Ken Jackson's Life-changing Odyssey

FROM PARKER BLUE

Mr. Ken Jackson barely had time to gasp before Busy Body plunged belly deep into the quicksand trap that lay hidden beneath the shallow, glittering trickle of the Bill Williams River. Acting by reflex, Jackson leapt from the back of his 16-hands-high Tennessee walker. He sank to his boot tops in the wet, yielding sand, floundered several steps forward, then threw his weight against the reins he still somehow clasped in his right hand. "C'mon Busy!" he yelled, tugging sharply on the reins. The show horse lurched frantically forward, eyes rolling, nostrils flaring, the liquid sand splashing against her broad chest. "C'mon!" Jackson screamed, suddenly afraid for his horse. Busy Body surged forward, great muscled legs treading sand, and found purchase in firmer granules. She hauled herself out of the sucking grave, stumbled forward, and stood shakily on relatively solid ground, her lungs gulping the hot desert air. Jackson staggered forward and cradled her long angular head, caressing the silky, sand-splattered nostrils. "That's all right, girl," he murmured. And he wondered, in this first moment of doubt, whether he'd gotten in over his head despite his year of planning, his feverish anticipation, and his increasingly desperate need to stage this great escape from the hobbles of his life. On the surface, Ken Jackson had the success everyone wants. He owned a thriving medical practice in Kingman, delivered hundreds of babies annually, pulled in an income well into six figures, lived in a sprawling house, owned a half dozen Tennessee walker show horses - including a two-time world grand champion - enjoyed the respect of his colleagues and the affection of friends, and could rightly claim success at every endeavor to which he had ever put his considerable intellect and will.So why did his life seem so hollow? Why did fears lurk in all the shadows? Why could he not shake this tight-chested, fistclenched, lock-jawed urge to flee his life and his possessions? Why did he feel as if he couldn't get a full breath, or a night's sleep, or an easy smile? He couldn't say. So, instead, he'd lavished a year on getting ready for the adventure of a lifetime: riding the width of Arizona from the sunblasted banks of the Colorado River near Lake Havasu to the pine-scented meadows on the New Mexican border near Alpine. He planned the trip with his typical attention to detail, driving much of the route in his beat-up four-wheel-drive pickup, caching supplies, buying a swath of topographic maps, and walking up to isolated ranches along the projected route to ask permission to pass. The trip became his waking obsession; he was like a man frantically building a rocket ship to flee the world's end. Now, on the first day of the trip, things already seemed unraveled. Busy Body and his other horse, Promise, floundered through the sand traps of the Bill Williams. The sun bore down with unexpected intensity. But he'd started. Nothing could deter him, not the quicksand, or the exhausted horses, or the rattlesnakes coiled alongside the trail. He had to be gone from his life today. So began the odyssey of Ken Jackson, in search of himself and some benediction in a language he'd forgotten. Photographer Gary Johnson and I had learned of his journey by roundabout means and determined to document it. We traveled with him four different times on a trek that ultimately spanned some 550 miles, a month of star-drenched nights, and the distance from one life to the next. He began the journey as a mild stoopshouldered man. His broad-brimmed hat sat uncomfortably atop his head, and he moved with uncertainty. He seemed to strain against the bit of his life, like his own Tennessee walker, who held her head always in the poised arch of the show ring, laboring without actually pulling against the reins. Amiable, friendly, interested, Jackson nonetheless seemed preoccupied by some internal debate. When we joined him on the second day, he was still tired from the long toil up the Bill Williams. We rode with him across 30 miles of blistered desert studded with bristling yucca, gnarled mesquite, and cruel cholla. We climbed up the long slope into the sun-burnished mountains, past the tumbled ghosts of mines, down the crumbled granite slopes, across the sweltering plain, down the shallow, meandering bed of the Big Sandy River, and through the twilight shadows to the corrals of a rancher who had befriended Jackson on one of his scouting trips. We savored our fatigue and the memories of the long perfect day. We left him then to continue his search. But it seemed he'd unclenched a little. Already the journey seemed less an escape than an exploration. The next few days tested the searcher severely. He spent much of one day lost, unable to make sense of the topo maps or to use his compass to regain the trail. He finally stumbled back onto the route at the end of 10 brutal hours in the saddle. That night he wrote in his journal: "I want to live (need to live) with less fear.

THE NEXT FEW DAYS

FROM PARKER TO THE BLUE

Fear of not being perfect. Fear of failure. Fear of financial devastation. Fear of law-suits. I should write more about Promise, a wonderful horse. I sit atop her and feel her muscles work all day. Isn't it grand to plan something and experience it coming true?

And so the trip went on. He wandered lost through the mesquite thickets that flanked the Verde River. He encountered a seemingly endless succession of friendly ranchers, cowhands, and wanderers. He sidestepped rattlesnakes, examined bear scat, shivered at the cougar's cry, flushed quail, surprised deer, fretted about vul-tures, alarmed javelinas, and marveled at the profusion of songbirds.

Gradually, he fell in love with his horses alternating, one ridden, the other pack-ing supplies. He studied their eccentricities, marveled at their heart, worried about their feet, and replaced their shoes. He learned to detect their mood through his knees. He had pushed them nearly to their limits when crossing the Verde River and then heading up the Mogollon Rim toward Pine, Strawberry, and Payson, where we met again. Slowly, they formed a single unit, communicating effortlessly with a touch of his heel, a tilt of her ears, a cluck of his tongue.

Once they nearly tumbled to disaster. Promise lost her footing on a steep slope, slid off the desperate excuse for a trail, and started a terrifying plunge down the hillside. Somehow Jackson retained his seat and jerked her head around upslope. She shifted and slid and balanced on the precarious edge of gravity. Then she found 'I'VE ALWAYS HAD TO BE PERFECT. BUT THE TRUTH IS, IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO MAKE A MISTAKE AND LEARN AND LOOK GOOD AT THE SAME TIME . . . . I'VE MISSED THE POINT OF MY LIFE. THIS SONG KEEPS GOING THROUGH MY HEAD: "LIFE GOES ON, LONG AFTER THE THRILL OF LIVING IS GONE." I DON'T WANT THAT TO HAPPEΝ ΤΟ ΜΕ.' strength from some unsuspected reservoir, gathered herself, and leapt back up over the ledge she'd just slid off.

Later he recorded in his journal: “I'm beginning to understand this trip. It's not about escape. It's about fear, particularly the fear of failure. Also about the fear of living my life without fear. Figure that out. Tonight I am alone and lonely. But not afraid. I feel better.” Gary and I had connected with Jackson three more times. Before he crossed the Verde, we rode across a volcanic yucca-studded mesa in rugged Bloody Basin, through a gentle, cleansing rain down into a com-pletely unexpected sycamore-graced canyon, and along the banks of a murmuring spring-fed stream. We were struck by the change in him. The hat now fit him perfectly, the beard had absorbed his worried frown, and he seemed somehow out of place when he climbed down from the saddle. He appeared to have lost interest in the angst of his former life. Now he seemed childlike in his excitement about the beaded Gila monster discovered beside the trail and the oriole's brilliant flash of yellow and black among the branches of the cotton-wood overhead. He confided sadly that his marriage had fallen apart, that his untended business had changed, and that he worried about a return to his former life. But he confessed these things with a curious calm, a certain shrug of his voice that stemmed more from acceptance than indifference.

That night he wrote: “I've always had to be perfect. But the truth is, it's impossible to make a mistake and learn and look good at the same time. I've never had the guts to look bad. Everything turns into drudgery, fear, effort, and worry. I've missed the point of my life. This song keeps going through my head: 'Life goes on, long after the thrill of living is gone.' I don't want that to hap-pen to me.

Later up on the Rim, he spent most of another day lost, seeking the trail. This time, it hardly fazed him.

"Lost again... spectacular, beautiful country. Elk. Ponderosa. Oak. Poplar. Fir. Aspen. Ferns. I'm physically exhausted every day and sleeping nine hours at a stretch. I'd forgotten what that feels like. Incredible feeling of balance. Well rested. Weighing less. No stress. What a life. What will I do when I have to go back? One day at a time. Today I'm at peace. Lots of birds. I feel that I belong on this Earth, in these woods, across these streams, around these animals which is not to exclude humanity the people I love."

We also rode with him at the end in the White Mountains. Bearded, tanned, and relaxed, he seemed transformed. He'd acquired the wisdom of a shrug, the grace of a laugh, the depth of loss accepted. A trio of mountain sheep watched his little party ride down the last slope of the last mountain to the Blue River, seeming to offer some silent benediction.

He wrote me after he returned to his life. "The trip is over, or has it just begun? I did ride across the state, you and Gary documented that. I would not trade it for anything. But I finally figured out what was missing. What a revelation: spend a month riding a great horse clear across the state and find that what you're miss-ing is back where you started. Don't get me wrong, it was the trip of a lifetime. And I know now that to take care of the people I love, I've got to take care of myself. I'm back at work. Feel at ease. Elated. Perfect. Slowed down. Less frantic. I know now that happiness lies in sharing my life. My only asset, myself, should be distributed freely not protected, isolated, and doled out conditionally.

"What's ahead? Whatever it is, I'll work it out.

"I'm not afraid anymore."