"You are going alone? That sounds awful." A common remark from people who inquire about my next adventure plans.

Here's the truth. Sometimes it is awful.

They think you will go unafraid, you tell yourself you aren't afraid but you still sleep with your can of bear spray and knife a few inches from your head as you spend the night alone in your tent. You think of the group of drunk guys in the camping spot across from yours, eyeing you up as you set up your tent and made dinner for one on your Coleman camp stove.

There are moments on the trail when you hear something. The hairs stand up on the back of your neck, goosebumps form, you tell yourself "relax Kourt, it's just the wind". And it is, usually, just the wind.

Your family hounds you with stories of the girl who disappeared from her tent one night a few years ago or the two experienced hunters who had guns and still got attacked by a bear. You shouldn't go alone. It isn't safe. Why are you so reckless?

But you go alone because there is no feeling like being out there with just your thoughts and your own uncompromised agenda. There is no audience, no one to perform for. The woods do not care if you wear makeup that day.

You go alone because you can. Because you feel lucky you have a body that can push you up mountains a mind that can handle the fear of being a girl alone in the sticks.

When you are alone in the wilds you lose yourself, and find yourself, and then lose yourself again. You run with the wind and dance under the stars and there is no one there to watch but the mosquitos and the squirrels.

And in part you go alone, because you are reckless. Because there is nothing more magic inducing then living a life on the other side of that comfort line.