Prey for Peace

How a Trail Walk Becomes Triggering

Does this look scary to you? Probably depends on whether you’re a man or a woman.

Trees are my people. I don’t take my time with them for granted, which is one of the reasons I treasure my trail walks.

I’m lucky to live in a neighborhood surrounded by miles of wooded trails. I don’t live near mountains or an ocean, but I do live by the woods, which is nothing to sneeze at. (Except in spring and summer and most of fall when the pollen count is high in Texas, but everything has its price, right?)

The woods are where I go to center myself, to reconnect to my senses, and to power down from the plugged-in part of life. I head to the trails for the quiet that’s loud with beauty.

I go to be alone. I go to talk to my mom and my best friend at my special place down by the creek hoping they’re listening just beyond the treetops.

In the woods, I don’t just observe nature. I sink into it. I often touch the trees, run my hand down their trunks, feel their leaves between my fingers. Sometimes I even talk to them. (Yes, I am that person.)

My trail walks are peaceful—until they’re not. Things I’ve encountered there: ticks, snakes, voluminous spider webs, stinging insects. And men.

To be clear, I have not personally been attacked by a man on the trails. I bet your mind went there, though, and rightfully so.

Here’s a note I wrote this week after an everyday encounter during my walk:

You are a man.

On your morning trail walk, deep in the woods, you pass another man. You tell each other to have a good day and continue on your way.

The end.

You are a woman.

On your morning trail walk, deep in the woods, you pass another man. You tell each other to have a good day and continue on your way.

You now listen for footsteps coming up behind you. You scan the path in front of you looking for another man who might be lurking in the trees. You think about how the man seemed nice and friendly, but then you think about so did Ted Bundy. You plot escape routes and hiding places.

Then you continue on your morning walk with a gnawing tug that pulls a bit of your awareness away from the beauty and nature around you and toward your own smallness and vulnerability in this world.

The end.

Here’s the thing. The woods could be a parking lot, a beach, a street, a crowded party, a park, a bar, an office, a gas station, a classroom, a home. The woods are anywhere a woman has to take inventory of her own safety. Any moment that requires us to measure our own strength, agility, or resources against the potential threat of a man.

As little girls, we usually start out oblivious to our own fragility in the world of men, at least until something happens. Something always happens. Whether it’s an actual assault of some kind, a threat, or just an unexpected scary encounter, we learn early that our safety is always up for grabs at the hands of men.

My something happened in the woods when I was about eight or nine. The fact that I was amongst the trees is almost poetic. My neighborhood friend and I were walking in the woods just down the hill from our houses. It was daytime. We were innocently exploring, wandering through chatting as we went. We heard the motorcycles’ engines before we saw them, but as soon as we saw them, they were upon us.

We screamed, scrambled, and ran toward the embankment we had worked our way down a short time before. Instead of continuing past us, the motorcycle men stopped in front of us and revved their engines. I say men, but they could have been teen boys. I don’t remember their faces. I don’t even remember if we could see their faces or if they had full helmets on. What I do remember is the terror I felt. I instinctively knew I was at their mercy. That no matter how hard I ran or kicked or screamed, if they wanted to get me, they could.

That was the day I met the absoluteness of my own vulnerability.

The motorcycle riders did not leave their bikes. I don’t believe they entered the woods with bad intentions that day. They stumbled upon us and took advantage of an opportunity to either assert their own power or have a laugh at some little girls’ expense. But I did not exit those woods unscathed.

I left with a permanent tender spot inside, kind of like an old injury that aches when it rains. Most of the time I don’t notice it’s there, but it often flares when irritated by other moments in my life, like the one on my trail walk the other day.

As for my childhood woodland, I never played in those nearby trees again. That land has since been swallowed up by townhomes and more houses, but I still think about that encounter every time I pass by the area where I first learned about the random delicacy of my own safety.

Here are a just a handful of other things females learn in this world:
• To be aware of our surroundings at all times
• To listen to our intuition
• To walk with our keys or pepper spray in hand
• To lock our doors as soon as we get in the car or home
• That being drunk means being doubly vulnerable
• That sometimes complying is better than fighting in order to survive
• To keep our eyes on our drinks at all times and to never accept one from a stranger
• To meet in public for a first date
• To share our locations
• To never let ourselves be taken to a second location

We learn early on that we are prey, but then we somehow have to figure out how to discern between potential love interests (or friends) and actual threats. I’ve never been on a first date where the guy told me up front that he was planning to eventually control/stalk/abuse/murder me. I don’t think most women have.

So we look for red flags, warning signs that tell us this potential partner who makes us laugh and looks good sitting across the table from us might actually end up with his hands around our throats. There’s always an underlying assessment happening: What’s underneath the surface? How far do I let him in before I truly know him? Am I safe?

I sometimes come face to face with deer on my trail walks. I always talk softly to them, make myself small and still, do everything in my power to let them know I am not a threat. They always run. They have no way to discern which one of us is a Bambi lover and which of us are hunters. If a woman ran from every single man who posed a potential threat, she would be considered crazy.

I don’t have answers. Just ancient outrage and a weighted tiredness at always having to be alert, aware, on guard. Frustration that a man and I can uneventfully pass each other in the woods on a lovely summer day and have polar opposite experiences in that moment. I’m sure the man was wholly unaware of the disparity inherent to the encounter. In fact, he probably barely even registered it, while my awareness had been turned all the way up to high alert.

I did keep going though. Still in the woods, still putting one foot in front of the other, but no longer fully present.

Is it too much to ask to just be able to pay attention to the trees?

The note that inspired this piece also inspired some spirited commentary from a slew of smart women (and a few men). To see what others had to add to the discussion, see the original note here: