In the heat of August, with no solo journeys planned for this year, I’ve been immersed in memories of a past trip. What has brought it to mind is remembering my “Beta Reader,” Mattie Belle who passed away one year ago. I’d made a promise to her that I would “keep writing” as she’d directed; she wanted me to finish the sequel to my memoir, He Heard My Voice, which she’d read and shared with her book circle at Holly Springs Baptist Church. I’ve been working on that sequel and now I’m into the rewrite of a chapter about a journey to Colorado.

In January of that year– 2013, I was feeling restless. I was working as a school nurse and I often felt that way after the holidays, when we had that long stretch until Spring Break. During the first semester of that year, our family had spent a lot of time helping Mama in her move to Parkview and then cleaning out her house for rental; both things had been physically and emotionally tiring. By the end of January, I typically started daydreaming about where to go during our two-month break in the summer. A plan would slowly emerge and I’d start to make reservations for late June or July.

But my restlessness that January was different from usual; I felt a push to go before the summer. There was an urge that wouldn’t let up that I needed time away for a solo journey. I started exploring where to go, what I wanted and needed to do. At that time, I’d completed my memoir and had taken it to a couple of summer writing conferences in the Southeast to “pitch” to literary agents. What if I went to a different conference in a different part of the country, I thought, as my head buzzed with ideas.

I looked up agents that represented my genre of inspirational memoir. One woman, whom I’d heard positive things about, lived in Colorado. I saw that she often attended the Pike’s Peak Writers’ Conference held yearly in Colorado Springs. That conference would be April 18 -20th and would offer lots of good workshops. The timing wasn’t great, coming right after our spring break the first week of April. My principal may have a hard time approving my leave so soon after the break. But maybe if it’s something educational, she’ll have a harder time saying no, I reasoned.

She approved my request and the plan for my trip came together. I’d have a combination of visiting friends, exploring Colorado Springs during my solo days, and then ending with the three-day conference.

I’d taken great care, I thought, with planning each leg of that journey. A friend from graduate school, Brenda would pick me up at the Denver airport and drive us north to Ft. Collins for the weekend. In the heat and humidity of the past week, I remembered how great that cool weather felt walking out of the airport; the air had been warm and pollen-filled when I left North Carolina. Brenda and her husband took me up to the Rocky Mountain National Park that Saturday.

When I was planning my trip out west, I remembered how I’d had some problem with altitude two years before in Wyoming. Remembering that, the week I left I’d started drinking more fluid and limited my alcohol consumption– thinking that would be enough. When I developed a headache as we climbed into the higher elevations in Estes Park on Saturday, I blamed it on the time change and not sleeping well the night before.

On Sunday, I drove my rental car south to Colorado Springs. I’d booked a room at Old Town Guest House in Old Colorado City. That would be my ‘base camp’ until I switched to the conference hotel on Thursday morning.

On Monday, I explored the area–including a walk at the Garden of the Gods. Even though the park was flat, with very few hilly areas, I became easily winded; I’d forgotten that even with being in good shape, often walking fast at home, I’d gone from an altitude of almost 300 feet above sea level to 6,000 feet. I would later read that the “high altitude zone” ranges from 4900 – 11, 500 feet and travel to that zone could lead to medical problems.

On Tuesday, thinking I was fine and adjusting to my new surroundings, I signed on for a challenge; I bought a ticket to ride the Cog Rail to the summit of Pike’s Peak. While I don’t like heights, I would be safely encased in that car and wouldn’t need to drive myself, navigating the dizzying switchbacks. The sign by the train said it would not be able to go to the summit at 14,000 feet due to high winds; we’d only get to 11,500 feet. That’s good, I thought, assuming it would be easier with not as steep of an ascension. I didn’t read until later, how you have to slowly increase in altitude–over days.

My trip to the stopping point at Pike’s Peak didn’t go well. I developed acute altitude sickness.

I spent the rest of that day and the next in bed, going between naps and preparing for the conference. I wasn’t my best when I arrived at the conference, but I was determined to accomplish what I’d set out to do. I had a successful pitch session that Saturday morning and an agent took my memoir to review. Tired and feeling hopeful, I returned home to N.C., so thankful to be back closer to sea level. That trip was a pick-me-up in the last leg of the school year. While I’d made lots of mistakes with that journey, which I’ll expound upon in the sequel, I didn’t regret my decision to go. In fact, I later realized the reason that urge may have been planted inside.

My final day of the school year, I got a call from my younger sister, Peggy. Our mother was in the hospital emergency room and had been diagnosed with acute diverticulitis. She was the sickest we’d ever seen her and ended up in the hospital and then the rehab center for most of the summer. When I sat by her bed, those long hours watching her sleep and praying she’d recover, I realized that if I’d taken my solo journey at the usual time, I would have been called home; amazingly that had never happened in all the years I’d taken those trips.

When I started feeling worn down that summer, I thought back to that invigorating cold of Colorado. I could see the beauty of the orange rock forms at the Garden of the Gods and remember the support of the Guest House staff when I was feeling so bad so far from home. I still waited to hear back from the agent who was reviewing my book, and drove home from the hospital to check my mailbox for her response.

There were plenty of mistakes I made when planning that trip. But the thing that wasn’t a mistake was trusting that push, that intuitive knowing that I had to go.

The timing had to be different that year. In January, I couldn’t see that I would be spending my summer break by Mama’s bedside. Since I didn’t lose my trip, my solo journey that I’d come to cherish, I was more able to be present for my mother. While she slept and I drifted in and out of hospital consciousness, I could see and hear the people and places that had been in my path in Colorado. I was grateful for those days and how I’d made a step forward in trusting that voice within me, that inter-knowing that only you can validate.

Best to you in following the Push that comes to you,

Connie

Still remember the kindness of the owner/chef at the Guest House. Just read my journal notes and saw that he’d made “coconut and banana pancakes with cheesy sausage.” What was even sweeter, was he scraped the ice from my windshield the morning before I left. The kindness of that “stranger” was so appreciated when I was still feeling weak from the altitude sickness.