Inktober 25: #Dangerous
Lightning. Hail. Sushi.
One summer day Lou Alice and I hiked up Grizzly Peak in Colorado, well over 13,000 feet above sea level. When you’re hiking above the treeline, people warn you to be sure to be off the mountain by early afternoon, since #dangerous thunderstorms can pop up unexpectedly. We got off to a late start that day, and we were a long way from safety when an afternoon thunderstorm blew up.
I have heard that more people get killed by lightning in Colorado than in Florida. I’m not sure that’s true (how could it be true?) but I was definitely thinking about it as we tried to run back. However, when your lungs are used to breathing at 550 feet above sea level, you can't run at 13,000 feet above sea level. There were a couple of very close and terrifying lightning strikes. I thought what an idiot I was going to feel if I got killed by lightning after everything I had heard about starting early and getting off the mountain in a timely manner.
To cut a long story short, we survived the hike. As we made the last descent, within sight of our car in the trailhead parking lot, a 30-second burst of hail clattered on our heads, as if the mountain were saying, “...And stay out!”
By the time we got back to town, we were good and hungry. Near the edge of town there was a strip mall. In the strip mall there was a sushi place. And in the window of the sushi place there was a poster that read ALL SUSHI 40% OFF!!!
I know what you’re thinking:
A) Except possibly for the steppes of Eurasia, no place on earth is farther away from fresh seafood than the Rocky Mountains, and
B) 40%-off sushi?! Gross.
But on the other hand,
A) Sushi sounded good after a day of high-altitude hiking, and
B) When you have faced death and come out the other side, your sense of what constitutes risky behavior gets a little skewed. I’m not saying we had become adrenaline junkies, but we were perhaps more willing than usual to live on the edge.
So we had the 40%-off Colorado sushi. And you know what? It wasn’t half bad. It wasn’t even 40% bad.