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My Soldier

The Definition of "Best Friend"

By Lovey McDonaldPublished 5 years ago 4 min read
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A life for a picture...

Have you ever been afraid, truly afraid of something? I don’t mean the jump up, adrenaline-pumping fear you get from a roller coaster or a scary movie. No, my fear is a true, bone-deep, tear gathering, loss of muscle control fear. It’s so pervasive, so much a phobia, that facing it can literally leave me in hysterical tears unable to move a single muscle. And yet, I have faced it; several times. I have faced it, and in facing it I have learned about trust and what I’m willing to do to get the perfect picture.

I am deathly afraid of heights, so afraid I can’t even climb a step ladder more than two feet off of the ground. I live with someone who is an adventurer. He loves hiking, camping, and especially fishing. He will climb just about anything, cross just about anything to find the perfect fishing spot. It’s almost awe-inspiring and definitely scary the length he will go to, and the lengths he will persuade me to go to simply to keep up with him.

Our latest adventure was a waterfall. It’s in Crockett Park in Lawrenceburg. Crockett Park is one of the closest state parks and has been improving its facilities in the last few years. One of those improvements is a path to the natural and man-made waterfall that is beside the dam which created the lake. The path is fairly straight forward, only about seventy-five to a hundred yards across the dam to an area that overlooks the waterfall. However, I, being an enthusiastic photographer, wanted pictures from the bottom of the fall. That meant climbing.

The path that climbs down is a mix of dirt, tree roots, rocks, and concrete. The day we chose to make this climb was a damp, rainy day which, combined with the moss growing in various places, made the path very sketchy indeed. But we did it, and with his help, I made it down. However, we could not get far enough down to the base of the waterfall for the really good pictures I wanted, because the path became too slippery and hinky to risk. And so he found another way, which required climbing back up and then back down.

Now, keep in mind that I am bone-chillingly terrified of heights, not in the best of shape, and I had already made this climb once. But I’m always game for a good photo op, and so off we went. Everything was fine until we hit the first really difficult bit. It was a large rock that was about two and a half feet up and the only way to get up it was to trust a vine root sticking out at the right height to make a foothold, the rock itself, and, for me, the hands of my climbing partner to give me the leverage I needed. I took a breath, closed my eyes for a moment, took his hands and stepped up.

At that moment my balance was at its worst, when one foot was braced (sort of) on the root and the other was on the rock, all my weight was committed to going up and forward. My life (well, my unbroken body anyway) was literally in the hands of my partner. That moment froze because I slipped.

My partner’s hands were a bit damp because it was a hot day and he had made this climb several times to find an easier way for me to get what I wanted. My foot was not braced as it should be, and my hands began to slide out of his. For just a moment, just a blink of the eye, I was truly, completely, hanging on with the tip of my toes and fingers.

Most people would look over their shoulders at what faced them if they fell. I didn’t. I looked into the gold-brown eyes of my partner and trusted. And he caught me. He simply shifted his grip from my hands to my wrists and pulled me up laughing and almost crying, because that moment could so easily have gone the other way and been so much worse.

There are days you never forget, and there are moments that last a lifetime. Everyone has or will have these. However, not everyone will have them while facing their worst fears. Most importantly, not everyone has someone they can trust to literally hold their life in his or her hands. Learning who that person is can be one of the most defining life events, the moment you finally know who your soldier is.

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