—WINNIE-THE-POOH Looking up at that first mountain summit, more than four thousand feet in the air, I wasn’t sure I could make it. It was at least fifteen miles, and the climb was steep. I’d never done a hike like that before. But there I was, with no choice but to put one foot in front of the other, making sure I didn’t lose the fire trail and go wandering off in the wrong direction, or worse, fall down the side of a cliff. It was seven a.m., I’d been up since five a.m. for a yoga class and a vegan breakfast, and my first thought when I started that trail was, “We’re going over that?!” This all started early in September 2001, when I booked myself into a hiking boot camp in Calabasas, California, because I wanted to quit smoking. I picked up the habit when I was fourteen and managed to quit a few times, but smoking has a tendency to creep back into my life, especially when I’m working or stressing. A week in a healthy environment, doing nothing but hiking and yoga, was my way of separating myself from cigarettes and going cold turkey.
