Dustin Grinnell

“Dr. Stowe?”
I looked up from my notes. A young woman with long brunette curls stood in my office doorway. “Yes?”
“The receptionist said you were ready for me.”
I glanced at the clock, and waved her toward the chair across from mine. “Of course. Tristen, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
She slumped into the seat, head lowered—a posture echoing her physician’s notes about possible depression.
“What’s going on, Tristen? This is a safe space; no judgment.”
“Where do I start?”
“Just tell me your story.”
“I grew up in Florida, started college there, then moved to Boston for a master’s in media science. Now I’m a researcher at a digital marketing agency in Cambridge.”
“How’s work?”
“I have so much to do, I feel like vomiting.”
I frowned. “Are you nauseous often?”
She grimaced. “Not really. I exaggerate, sometimes.”
Exaggeration or not, her job clearly overwhelmed her. “You work hard, don’t you?”
She chewed her lip. “Ever heard of kuroshi? It’s Japanese for ‘overwork death.’ People in Japan work so hard, they die.”
“Do you feel like that?”
She shrugged. “I have this stress-dream where I’m so exhausted in a meeting, I pass out, hit my head, and lose all my teeth.”
“Have you thought about harming yourself?”
She snorted. “Too busy to kill myself.”
When I didn’t laugh, she looked away.
After a pause, she spoke softly. “I’ve always been fascinated by Japan’s suicide forests. Sometimes, I drive to Walden Pond, walk to a field, and think about not being alive.”
Her words troubled me. Work stress was evident, but I suspected deeper wounds. We agreed to meet Thursdays.
Tristen’s distress, I gradually realized, stemmed from alienation and purposelessness. As an existentialist therapist, I aimed to help her find meaning. Who was she? What did she want?
Weeks into working together, we discussed the true self.
“I don’t get ‘finding your true self’,” she said. “What is it? How do I know if I’ve found it?”
“I don’t think it’s something to find,” I replied. “Existentialism says we create ourselves through choices— it’s our responsibility to find our window of freedom and stretch toward it.”
“Window of freedom,” she murmured. “I like that.”
She grew impatient, though. “Shouldn’t I have a breakthrough by now, like in Good Will Hunting?”
“Movies dramatize this process. Everyone’s journey is different.”
Next session, I asked, “Who is Tristen?”
She paused. “No one’s asked me that.” After silence, she said, “I see myself as a dung beetle, rolling a growing ball of poop.”
“Why a dung beetle?”
“Because of all the crap—college perfectionism, now work, striving for American milestones I don’t want: job, marriage, kids, suburbs.”
“How do you really feel?”
“Most people die at twenty-five but aren’t buried till seventy-five.”
We explored spirituality next.
“Raised Catholic,” she said. “Lapsed now. You?”
“I’m an atheist with a cosmic view.” I pointed to a photo of Earth from Mars—a speck in space. “We’re one species on a tiny rock in a vast universe.”
“Bleak,” she said.
“It’s honest. Life has no inherent meaning, so we craft our own.”
“Still low-key depressing, Dr. Stowe.”
In our tenth session, a wound surfaced.
“I’ve always liked girls,” she confessed. “In high school, gay kids got bullied. I admired those who came out, but I couldn’t.” “Did your parents know?”
“I told them eventually. They said I was confused, that I’d chosen wrong—like sexuality’s a choice. It destroyed me. My grades tanked. I quit swimming, lost friends.”
She paused. “One day, I went to the woods with pills I’d collected. I sat on some moss, crying. A fox appeared, let me pet it, then left. I dumped the pills and drove home. Applied to Boston University the next day.”
“What drove your perfectionism there?”
“Needing to be perfect—student, athlete, person.”
“You’ve done well. You have a good education, a good job.”
“Still feels inadequate, so I overwork, burn out.”
Tristen’s twenty-fifth birthday loomed. “At eighteen, I made a pact: if I still felt this way at twenty-five, I’d end it.”
“How far off is that?”
“It’s next month.”
“Do you feel the same?”
“I’ve changed some, but I’m still carrying this load.”
Days later, I worried. Ruth, my mentor, suggested rest. “She’s exhausted from overwork. She needs a break—from work, the city, herself.”
Next session, I asked, “What do you want out of life?”
“Good health, happiness, love. I’ve always wanted to hike the Appalachian Trail—all 2,193 miles.”
“What’s stopping you?”
“Work. Responsibilities.”
Tristen missed our next session. Calls went to voicemail. Fearing her pact, I drove to Walden Pond, her “suicide forest.” In a field, I found her on a stump, eyes red.
“What’s wrong?”
“My birthday’s next week. Nothing’s changed.”
“I’m worried, Tristen. The hospital—”
“I’m not here to kill myself,” she snapped, showing empty pockets. “I just wanted the forest to help.”
“I believe you. I can help you feel better—trust me.”
“Why? You don’t even think life’s worth living.”
“You’re overwhelmed, trapped. I want to help you feel free.”
“Free to do what?”
“To live how you want.”
She took my hand. We walked back silently.
Over the next few days, I researched psychedelics—tools for healing. “Mushrooms might help her go deeper,” I told Ruth.
Tristen agreed. “I took stuff at Burning Man. Felt connected to everything.”
Monday, in an exam room, she drank mushroom tea. “Worse it tastes, better it works, right?”
“Lie back,” I said. “This might shift your consciousness, let you see yourself anew.”
Twenty minutes later, she said, “It’s like weed, but deeper.”
Her pupils dilated. “I’m in the feels now.”
“Do you hold back parts of yourself?” I asked.
“Yes. Always pleasing others, not being me.”
“Who do you want to be?”
“Not this. I’m drowning in obligations—just want to be free.”
She grabbed her phone and deleted photos from her social media profile. “Look at me—phony!” She erased her whole profile, crying.
“Tell me what’s going on, Tristen.”
“I feel like I stopped rolling the dung.”
“What does that mean?”
“I know what to do.”
Next session, she was beaming. “I got a six-month leave to hike the AT!”
“That’s terrific!”
She showed me the Far Out app. “Follow my blog—Trail Magic.”
Two sessions later, we parted. She didn’t need me anymore.
Her first post came from Springer Mountain. She wore blue-tinted sunglasses, earning the trail name “Shades.” Trail Magic chronicled serendipitous support—drinks, hot dogs, stories from “trail angels.” She hiked with her “tramily,” and grew close to Amber. A video showed Amber on her lap, singing “Country Roads” by a campfire.
Five months in, her posts stopped. After a week, she called. “I dislocated my knee in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. I was airlifted out—300 miles from Mount Katahdin.”
“I’m so sorry, Tristen.”
“Work caused it. My boss emailed about a crisis. I tripped worrying.”
“Do you want to resume therapy?”
“Yes,” she said, solemnly.
That night, she posted a photo with Amber, captioned, “I miss the trail’s rhythms—sunrises, coffee, hiking and laughing with my tramily.”
In therapy, she cried often, devastated. She’d broken up with Amber. “I wish you’d never told me about existentialism. We’re just a cosmic joke.”
“It’s not a curse. You can invent your purpose.”
She sank deeper after Amber summited Katahdin. Ruth advised upping her Zoloft.
In the next session, Tristen burst in. “I reread my blog, and had an epiphany about existentialism.”
“Go on.”
“You see life as random, meaningless. But I want meaningful coincidences—a connected universe. Hiking, I felt all things linked—plants, water, us.”
“Sounds like transcendentalism?”
“Yes. Thoreau trusted intuition over reason. On the AT, I felt free, at peace.”
“So, what now?”
“I need to finish the trail from New Hampshire.”
“What’s stopping you?”
“Fear I’ll fail again.”
When Tristen missed our next appointment, I checked her blog. The post I found made me so happy, my eyes filled with tears.
Tristen wrote about seeing her blue-tinted sunglasses on the dashboard while driving home from therapy. In that moment, she knew she had to complete her hike to Katahdin.
Instead of going home, she drove to the White Mountains for gear and messaged Amber, who met her at the trailhead.
A week later, Tristen posted a photo of them at the Appalachian Trail. She was free to be whoever she wanted.
“Thank you, Dr. Stowe, my Trail Angel.”