Blistered Kind Of Love Read Online Free Page A

one other guy, who wasn’t representing his gender in the most enthusiastic manner. He was a wispy gentleman with pasty skin and a half-hearted pyramid of facial hair hanging from his chin. He looked as though he might buckle to the floor under the weight of a sunscreen-filled fanny pack.
    Our instructor was a gruff and weathered former colonel in the Air Force. During his thirty-nine years in the Force, he informed us, he’d taught many raw recruits the skills of outdoor survival and interrogation. To punctuate this point, he pulled a green hat with white lettering from his canvas sack.
    â€œWe seized this hat from a Russian soldier. Do you know what it says? ‘Excrement Happens’—and in the woods it does.” The colonel scanned the troops and did not look pleased.
    â€œLet’s get something straight from the start.” Dramatic pause. “The outdoors is not Walt Disney World.” Another pause. “When you go out there, it is not like going to the amusement park for the afternoon.” Longer pause. “The animals you see will be real. They
will not
be people in fuzzy costumes.”
    Satisfied that he now commanded our attention, the colonel gave us thedetails regarding a series of day hikes, which complemented the classroom instruction. On Sunday we were to meet at a Dunkin’ Donuts near the trailhead. The colonel wanted to make sure that this reconnaissance would go smoothly.
    â€œWe will meet at the Dunkin’ Donuts at oh-nine-hundred sharp,” he commanded. “Note I said
at
the Dunkin’ Donuts.” Nice long pause. “Not
in
the Dunkin’ Donuts. Now, if you want to go and sit
in
the Dunkin’ Donuts and have your four-hundred-calorie glazed cruller, you can do that. But I will not, I repeat, will
not
come to look for you there.” The colonel stopped and slowly spread a glare around the room.
    Our gruff leader spent the rest of the evening reviewing hiking clothing and equipment. While explaining the usefulness of 1972 L.L. Bean flannel shirts and blue jeans, he pulled these items out of a weathered bag. Pretty soon there was a large pile of tired clothing on the table, including a musty thermal undershirt, several pairs of thinning wool socks, and two industrial-strength leather boots. He continued unloading a first-aid kit and a pair of wool pants that made my legs itch just looking at them. The whole time I half-expected him to pull out a hand grenade or a bazooka. He didn’t, but it wasn’t long before the subject of artillery was broached. The colonel had gone off on a tangent to explain safety requirements on our weekend hikes and the perils of straying from the group.
    â€œI don’t like people falling behind. I carry a .45 and if you fall behind too much . . . well, as a squad commander, you are allowed a ten-percent loss.” The room went deathly quiet. I think that’s when we decided not to join our classmates on the weekend excursions; somehow filling re-supply boxes seemed quite a bit safer.
    For the next four Monday evenings
Hiking 101
continued to be an excellent source of amusement. Not excellent enough, however, for Duffy to miss
Monday Night Football
, so I endured the rest of the colonel’s tirades on my own. Unfortunately, the course didn’t really offer a whole lot of practical information for the aspiring long-distance hiker. The colonel seemed to have a fantastic recall of the outdoor survival techniques he’d taught fifteen yearsearlier, but he hadn’t completely updated his résumé for the new era of Polartec jackets and ultralight travel. To prepare ourselves for our quest, we were going to have to take matters into our own hands.

    â€œI’m not gonna lie; it concerns me that you’ve never backpacked,” Duffy remarked quietly. We were alone, peeling apples to dry in our food dehydrator, but his tone seemed to indicate that he was afraid someone else