Free Backwater by Joan Bauer

around the stove. Even though we had some water left, she told me to light up the small gas stove and start melting snow for drinking water. This was trickier than it sounded, beginning with getting the stove to light. My hands were freezing and pumping canned gas into the stove tank to light was close to impossible. When I finally got a flame, it took three pots of melted snow to get a half glass of water and when I complained about it, I got another of Mountain Mama’s outdoor precepts for living.
    “The wilderness teaches patience, Breedlove.”
    I massaged my half-raw fingers and said I’d noticed that. Then I “established” the latrine, which is a nice way of saying I found a windless place where we could go to the bathroom and bury our labors deep in the frozen terrain—the buryingpart required an ice pick. Going to the bathroom outside in the middle of winter makes you think about life in a new way.
    I was sick of being cold. Mountain Mama pulled out a slab of deer jerky, sliced off a hunk with her knife, threw it to me. I held it, recalling Bambi. But hunger rules all. My stomach growled. I ripped the jerky apart with my terrifying teeth. It was good, salty.
    Bye-bye Bambi.
    “I give that young man real credit for facing his weaknesses,” Mountain Mama said.
    “I hope his teachers do.”
    “The wilderness has a way of separating people, Breedlove. It’s a life that demands two things of everyone: toughness and truth.”
    She sliced another hunk of jerky.
    “I guess you’ve seen a lot of people who can handle it and who can’t.”
    “I’ve seen my share.” Mountain Mama looked off sternly into the distance. “I’ll tell you what frosts my shorts, Breedlove. It’s when smart, strong women convince themselves they’re not tough enough to try.”
    I made a mental note to not do that in her presence.
    Mama wiped her knife blade with a rag. “My mother was afraid of adventure. My father and I would go off on climbs and she’d sit home. We’d come back and tell her she could do it, too—she could climb a mountain, pitch a tent and listen to the forest sing her to sleep. Pop and I would tell our stories about the bears we’d seen or the coyotes we’d heard howland my mother would get angry that we’d gone, angrier still that we’d enjoyed ourselves, and downright hostile that we loved something she thought was stupid. She left us because of it.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “Life is tough, Breedlove.”
    “I know, but that had to be so hard for you.”
    “I’ll tell you what. I vowed to not let women give up like she did. There’s more wilderness in most women than anyone realizes.”
    She spat in the snow.
    “Are you going to say that in your book?”
    “I’m going to shout it.”
    Mountain Mama slapped more jerky in my glove, marched to her pack, and started unfolding the tent.
    “Let me help, Mama.”
    She waved me off.
    I guess everyone’s got a deep hurt somewhere.
    I went over and helped her put up the tent anyway—pounded the special snow stakes deep into the ground. Mountain Mama said without snow stakes, a strong winter wind could send the tent sailing.
    I was cold and tired as we made the rice and beans and ate raisins and cheese.
    I thought we had night in the suburbs, but there’s always something you can see. In the mountains, night is serious. Everything is. I felt small and big at the same time.
    Mountain Mama told me about how her father took herhiking as soon as she could walk. She did her first solo overnight camp-out at eight years of age.
    “I just always loved it out here, Breedlove. Always felt more like myself than at any other moment.”
    “Why do you love it, Mama?”
    “It’s taught me to not be afraid of the unknown—that’s my definition of what makes a person free.”
    *    *    *
    I had trouble sleeping even though I was exhausted. It didn’t help that I had two bottles of drinking water in the bag with me—this kept the water from freezing.
    I