I flipped through the pages, thouroughly enjoying myself, when I at last got to one of my favorite sections: the "Adventure Grid". This is where Backpacker Magazine creatively plots something onto a nice grid. I love this section because I am a nerd... and I love the collision between the hiking world and math world. This week's Adventure Grid was called, "Things that Kill: What should you worry about on your next hike? Here is a handy analysis"
On the Vertical Axis was a scale from most dangerous to least dangerous. On the horizontal axis was a scale from most likely to least likely. Need an example? "Falling" scored a 13 out of 13 for most dangerous and most likely because, "its the leading cause of deaths in the mountains." Wolves on the other hand get a 13 for least likely and a 13 for least dangerous because they almost never attack humans.
I was enjoying the grid as usual, when I saw something that literally made me laugh out loud. Tucked in scoring a 12 out of 13 for least likely and a 9 out of 13 for most dangerous was none other than FALLING TREES!
If you are wondering why I think this is funny, its because this has happened to me. This past August in the Adirondacks we were at our last campsite of our 3 day backpacking trip when this theoretically unlikely event happened to us. Our neighbor was showing us (enthusiastically) his cool Hennessy Hammock... Alex, Tim, Kari, and I were politely listening to him. He then demonstrated how to get into the hammock. He jumped in, saying "don't worry, you will not fall!" and all of a sudden we heard a huge snap and the sizable tree it was attached to came crashing down toward us.
My friend Kari and I got hit dead on. I ended up with a nasty bruise on my leg and she got a nice goose egg on her forehead. We spent the rest of the night in shock after it happened. The nights conversations consisted of us sitting around saying things like, "can you believe that really just happened to us?" or "That could have been so bad!"
We were counting our blessings when we got to walk away relatively unscathed. And I loved recalling the adventure tonight as I was reading the "Adventure Grid"
And now it's quite the conversations starter.
"hey, how was your summer?"
"It was great, I got hit in the head by a tree"
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| Kari and I with the tree we will never forget |
