Lighting My Path
I think I have finally narrowed down the source of my weird energy. I mean it can’t be coincidence that strange things always happen to me. Thus, I have decided that the first step to recovery is to admit I have a problem.
So….I was struck by lightening when I was 19.
This electrifying tale begins at 4 am one lovely fall morning in Colorado Springs. There used to be an annual hike up Pikes Peak in association with a car race. Pikes Peak is a peak in the Rocky Mountain range that has an elevation of 14,115 feet. A view from this lofty peak inspired the writing of the line in “America the Beautiful” – “For purple mountain majesties…”
A community service organization I worked with was looking for volunteers to help with hike. They were in need of physically fit people, with some medical knowledge who were willing to hike up the mountain and keep an eye on the hikers, particularly those from out of town who were especially susceptible to altitude sickness. Apparently people came from all over the country to be part of this event. Eye ball – check, willing to volunteer – check, medical knowledge – check, physically fit – well…kind of but even less so after I finished the hike.
At the awful assigned time of 4 am, I arrived at the base camp to orient myself to the route, the check-in points, and any other safety features I needed to know. My first job was to meander along the initial three mile stretch and watch for those who had no business being on the mountain and make sure they made it back down via the trail or a ride from the first check point. The first person I removed from the event was a man who just had two toes amputated the week before, but didn’t want to miss the event. I’m not really sure what he was thinking.
After the first couple hours, my assignment was to slowly walk the next six miles and make sure no one wandered off the trail or needed any aid. Since I was slowly walking the entire time, I had no problems with the climb. I somehow was nominated to be the last hiker off the mountain. This entailed making sure no one was lost, hurt, or unaccounted for. The last check station is three miles before the summit. So once I reached that point, I waited until everyone on the list had passed and I brought up the rear.
Little side note – Colorado Springs used to have very predictable weather in the spring and fall. Hot during the day, a refreshing thunderstorm in the afternoon, and then clear in the evening. These thunderstorms always included lots of lightening and thunder. So our goal was to have everyone finished with the hike before this lovely weather phenomena began.
The last person to reach the final checkpoint was a gal from Ohio who was moving pretty slowly. Several of us evaluated her and with her enthusiasm and determination, we decided she was good to go. So I began hiking with her. Just another fun interesting side note – the last three miles of the hike are all above timberline. As we progress up the trail, she gets slower and slower and I notice the clouds getting closer and closer. I encourage her to pick up the speed but that made her short of breath. She’d walk twenty steps, and stop to rest. I knew it was twenty because I was counting. I was getting pretty concerned. In the distance, I could see the lightening begin to dance across the sky.
But lo and behold, we make it to the top just as a light sprinkle of rain begins. I was so excited we beat the storm. And you thought I was going to get struck by lightening…hahaha…oh wait, I did.
The crew is sitting in the summit house enjoying a little hot cocoa. I’m pretty tired so my ride down the mountain tells me to get in the truck, relax and they will take me down shortly. By this time it is thundering, lightening, and raining. Mind you; I had loved storms up to this point. So I casually walk across the empty parking lot, like a beautiful lightening rod waiting for my special beam of energy. Seriously, I was the tallest thing in the parking lot and this guy was parked way at the back. I will never forget the feeling I had right before being lit up. This crazy static energy swept up my body. The hair on the back of my neck was actually standing up and my fingertips were tingling. Next thing I knew I was laying on my back and everyone was standing around me.
Reputedly I was walking along when my friends saw me get struck by lightening and thrown about 12 feet. As I was regaining consciousness, all I heard was ringing. I saw their mouths moving but couldn’t get a grip around what they were saying. And boy did my head hurt. They all seemed so panicked. But I really couldn’t process what was going on. Finally I tried to sit up and reassure everyone I was okay. Yeah, my body didn’t real want to cooperate. Now, you might wonder why no one called an ambulance. The road to the summit is 19 miles, with 150 or so turns, that takes an average person 2-3 hours to ascend. So they just figured they would drive me down.
Once my senses returned I insisted that I was okay. I just wanted to get off the mountain. As a poor college student, I didn’t have insurance and could not afford an ER visit. After bargaining with my driver, he agreed that if I seemed fine when we got to the bottom he wouldn’t make me go to the hospital.
You may be thinking that I wasn’t actually struck by lightening because I wasn’t burned. That is a possibility, but did you know that brain injuries are more common than burns from lightening strikes? Things are starting to make a lot more sense now, right? All my crazy blog posts stem from this one incident long, long ago on a mountain far, far away. And I thought the only thing that was damaged was my hearing. Even to this day, I am very hard of hearing. Combine that with my mythical ability to bring disaster to every day situations and all my misadventures really start to make sense. Everyone thinks I fake my deafness to ignore them. Well, I’m not saying I don’t use it to my advantage, but really, I was struck by lightening.
And that, my friends, is the tale of how I went from a sweet, healthy college student to a crabby, hard of hearing enigma. But I learned if I can survive that, I could survive anything!
