Incorrigible

At an elevation of ten thousand feet on the Mount Whitney Trail in the High Sierras, I met a blonde with sky-blue eyes who looked straight at me with disarming innocence.
She hiked up the trail on a wild idea that she needed to do something different with her life, because it was not going well. Her companion for the trip wanted to go further up toward the summit, but she was wet and cold, and so she turned back to the shelter of the Mirror Lake campground. Alone, with a damp sleeping bag an...