Speak No Eatable
In retrospect, we probably should have known better[K1].
Well, I’ll admit it. I did know better. I’m an experienced mountaineer, after all. I know what to to bring on a hike. I know howknow to keep blood sugar up, and I know what to eat before hiking. And Ryan and Ali and Andrew weren’t exactly rookies either. We’d climbed tons of mountains. We knew what we were doing.
[K2]
And yet [K3]somehow, suddenly, we found ourselves stuck halfway across the Sawtooth traverse between Mount Bierstadt and Mount Evans, not having eaten in hours, hiking on aching stomachs, operating under a strict ban on conversations about food.
“I told you so,” I kept telling my companions. “I told you so.”
I had told them so. I had warned them. Don’t talk about food, I said. For God’s sake, it’s too dangerous. I’ve seen the consequences—the inhumanity, the suffering. I described it to them the way a soldier back from the battlefield might describe the horrors of napalm, or gangrene. They listened carefully, soaking in every word.
“We’ve been there,” Ryan and Ali said. TAnd they told the story of how, in the third hour of a weeklong canoe expedition, poor Ali had become infected with a senseless craving for chicken tandoori, an all-encompassing food-lust that grew like a fungus, spreading to Ryan, until finally they had to cut their trip short and drive four hours to the nearest Indian restaurant. It was the best chicken tandoori they’d ever had, they said. The outer skin had been crisp and black and perfectly seasoned, the butter-soft meat inside it practically dripping off the bone...
“No!” I cried, but it was too late. We could all taste the chicken tandoori. My belly burned like it was on fire.
It was all over. We tried talking about other things but hunger wouldn’t let us. A few minutes later Ali accidentally said the word “stroganoff” and Andrew had some kind of seizure[K4]. After that we had to hike in total silence. I began to hallucinate that I was still chewing my breakfast: the half a chocolate muffin that Andrew had given me. It was all I’d had to eat before hiking. He’d waited until I’d swallowed the thing to announce that it was seven months old, and that he’d found it in the trunk of his car.
Now, four hours later, I gladly would have killed him for the other half.[K5]
You don’t have to spend long in the backcountry to know how it magnifies the attraction of food. When I was in high school, camping with friends, we used to sit around the fire wolfing down freeze-dried goulash reconstituted with boiled river water full of spruce needles and dirt, raving about the exquisite taste, declaring our undying love for the cooks, swearing to God that the second we got home, we were going to recreate this matchless meal in every detail. Those of us who followed through learned that in a kitchen, away from the smell of evergreens and soil, away from the chill in the air, the stuff we were eating wasn’t merely bad. It wasn’t even food.
[K6]
Out on the trail, in our weaker moments, we’d give ourselves over to fantasy. If the backcountry can make the sorriest slop taste delicious, what could it do to fine cuisine? What might happen if we somehow procured a platter of Beef Wellington? Would we ascend directly to Nirvana[K7]?
We concocted elaborate plans to get good food into the backcountry. Much brainpower was expended on schemes to keep it hot on its seven-mile journey from the trailhead. Before long, we realized that if one of us fell off a small cliff, we could order a helicopter medical evacuation, and while we were at it, maybe a roast duck in cranberry chutney, a whole bucket of Olympia oysters, two supreme Mountain Pie pizzas from the original Beau Jo’s in Idaho Springs, and a twenty-pound variety pack of Little Debbie snack cakes.
Soon the food fantasies would go horribly wrong. Crazed with hunger, we’d start eyeing each other suspiciously, wondering who was going to be volunteered for the cliff dive, and who would get to call in the food order, and whether he would insist on anchovies. We were starting to understand what might drive a wild-eyed, cabin-fevered mountain man to cannibalism. “It’s not that I felt like eating old Jeb, particularly—it’s just that he wouldn’t quit talking about juicy, medium-rare strips of grilled venison sirloin marinated in burgundy wine, with Kalamata olives and fresh oregano...”
As the word “oregano” escaped my lips, I snapped out of my feverish reminiscence and realized I’d been talking aloud. Ryan, and Ali and Andrew were staring at me with desperate eyes, measuring the distance between us, clearly wishing that they had an axe, and a cooking fire, and a bottle of burgundy wine.
Three hours later—dangerously, slaveringlyslavering, terminally ravenous—we stumbled like drunks into the restaurant at the Echo Lake Lodge. We demolished greasy bacon cheeseburgers with fries and chilled coleslaw and salads of iceberg lettuce squashed flat under the weight of a ponderous bleu cheese dressing. [K8]The well-being started in our stomachs and crept slowly outward from there, as successive layers of body cells gasped collective tiny sighs of relief. It would’ve been a mediocre meal if we hadn’t been crazy with hunger. Under the circumstances, it was beyond exquisite. It was divine.
And that was when I realized where the magic comes from. Not from the smell of evergreens and soil, not from the chill in the air. The magic is in the fantasies. If you didn’t marinate for hours in detailed dreams of texture and flavor, you wouldn’t get the reward. If you obeyed the rules and never talked about food on the trail, then when you finally got fed, it wouldn’t taste so goddamn good.
I explained my new theory to the others. We thought about it for a long time, licking the congealed grease off our fingers. As they started to drift off into food comas, I could see that I had convinced them that maybe, just maybe, there is a time and a place for talking about food on the trail.
“Sure, you can talk about food all you want,” said Andrew dreamiliydreamily. “But next time I’m bringing the axe.”[K9]
[K10]
[K1]I like this opening line. It’s brief and a good attention grabber
[K2]This first paragraph is a good set-up, with enough suspense to keep the reader going. I would recommend combining a few sentences; it’s a little choppy
[K3]Starting with “and” feels a little awkward, maybe just take it out
[K4]This is funny!
[K5]Not sure if this needs to be a new paragraph
[K6]The previous paragraph is a really good one. It tells readers who may be confused (such as those who have never been in the wilderness) a little more background on outdoor food experiences.
[K7]There is some good foreshadowing here as to what happens near the end.
[K8]There’s good imagery here.
[K9]Good ending here. Wrapped everything up nicely with a good punch line.
[K10]I feel like the audience would have to experience this story first hand to really understand it. Maybe add a paragraph relating the hiking hunger to that of another area many people would understand. DMV, church, places such as that maybe?