Days 46-52: “If It Were My Son”

WEST UNION, WV—

May 9-15, 2024

Days 46-52:

I'm currently writing this entry from a bed at the home of Sharon Weekley, the ADT West Virginia State Coordinator, in West Union. It's located approximately 50 miles from Ohio, a destination the hiking gods seem determined to keep me from arriving at too quickly.

My mind and body are fatigued from a virus I contracted on trail, which brought me into the Clarksburg WVU ER the night before last, so these words feel much more like paint haphazardly splattered across a canvas, abstractly at best, rather than a coherent image telling a story. Bare with me and my brain fog.

I had finally started to get back into a good walking rhythm after Dave and Pam dropped me back off on the trail. I covered a decent distance on roads before reaching the “rail trail,” an old 70-mile railroad system on the western side of the state that was converted into a hiking/biking trail some time ago. It is, God willing, the route that will lead me into Ohio.

While walking around a bend in Barbour County a few days before, I came across two black bears just 20 feet away from me on a hillside. Following a brief staring session, I clicked the ends of my trekking poles together, and the two scurried off into the woods. From my current bedridden perspective, one is behooved to fear a virus far more than any black bear. A black bear fiends for the insides of your peanut butter jar. A virus fiends for your insides.

After spending a night at Sharon’s, where I also met her husband of 55 years, Paul, I hit the rail trail again the following morning, feeling completely healthy. Around noon, I started to feel a little queasy as I walked, so I sat in some shade, thinking heat was the culprit. That break lasted for two hours, and my nausea only amplified, ultimately leading to the first of some 15 vomiting fits over the next 8 hours.

Where I sat turning up my insides was not accessible by road, so I had to get to a pickup point 2 miles west for Sharon to retrieve me. I arduously stumbled over to the nearest road, throwing up about once every 15 minutes along the way. I couldn’t even keep water down. By the time Sharon and Paul picked me up, I was shaking and having some difficulty breathing, and once we returned to their home, I started throwing up blood. Not going to the ER was out of the question.

Sharon drove me to the Clarksburg WVU ER, she spoke for me when I could not, she carried away my vomit-filled biohazard bags and brought me a new one as soon as the last was full, and sat with me through blood tests and as an IV bag dripped fluids back into my thoroughly dehydrated body on a hospital bed.

“If it were my son, I would want someone to take care of them like this,” she said, after I apologized for the inconvenience.

What I contracted was likely the infamous trail virus known as norovirus, a virus notorious for its ability to survive on surfaces for long periods of time. Fortunately, my bloodwork and urine samples came back with good results. Once I was able to keep water down, the doctors said I was cleared to go.

The last 48 hours are still largely a blur to me. I can hardly recall the words Sharon and I shared outside of a few, and it’s a challenge trying to string any of the events together for you here on the page. Amidst the fear, chaos, and confusion, one thing remains vivid, perhaps the only thing worth remembering: an image of Sharon Weekley’s compassion, exemplified by her unconditional care for me as if I were her own son.

At this moment, words fail to express the depth of my gratitude toward her. All I can summon as I recover is a smile.