“In difficulty lies opportunity.”  I saw those words on a billboard today, somewhere between a gas station and the rising blue ridges, and they swirled themselves around my brain. The phrase looped over and over as I drove home on this warm,gorgeous spring day.

Over the past four days, I hauled 15 pounds of trash out of the backcountry. That’s right—fifteen. A small toddler’s worth of bottles, fuel canisters, ramen bags, and mystery socks now removed from the wild. And still, it was a lovely hitch.

The sun was shining. The air was warm. And the trail was full of people chasing the hope and renewal that spring in the Smokies so effortlessly delivers.

Still…
At every shelter I visited, more trash. More abandoned gear. More layers of discarded things that should’ve kept moving forward but instead were left behind for someone else. It weighed me down—literally and figuratively. My pace slowed. My pack groaned. My sense of humor became an essential item in my gear list.

It was difficult.
But buried in all that mess, there were indeed golden opportunities… moments to connect, to educate, to gently shift perspectives.

I’m a Ridgerunner, sure, but I am always a teacher of trail etiquette, an unofficial trash-hauling pack mule, and now a walking billboard for Leave No Trace. At some point, I started strapping the ever-growing trash bag high on top of my pack, like a crown of absurdity. It bounced comically as I hiked, drawing glances and, occasionally, gasps.

Each hiker I met got a smile and a cheerful, “Thank you for packing out all of your trash!” And almost everyone responded with warmth, curiosity, and even a little horror. Some even laughed. Connection made.

Because at the end of the day, words are just seeds. It’s actions that grow roots. If just oneperson thinks twice before leaving their spent fuel canister behind in a shelter, or shoving a granola wrapper between logs, then the miles and the weight and the quiet grumbling to myself were totally worth it.

And maybe next hitch, I’ll haul out only five pounds.
Or one.
and maybe, just maybe… I’ll get to wear my trash crown a little less high.

Namaste