Travel At Your Own Risk 

The clouds were an ominous black that matched my spirits as we drove straight into the storm toward our destination in the Sawtooth Mountains.  Our family loves camping and spending time outdoors and while we often camp just our immediate family, we also enjoy experiencing the outdoors with good friends. For Memorial Day weekend we attempted to plan our annual camping trip, which we typically take with friends, but because of schedules, weather and sickness, we found ourselves all on our own.  We headed into the mountains from the south and on our drive we encountered fierce, accumulating hail, relentless rain, and howling winds.  But we Stobies are not scaredy-cats so we just kept driving deeper into the mountains. At the summit, the clouds began to disperse and bright sunshine illuminated the mountains in front of us.  We breathed in a sigh of relief just about the time we noticed the large road blockade ahead. We paused for a moment at the sign reading "Travel at your Own Risk," made eye contact, exchanged smiles, shrugged our shoulders and said "why not?"  We drove through flooded areas, past snow banks and eventually found a beautiful spot on a creek, ribboned with snow. The sun came out the next day and it was warm enough that the girls put on their suits, walked over the snow banks and played in the river. We rested, relaxed, and I tried to pretend my heart didn't hurt that no one wanted to come with us.  

In reality it was more that friends couldn’t come with us but after a long, hard season of having deep relationship seemingly torn away from us, the story I wrote in my head read more of conscious rejection than it did of circumstantial hiccups and tangible hindrances.  There have been valleys in the course of the last few years where I've wanted to quit at relationship all together because it can be so hard and this trip certainly fit the pattern. 

In the sunshine of that first day I worked hard to bury that hurt deep down and slapped on the label of “putting on my big girl pants and brave face” and I decided that as a family we can do anything as long as we are together and we certainly don't need anyone else.  By golly, I love us and us is all we need.  Because we all think it is just that easy. Turning off the hurt like a burner on a gas stove. 

The trouble is that when we turn off our feelings, we also turn off the fuel that ignites our soul to love.  The irony of how many times I thought I have *learned* and subsequently forgotten that truth is not lost on me.  

God has a kind, but funny, sense of humor. Our second day in camp, we drove deeper into the mountains looking for a hike and came across a marshy-looking meadow. We started the cautious drive through and Joel made the decision to not go any further lest we get stuck. Our tires sank simultaneously with his words, “I’m calling it.”

Slowly we opened our doors and exited the truck, feet sinking and shoes sticking in the thick mud.  Not too alarmed as it was early in the afternoon, we carried the girls to hard soil and assigned them the tedious task of collecting sticks for tire traction and support.  Joel started digging out the tires.   We worked side-by-side for a while, occasionally attempted to rock the truck out, and talked about how we could hike back a couple miles to where we spotted the last campers.

The sound of ATVs  broke our conversation.  Four friendly faces paused and offered to help.  After many failed attempts, and truck tires deepening in the mud, the friendly faces offered to go for even more help. 

A half hour later, another vehicle, this time a very large, heavy truck appeared on the scene and within moments of attaching the towrope, the large truck popped us right out of the thick mud.

We stood in that serene meadow, engines off, talking, laughing and finding a community we didn’t even know we needed.  We found hope and the start of healing we didn’t know we needed either.  That night, we tracked down our rescuers and gave what simple offering we could find – the last half of a bottle of homemade Kahlua; a token of friendship, gratitude and encouragement to them to keep pressing in and towing people out when they need it. Because we were aware of just how much we needed it.

As our rescuers drove out the next day, the sound of their friendly honk and the sight of waving hands bid us farewell and Joel called out to me, “Hey, you made friends!”

I’d like to say I was perfectly healed that day. Alas, there have been many more tears since then, but a lesson was learned I will carry with me forever.  God humbly whispered to our hearts, "You can't do this alone. You need community no matter how hard it can be." It may be risky, but there is hope and love found only in the adventure. It is always worth the pain you must press through.

We need community. But in order to find it, sometimes we have to drive right on by that safety sign, all the red flags waving in our hearts, and take a risk.

We have to choose to travel at our own risk. And a risk it is indeed.  The reality is that in life, we will get stuck in the mud, definitely more than a time or two.  Rather than hiding at home, disguising the hurt as bravery, we have to choose to actually do the raw, hard, vulnerable thing and travel outside our comfort zone.  We have to choose to blow right past that orange and white barricade that reads, “Travel at Your Own Risk.”

Do it. It’s worth it.