Twelve years ago, our lives were forever changed when we met a ruby-lipped cherub. She was 5-½ weeks early, offering the greatest April Fool’s Day prank I’ve ever been the recipient of. My sweet Siena Lillian came into the world squawking and determined. Impossibly small at 5-lbs, 11oz, we would spend the next 17 days in the hospital while she got stronger. And the next dozen years getting to watch this amazing kid grow. She now stands 5’1.5″ tall and wears a women’s size 8 in shoes. She loves reading, circus, and the outdoors. She’s a cautious rule-follower, a hard worker in school, and is a great conversationalist, with a keen interest for history. She has the most genuine of hearts and gentlest of personalities. She leads with kindness in all she does, and watches after her brothers with affection and a dash of annoyance.

Her birthday always falls around Spring Break, so instead of birthday parties, we often get creative with celebrating on the road. This year, we hopped in the Jeep and drove to Blanchard Springs Recreational Area. It is famous for its impressive cave, though due to to COVID, it is closed indefinitely. However, we found there was plenty to discover above ground.

We jumped off the main trail and discovered a natural staircase carved into the side of a mountain. A little further up we saw enormous limestone rock formations making up an entrance to a cave. The boys squealed with excitement as they explored the huge space. Siena nervously asked, ”Should we be doing this?” I grinned at her and said, “Probably not, but sometimes it’s okay to live a little, kiddo.” That was all the permission she needed – soon she was off scampering after her brothers. 

Over and over again, John and I fielded: “Dad! Look at this!”, “Mom! Come here!”, “No way! You have GOT to see this!!”

Rhodes plucked some purple, white, and yellow wildflowers for my hair, as Porter picked some for Siena. We discovered interesting looking rocks and plants, and I explained how stalactites and stalagmites were formed. Porter told us all about bats and copperheads.

We continued onto a gorgeous green-blue spring and waterfall, basking in the fact that we were the only visitors to the park. The kids and John sought to climb the coolest and most severe of rock formations, while I lingered along the ground admiring spring buds, flowers, minnows, and rocks.

I settled at the base of a small waterfall to sketch. Siena followed me some time later and sat beside me. In doing so, she jostled a root that ran along the entire back of the rock I was rested on and into the ground above. Thinking it was a snake, I leapt up, lost my balance, and went tumbling into the river, sketchbook and all.

When the Hickman men returned, John wanted to go on another hike. I was feeling a little stiff from my fall, so warned him that I might only make it one way and he’d have to pick me up in the Jeep. The trail was shorter than expected and extremely easy. I could have made it back with no issue – and intended to. But John, ever worrisome for me offered, “Well, there’s no way for me to pick you up unless you cross the river. You could shimmy down this log, but you’d have to take your boots off and get in the water for the last little stretch”

Well now. Cross the rocky-floored river barefoot in the frigid waters or go back the way I came? Why shimmy the log at all? Just cross the whole thing barefoot, I decided. I hiked my pants up, removed my boots, tying the laces together and tossed them over my shoulder. John gasped when he saw me. “Babydoll! You’ll kill your feet on those rocks!” I laughed. Had he forgotten how much I love being barefoot, rocky soil or no?

I slipped a little, nearly went all in a couple times. The kids stood on the bank stunned at their adventurous mother.

You see in our family, John is the adventurous one. John lets them do the daring tree climbs and rock scrambling. Every time we are on a hike, they say, “Careful, Mom.” Or ask if I’m ok. I often have to remind them that I’m sturdy and capable.

But yet, they see the woman that is their mom now. The worry-wort standing below, ready to nurse them should they get hurt.

They don’t know the silly, spontaneous woman I once was. They haven’t met the woman (and for good reason!) that drank from the broken jagged neck of a wine bottle down the darkened streets of Montepulciano, or the woman that jumped out of a moving vehicle in flip flops to chase a sheep in Ireland. Nor the woman that rode a felucca down the middle of the Nile while bandits chased us down in the pre-dawn hours, nor the woman who stole away in an armed caravan across the desert to see ancient Egyptian ruins. They don’t know the thrill of excitement I had when an elephant tripped over John’s and my tent in the middle of the night or when hyenas sniffed our bottoms mere inches away with only a piece of canvas separating us, or that time I peed on the open plains of the Serengeti while John nervously kept watch for lions and cheetahs. Nor do they know the woman that swam with penguins in South Africa, or drove a scooter at high speeds (without a helmet no less!) through the winding roads of Patmos. The woman that backpacked around the world, rode a rickety bus on a roughly carved dirt road up a steep mountain pass in the rainforest of Costa Rica, slept in a barn in Switzerland, or raced off in a Smart car after stealing back our passports from a crotchety old Italian woman. 

That woman peeks out from time to time. She’ll suddenly climb a tree. Or scramble up a steep granite wall, or boulder hop across a river. She’ll wander off the trail to catch a closer look of a wildflower, or jump out of a boat to swim back to shore.

Their father always looks on, never surprised, but always delighted, to see the woman he fell in love with glimmer through the rigors of responsibility and persistent state of exhaustion. In those moments, he remembers she’s still there, and his heart thunders a little harder.  

My toes were nearing numb by the time I reached the shore, but I felt refreshed. I continued to walk barefoot through the soft spongy moss on the shore, through virgin forest until I found a boulder to sit on to lace up my boots again. I chuckled as the kids screamed from the opposite shore, but told them they couldn’t follow, as the rocks were too rough and slick.

John recommended a fallen tree laying across the breadth of the river. The two older kids skooched their little butts across the log, struggling a bit at a particular narrow part of the log. When they reached the end, they hopped over a wobbly boulder and onto shore. I thought it too risky for Rhodes to follow, but he ran off behind a tree, crouched down with his tiny fists pressed into his eyes, while his shoulders silently shook. It gutted me.

“All right, John. Let’s get him over,” I said.

John loaded him onto the log and offered instruction. I perched at the other end, stretched out as far as I could safely go. Siena stood on the shore, legs sturdily placed, arms stretched, waiting to take him from me. Porter stood off to the side hollering words of encouragement. I surveyed the river below and plotted how I would get to him should he fall in.

Rhodes started down the log, realizing it was much scarier than he expected. John mounted the log behind him to guide him as far as he safely could, nervous when the old tree groaned in response. All four of us rooted him on. There was about five feet Rhodes had to go completely on his own. I eyed the river carefully. John watched nervously behind him. Both of us poised to pounce into the river. Finally Rhodes was in my arms, with a grin as wide as the crescent moon. I scooped him up, kissed his baby soft cheek and swung him over to Siena. He jumped up and down celebrating, the adrenaline coursing through him.

I found a little quarter sized snail shell, bleached white by the sun and handed it to Rhodes. “This is your trophy for making it across. You were SO BRAVE.”

He protested, “But I was scared!”

“Yes, but you didn’t let your fear hold you back, baby. And that’s what makes you brave.”

John retreated to the trail to get back to the Jeep, while the kids and I explored an old dilapidated cotton mill. It looked like the ramparts of an ancient castle. The stone walls were steeped in age. Moss, grasses, and wildflowers shot up through the cracks. I sat down to sketch while the kids played make believe, fighting off deadly enemies with grenades made of rocks and guns of sticks. Even Siena. She may be twelve, and growing out of the play stage, but when protected by the privacy of her family, she dives right in and plays alongside her brothers.

Suddenly Rhodes fell over onto the soft grass, clutching his stomach. “I’ve been shot! I’ve been shot! Medic!” Porter raced around the corner of the wall, dived for him and drug him into safety, “We don’t leave men behind!”

No, I guess we don’t. Certainly not sweet little brothers.