be needed for my one or two minimum middle-of-the-night visits to the loo, which I’m trying not to think about.)

I’ve spent quite a bit of time shopping for camping pillows. I’ve narrowed it down to a couple, including the following luxury option. On the REI page (nothing against REI, which I love), this pillow—pictured below—is described as “plush”, and is said to provide “homelike sleeping comfort”. Additionally, the down layer is “quiet and comfortable”. Since when does a pillow's selling feature include “quiet”? And whose home sleeping resembles anything remotely close to this? (I have four goose-down king-size pillows on my bed.)

Even as I make light of this trip, I’m well aware that there’s nothing funny about the real reason I’ve decided to go.

There’s no doubt I am significantly past the halfway point of my life. I measure the quality of my life in large part by how good I feel physically and how active I am. I have a friend who counts how many “good” summers she thinks she has left. When you think of it like that, you know you don’t have time to waste.

I started writing my first novel—something I always wanted to do—while I was undergoing chemotherapy for non-Hodgkin lymphoma. I was 57-years-old and it was the first time in my life that I was seriously ill or injured. At my worst, I could barely walk a block without having to turn around and lie down again.

The day I got my cancer diagnosis. I got the call while on a ski vacation.

Five weeks later, after I lost my hair.

That’s why I wrote the book, and that’s why I signed up for this trip. I want to lie at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, look up at the night sky, and be completely dazzled, just as Cyd, my protagonist, did in the book.

I didn’t intend it this way, but as it turns out, I wrote it, and now I’m going to live it, rather than the other way around. I had been to the Grand Canyon twice before I started the book, and I had hiked part of the way to the river. But I had not gone all the way to Phantom Ranch, nor had I spent a night at the bottom of the canyon.

Now, after one serendipitous thing leading to another, I find myself planning to go back almost on a whim (like Cyd), with a group of strangers (like Cyd), all the way to the bottom (like Cyd). And, like Cyd, I am processing a major upheaval in my life, one that occurred after I finished writing the book. It all feels very strange and compelling. The Law of Attraction in living color.

As I continue to make my way down the travel list and gather the items necessary for a safe and (hopefully) comfortable time in the canyon, I find myself drawn back to the time when I couldn’t see much beyond the next doctor’s appointment. I remind myself that I’ve endured a lot more than a few painful blisters or sleeping on the ground without a pillow. I reflect on my resilience and recount my blessings. I am determined to check items off a different list; the list that contains those scary, difficult, outrageous, or even frivolous things that I want to do for myself, for whatever reason, while I still can.

Thank you, as always, for being here. Remember. . .

Life is short. Read fast.

From one lover of the written word to another,

With love,

Jayne

BOTTOM OF THE BREATH, Winner 2025 Best Book Award in Fiction: Women’s Fiction

Coming July 8, 2025! IT’S HERE!! Bottom of the Breath is the story of a woman catapulted from her tranquil life on the Florida panhandle onto a cross-country road trip with her recently estranged husband. She must outrun a hurricane, digest a shocking, decades-old family secret, and come to terms with her own pain-filled past. Laced with mysticism and set among the majesty of Sedona and the Grand Canyon, the novel explores the power of friendship, the importance of forgiveness, and the vital need to create a future that embraces the past.