Tag: Chuck Stith

My Rules

On this trip to Snowbird, our hideaway in the mountains of North Carolina, Brother Pop and I were alone, headed for the cabin in his Ford Ranger pickup.

He had tried several times to get his truck to go into four-wheel drive but it just wouldn’t go. That was OK at first.  But when we got to Big Rock, a little over half a mile from the cabin, he should have just parked it. It had been raining some and when that hill got the least bit wet it was so slick you had to have a four-wheel drive.  That’s all there was to it.

But Pop was determined to drive his truck to the cabin, so he tried again and again to get up the hill.  And the more he tried, the madder he got.  His tires were smoking, and so was he.  I got out, away from his truck, away from him.

Pop kept on trying.  He floor-boarded it.  His tires were screaming.  I just about couldn’t see his truck anymore,  hidden in a  puff of blue smoke coming off his rear tires.

Chuck, top, and Mike Stith
Chuck, top, and Mike Stith

Finally, finally, he gave up and we went on the cabin riding double on an ATV.   Pop didn’t like leaving his truck at Big Rock, not one bit.  He took it personally . He said when his boys, Chuck and Mike, got there that truck was coming up the hill. He made it sound like they were going to beat his truck senseless with a tire tool and drag it up the hill if they had to.

His sons and a couple friends got there the next day and ran into one of my sons, Mark, on the way up.  Mark is the one who got in the Pop’s truck and drove it up the hill to the dam, just below the cabin. Not taking anything away from Mark, but the road had pretty much dried out.  

Lucky for Mark he stopped at the dam and got out to check out the pond and Mike got behind the wheel, only about 50 yards and one enormous mud hole from the cabin. 

He didn’t make it.

Back and forth Mike drove that truck through that mud hole. He would drive it up the hill, guys pushing, tires spinning, slinging mud everywhere, almost there but not quite.  And when the truck could go no further it would slide backwards, back into that mud hole.

On one of those slides back down Mike opened the driver’s door so he could stick his head out and see better. But he was too close to a tree and when the truck slid by the tree it caught the driver’s door and bent it backwards.

Bummer!

Anyway, they finally got the truck out of the mud and up that last little hill and Mike parked it at the cabin. A couple of them pushed on driver’s door, bent it back around, until they finally got it to shut.  While they worked to close to door Chuck told me one of their family rules, a rule that he said applied to situations like that.

What’s the rule? I asked.

“If you’re gonna be dumb, you gotta be tough,” Chuck said.

The Rules
The Rules

Here are my Top Ten.

  1. Never lie to yourself.
  2. Half measures avail nothing.
  3. It’s an ill wind that blows no good.
  4. Sooner or later you get to be known for what you are.
  5. The harder you work the luckier you get.*
  6. If you’re gonna be dumb, you’ve got to be tough.
  7. Never bet another man’s game.*
  8. You never get paid for more than you do until you get caught doing more than you get paid for.*
  9. Get an “est” after your name.*
  10. Pee on problems before you have to call the fire department.* 

*These were Dad’s rules

Postscript:  Was Pop mad about that door? Not at all. He wanted his truck on top of the hill, Mike put it there, and that’s all that mattered.

Coming Monday: Payback

Lost On Blood Mountain – Part 2 of 2

It’s hard to appreciate how black total darkness is because we so rarely experience it. There’s always a little light somewhere, if only from the face of a digital clock. So I was surprised when my cap light died on Blood Mountain and I couldn’t see anything. It was as if I were standing in a closet at night with my eyes closed and the door shut — wearing a blindfold.

I dug into my pocket and pulled out a cigarette lighter.  But it wouldn’t light.  I discovered later that the flint was wet. 

That’s when I told myself: You make one more mistake –if one more thing goes wrong –you’re not going to Maine.  You’re not going home, either.

I had a spare cigarette lighter in my tool bag.   Now if I could just find it in the dark and coax my fingers, which were freezing and not working all that well, to make fire.   I fumbled through my pack and, somehow, I did find it. I shielded the lighter from the wind and got fire.  With that light I was able to replace the batteries in my cap light.  Now I was back in business.  I put the cap light back in my mouth and, in a few minutes, I had my tent up and I was inside, in my sleeping bag, starting to get warm.  Outside it was still sleeting.

Did I pray any that night when I was lost on Blood Mountain? Oh yes, without ceasing.

This photo was made at Nell Gap two days later, after the storm passed.
This photo was made at Neel Gap two days later, after the storm passed.

There was light coming through my tent when I woke up next morning. It was 6:40 a.m. Time to move. I had to get off that mountain.

Everything was frozen.   I could not open or close zippers.   My tent was frozen to the ground cover and the ground cover was frozen to the ground. I peeled them off. The joints of my tent frame were frozen.  I huffed and puffed warm breath on each joint, warming them up enough to pull them apart.

Worst of all, I had left my wet mittens outside and they were frozen. I should have slept with them.  The frozen mittens were a major problem. Unprotected in that kind of weather your fingers freeze in a few minutes and then they stop working.

I couldn’t just put my hands in my jacket pockets because I couldn’t hike on ice without using my poles.  So I stuck my frozen mittens under my shirt, next to my stomach, to melt the ice enough to get them on.

My plan was to walk down the Freeman Trail until I found the A.T. or I found civilization. No more turning back. I jammed my frozen gear in my backpack, strapped it on, and headed down the mountain.

It was slow going on the ice but, two hours later, there it was, a beautiful white blaze.  I had intersected the Appalachian Trail.   In another 45 minutes, I could see the roof of Mountain Crossings hostel through the ice laden trees.  What a beautiful sight! Warmth, food, safety.

NOTE: I got frostbite on two fingers, a thumb, and one of my ears but the sores healed in a few days.  The feeling returned to my fingers in a month or two and over the past two years part of the feeling has returned to my toes.

Postscript:

That's me, sitting by the fire the next day.
That’s me, sitting by a fire the next day in an outfitter store adjacent to the hostel.

I stayed at Mountain Crossings for two and a half days with seven other A.T. thru-hikers, waiting out a terrific winter storm and zero degree temperatures. I was glad to be indoors, but the hostel was not the toasty refuge I had imagined it would be.

It was cold inside the hostel.

How cold? So cold I wore a toboggan when I took a shower.

Nah, I made that up.

But how about this: the water in the dog’s bowl froze. No, the bowl wasn’t on the porch. The bowl was sitting on the “living room” floor of the hostel. And, no, I didn’t make that up.

Coming Monday: Take Her or Leave Her