The Clam-Chowdery-Misty-Soupy-Morning

Day 2
Miles 11
Sophie whacked her ankle on the picnic table first thing. Look at the lights of Reno! she said. And we didn’t know if it really was Reno or not but they were beautiful in the dawn.
The mist flying over the ridge looked like smoke and I posted on Facebook but everyone confirmed that it was nothing and pretty soon we were hiking through it and it was cold and crazy blowy and even the trees knew this was normal with their branches only growing on one side. But we didn’t think it was normal. We were exhilirated and flushed with joy and cold and windburn and our hands gripped our phones, taking photos when the sun peeked through with breathtaking glimpses of Marlette Lake before it was all lost in this clam-chowdery-misty-soupy-morning once again.
Young moss littered the ground, having fallen from trees much older and wiser than me. And the forest smelled rich and the packed pine needles under our feet made a hollow sound and the goats trotted along trot-trot-trot and all was well.
Every person said some version of I’ve-never-seen-goats-out-here-before! Where’d ya get ’em? I need one of those for myself. Can I take a picture? And it was all good fun and everyone’s eyes twinkled and I was so happy to see that we’d created such happiness in people. And Sohie was like, let’s just go – haven’t you ever seen a goat before?
The pinecones were tiny and Bosco was slow around mile 8. Mile 9 was tough for him. Mile 10 was like pulling in seaweed on a trout line.
Mile 11 and we were at a creek. All the boys drank and drank and drank cool, clean water and then we backtracked to a wide campspot just big enough for the six of us and our electric fence.
I didn’t feel good and Sophie’s ankle was swollen. I’m going to eat until I feel better, I announced.
And I mixed up a curry powder mix with a pouch of chicken and dumped it into a medley of dehydrated veggies I’d dumped into a pot of boiling water. Then I ate a bag of chips and a packet of gluten free fig bars and some fruit snacks and two bottles of water with nuun tablets and some granola cereal and some other stuff.
But I didn’t feel any better.
But I did stop eating.