adventure week

I went backpacking with a ton of ninth graders for five days and nights. To say it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done would just sound dramatic.
My students and I had two outward bound instructors who had our week planned. One instructor used a pee rag, why waste toilet paper in the woods…. I guess. The only problem I had with it was she didn’t wash it until the end of the week and it stuck out of her back pocket all week and every time I saw it I wanted to throw up in my mouth.
My students did amazing! AMAZING! I couldn’t have more pride in my heart! They rocked the mountain and the sleeping under the tarps (they didn’t even get tents) and the cooking over the fire and the lack of showering. I actual wonder if I complained more then they did....oops!
My students got along so well…….maybe a little too well because a few decided that making out in the woods was a great way to help our crew get closer. “Spread peace not violence” was our goal for the week, the making-out sessions really helped them to reach that goal. Just kidding it wasn’t tons and tons of times, I promise I’m a good teacher and keep them under control....well most of the time!
Not showering for a week is intense…. Intense on so many levels. Intense for me cause I have white people’s hair and within two days it resembles more grease than anything else. On Friday I tried to get everyone to touch it cause it was the sickest thing EVER. It was intense for all of us cause we were so sweaty and smelly it’s a miracle no one passed out from being around us.
What an experience!!!!

Girls gone hiking

I grew up hiking. I started caring my own backpack when I was six. I learned then how a girl can pack light. Maybe that was really my parents’ reasons for taking their three daughters backpacking. A lesson we learned well: pack light when you’ll be caring it for miles and miles.
I love the outdoors, nature, peace, and being completely exhausted after a day of backpacking. My friends loved the outdoors. We had to, what else is there is do in Delaware. Don’t get me wrong I am Delaware’s biggest fan. I live in New York City now.
The woods have become something like a second home to me and I feel really comfortable there. Two of my friends and I set out to backpack a part of the AT sometime in November.
We set off. We got lost. It was late and we were tired so we set up our tent somewhere in the woods. We slept.
I pack light, too light I learned because it is essential to bring a mat when camping in November. I woke up blue and shaking. Honestly I don’t remember everything I was so cold I thought maybe I would never be warm again. I am a pretty rational girl but I am a summer girl and do not do well in cold. I get nervous when I feel like I am stuck somewhere.
“I’m going to the car, I need heat.” “Jes, you can’t go to the car because we are stuck out here because we got lost and you’ll never find the car now.” We are trapped. I am nervous. I hate being trapped.
I started to unzip the tent because I was convinced that I should get myself to some heat because I was beyond cold. Seriously how do people live in the cold? I can deal, and actually love New York 105 degree days, which actually feel like 115 because of humidity. The cold is just not me. My friend somehow convinced me getting lost out in the cold would be worst then shivering here in the tent. I’m not sure it would be worse.
So I am dying. I am sure this is the end. It’s been real. This is it. I will freeze to death. Just because I packed light. This really sucks. To me this is the worst way to go. I hate freezing. I hate feeling cold at all. This must be death.
I’m stuck, which makes me nervous, so if I don’t die from shaking and shivering I may give myself a heart attack from feeling completely out of control. I have issues. Who doesn’t?
I didn’t die. Somehow I managed the cold of November in Pennsylvania. I wonder who will play me in the movie.