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Today’s guest writer is my father.
When I hiked the PCT in 2023, my family sent me off at the southern terminus. My father wrote and delivered a speech for the occasion, in English. It really moved me to hear his reflections on what it was that I was about to embark on. You can read the full text of that speech archived on my Substack. I also shared a small clip of his delivery on my Instagram.
My father delivering his speech at the southern terminus of the PCT
This year, for my attempt to be the first known woman to hike the Continental Divide Trail and the Great Divide Trail combined, I will be starting at the southern terminus alone. I’ve asked my father to share some thoughts that I will read in his honor. He wrote this speech in Mandarin, which he translated with Google and asked me to edit for clarity and grammar.
While the English translation is nowhere near as poetic as his original, I hope you’ll enjoy.
xx
stitches
My parents and I at Manning Park, after I completed the PCT in 2023
Dear Jessica,
When you put your pack on your shoulders as you left home, I looked at each seam as if I could see the rolling sea of clouds and steep rock walls on the road ahead. Three thousand, seven hundred miles: this string of numbers meanders into a silent epic on the map, and you will fill it with the rhythm of your footsteps.
My family on the last vacation we took together, December 2023. L-R: my sister’s partner James, my sister Annette, my mother Lisa, my brother Michael, my father Roger
I have seen your awed eyes and trembling hands when you watched the extremely difficult acrobatic shows when you were five years old; I have seen the difficulties you faced when you were eight years old, selling Girl Scout cookies outside the local grocery store. You announced your wares over and over again to everyone around you, but few people responded to you. Yet your eyes became more and more determined.
I still remember one night, when you had just learned to ski, you and I accidentally took the chairlift to a black diamond run that was a ski slope two levels higher than ours. You were six. You witnessed me fall 100 times, but I gritted my teeth and stood up 100 times. I told you, “Child, you can fall, but you must stand up!”
When you sold 2,100 boxes of Girl Scout cookies to rank third in sales among all the Girl Scouts in Seattle before graduating from high school, I suddenly realized: you have grown up! In this seemingly impossible challenge, you defeated yourself! You set the bar high, you made it!
My mother on trail with me near Julian on the PCT.
Today you set your new goal. I trust you will achieve it! At this moment, you are standing in front of the starting terminus, and the mountains in front cast a huge shadow ahead of you, but your shadow is straighter.
As a father, I am also worried about my daughter. My worries are as heavy as the snow in the mountains that never melts all year round, but your courage is like the golden sunlight that penetrates the clouds — firm and persistent!
There is no need to look back to find my eyes. Go, child, let the red rocks of Colorado witness how you forge fear into armor, and let the morning mist of Continental Divide soak your thriving soul.
My father on trail with me on the PCT, at Warner Springs
When you finally reach the mountains of Jasper, Canada, the mountain wind will echo the safety of my beloved daughter, and your smile will color the ravines of Jasper.
The six thousand kilometers of clouds and moonlight have turned into a song under your feet: a song of bravely climbing without fear!
Your mother and I will pray for you, and the lights in front of our house will be lit for you. When the mountain wind tells us that you have arrived at your destination safely, I will open my arms and catch a daughter who has returned from afar!
Proud of you,
Dad
My parents on a ferry in Washington
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