reflections from Mariah the Magnificent on june the 15th

tsk,tsk,tsk,tsk. The first 4 words that come to my mind when i ponder on June 15, 2010. we were on a hike through arches when we look up to see an older man with his Nikon in his hand shaking his head at something we could not figure out. As we got closer we found out that he was not too happy about a plastic pipe coming out of a rock. we then asked him what is so wrong about a plastic pipe?he said "i work at a national park and at the place where i work this plastic pipe would not be acceptable. tsk,tisk,tsk,tsk." at that point we thought that that was a little over the top. our family would not have even noticed it. but that all changed when we really got to know him. we went on a couple of little trails and kept meeting up with him. so we started having conversations with him. we came to a point in the hike when we had the choice weather or not to go on a long hike or not. we chose to go on the primitive hike. about 5 minutes into the hike this man looking at a map started to pass us. the man was Wayne!!!!!!! so for a long time on the hike he was known as our tour guide. he guided us through the narrow paths and the wide paths up the rocks and down the rocks.by then we had pictures with him and we considered him as a very good friend. we came to a point in the path that was flooded. our family decided to take that time to climb a rock...but not Wayne!!! before we know it Wayne has his shoes off and up to his shorts in water. our whole family was cheering for him. r he made it across that way but our family went over this huge rock. then it happened Wayne knew his limitations he knew that he could not make it over this next rock. we were devastated. for the rest of the hike the story of Wayne constantly came up and tears were in our eyes. And from then on Wayne has always been in our conversations. we miss him so much. he will forever be called friend in our family and maybe some day we will meet again with Wayne whether we are climbing mt. Everest or shopping in Wal-Mart (its a small world who knows if we will see him again?)well if Wayne is reading this (we love you Wayne!!) thank you for your time to read this.-Mariah Annette Martin-