Hello, my name is Leslie.
I am the host of the Why Not Today podcast.
This is a podcast to celebrate people who have been courageous and said, why not today?
I started this podcast and honored my father, Patrick Cain, who often did say why not today.
I'm based in Reston, Virginia, a planned community right outside of Washington, DC.
And thanks for joining us today.
And I'm excited about my guest today, Chris Howard.
I don't know really much about her except for what I've seen in the press.
A friend of mine sent me a link to her story that was on a local news station of her adventures.
And she's like, you need her on the Why Not Today podcast.
And so I reached out to her, found out she lives maybe a half a mile from my house.
I think I could walk barefoot to your house.
Yeah.
So I'm sure we've run into each other and passed each other and walking.
So I'm excited to have you here and share your journey, your experience.
So before we kind of hear all your courage stories and everything, tell us a little bit about who Chris is
and a fun fact about you.
Well, a fun fact is I'm a bit of a princess, honestly.
Oh, that's for you.
Which is a bit of a juxtaposition to the story that we're just about to talk about.
Right.
In fact, I just redesigned my home to kind of reflect my personality.
And it's designed in pink, crystal and fluffy everywhere.
I love that.
So the other hat I wear.
Unapologetically, yes.
That's OK.
The other hat I wear is, and I do have a pink shirt on today, is I'm a sales director with Mary Kay.
And so I still, January, my wall behind me was bright pink.
But I moved.
Oh my gosh.
So yeah, pink.
My niece asked me one time why pink was my favorite color.
I'm like, if really not, it just pays me really well.
But now pink and fluffy is always good.
So I'm excited to hear your story and your adventures.
And so before we kind of hear that, what does courage mean to you, Chris?
For me, courage is daring to live your authentic self.
So courage comes from deep inside.
And when the heart and your actions are totally aligned,
then you know exactly what needs to happen from what may.
Yes.
And we're not worried about consequences.
We're not worried about what people think we're doing what we need to do in that moment.
I would agree.
Got to look at values.
And so many people don't, unfortunately.
Yeah.
So you had a really cool adventure.
And I was kind of teased about it.
But, and, you know, honestly, I read the story, part of the story, not the whole story.
And because I kind of want to be surprised by it.
And, and I don't know if I've known anybody that's accomplished this.
So let's talk about what you accomplished, why you did it, the backstory,
and some of the courage steps in between.
So I'll let you spill the beans and share what you did.
Before I, yeah, just jump in and, you know,
let me redirect if you need me to.
So.
So we'll just start with the it.
So the it is the big adventure is I left my job.
I was 11 years with lab core drug development and 33 years as an executive
in bio pharmaceutical development, drug development.
And, and I just resigned in order to go hike the appellation trail.
And for those who may not know what the appellation trail is,
it's the longest footpath in the world, continuous footpath.
I started.
Yeah. I started in Springer Mountain, Georgia and walked
with whatever I could carry my back and all my supplies, all my food,
all my water, my sleeping bag, my tent was 25 pounds in the winter time,
19 pounds in the summertime.
And I walked through 14 states along the East coast and ended my journey
in Maine, Mount Contaudin, Maine, right smack dab in the middle.
Yeah. So the total mileage is 2,200.
So when did you do that?
I started April 10th of this year.
And I started in Contaudin on September 24th of this year.
So it's about five and a half months to me.
Okay. Wow.
Wow. So was this something you'd always dreamed of doing?
Is this was it a was it a pandemic?
Like, OK, let's relook at our life and what are we doing and putting your
thought maybe a lot of people that I've talked to are just like at that point.
It's like, OK, what's next?
And this is not fulfilling me.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, there's a convergence of three different factors that were all kind of
happening at the same time that kind of was the fine point to me
making the decision to do this.
First of all, my background was an Ironman.
Well, the ultra distance swim bike runs as a total of 112 miles.
And I did that for 10 years.
And really, my my identity was formed through Ironman.
How many?
12, including the World Championship.
Wow.
I actually interviewed him on the podcast in March of last year.
He did like Placid and.
OK, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, that was my life.
I was even on the board of Ironman and, you know,
end up doors for women to participate in a sport and increase the women participation.
So it was it was everything.
But then I experienced an injury.
I had a tear in my back called the multifidus.
And the bottom line is I can no longer run and I can't I can ride a bike.
But when I'm used to doing 112 miles at 22 miles an hour and now I can only do 14.
That's just not fun anymore.
So so that that part of me and I try to replace it with, you know,
lifting weights in the gym and all this other stuff.
But being outside all day, I really missed that.
And then for my company, my job at work, I built a department from scratch.
And it was, you know, my job is to work myself out of a job.
The cliche is true.
And so I'm working entrepreneur at work and this was reaching steady state grew.
This department to 300 people, project managers around the world, 24 countries.
Wow.
And so so I was I was kind of reaching that kind of culmination.
I was looking for something next, another challenge, something to fill that in.
And the company was that my division was sold off to start a new division.
The time was good.
It was a good time.
It was not disruptive.
It was it was it was an easy transition out.
Right.
And then the third factor is I got diagnosed with melanoma.
Oh, wow.
And so I took some time off work about five weeks off work to get that treated.
And while I was there, I saw a map of the Appalachian Trail on a friend of mine's wall.
And I was obsessed.
I was studying it all the little lines, all the little twists and turns.
And it felt like a bolt of lightning hit me from the sky.
And it was that moment that I was like, this is it.
This is this is this is going to scratch the endurance itch.
I need an adventure.
This will bring me back to my core self.
And two months later, I was on trail.
Wow.
Love that.
And by the way, a little detail.
I've never hiked before.
I've never camped before.
Okay.
Before honey, I'm not kidding when I say I'm all princess.
And that's such a why not today story.
It's like jumped it and did it.
And like this podcast, I had never done this.
And literally in my first episode, I reported on a Saturday.
I launched on a Saturday, I recorded it Friday at three o'clock because I was scared.
I'm like, okay, I just got to do it.
If you don't, if you think about it too much, then you'll talk yourself out.
Yeah.
And you know, and so that's part of the podcast is I don't edit it.
It's because it's just it is as it is.
And it's real.
Yeah.
And I love that you've never been camping.
And yeah, my idea of, I always say my idea of rooms of camping is when the room surface
cuts off at midnight.
So I couldn't imagine the camping part.
Oh, that's great.
Did you go by yourself?
Yeah, I did.
I did the entire trek by myself, but I was never alone.
So there was lots of other people who, who, who also are on the trail.
So in fact, the first time I, the first campsite, I logged in and there was this ring of these
very experienced hikers and they were, you know, very rough.
They had their beards and their skin was weathered and their hair was like long and unkept and
their clothes look like they slept in it for a month, probably more honestly.
And they were having the fire and they're cooking their food over the fire.
I mean, these people were legit.
And this one guy had a tie dye shirt and the shirt said, I have weed for sale.
Right.
So this is, this is the kind of people.
Right.
And I'm not people that I would normally hang out with.
And I walked up and I had my little pearl earrings on.
And I was about to ask how pretty were you dressed during this thing?
You know, all my clothes are brand new, you know, and I walk in and I'm like, catch a
tent.
And the guy who was wearing this, that shirt I've got weed for sale.
His name was Woodstock.
We all have trail names.
His name was Woodstock, which was quite appropriate.
And he had a deep, deep Southern accents, so deep it almost required a translator.
And he says, well, shit.
He said, I've been out here all my life and I still don't know what I'm doing out here.
And all the other people just laughed and all, and the whole gang got up and they walked
me around and they showed me the ropes and they taught me how to look for a campsite
and make sure the tree is not going to fall a branch on your head and look out for snakes
and make sure you look for this kind of flat land.
And they adopted me.
And so that story, you know, I think we need to be risk being vulnerable to people who
are quite intimidating, right?
Because they were purely experts and just be willing to laugh at yourself and be messy
and look like a fool.
And it opens up new doors.
It's certainly dead.
Yeah, that's really the message I'm trying to get across is we need to live our life
and just do the things and not be afraid.
And I was talking to somebody yesterday about doing events and things for women.
And she's like, you know, we were talking about people who just say they're going to
do something and then don't follow through.
And there's, you know, if you don't have to pay, there's not a lot of skin in the game
I found.
And what she was saying that, you know, a lot of people, they say they want to do it,
but they're scared to walk out of their house or scared to walk in a new situation or scared
to meet new people.
Yeah.
Which is so true.
So, well, I guess you have amazing stories.
So I love that story.
So what was your, what would you call it, your trail name?
My trail name.
My trail name is Phoenix Rising.
Okay.
Love that.
And everybody called me Phoenix for short.
So whenever I'm on the trail, nobody knew what my real name is.
They only knew me as Phoenix.
Oh, wow.
That's really cool.
Yeah.
All right.
So what were the hardest parts that really took courage or once you started, you're
like, okay, I'm good or were you ready to quit or?
No.
No, it was so hard.
It was so hard.
And, you know, I need to stop saying it was so hard because we need to define hard, right?
And put words to it.
And wait, I think that I've got a friend that says I can do hard things.
Yes.
Yes, for sure.
But this, this made an Ironman look like a walk in the park.
Oh, wow.
And the, I, the, I'll just give a couple of stats.
Um, total, there's 550,000 feet of elevation gain, which is the equivalent of climbing
Mount Everest 18 times.
Oh my goodness.
And the trail, the train is best described as the longest obstacle course in the world.
So if you're not dealing with mosquitoes, you're dealing with heat and then all of the
heat rash and the, um, your heat crystals, the salt crystals burrow into your skin and
create a lot of swelling, especially on your back where your backpack is.
Um, if it's not that, then it's mud and rain.
In fact, there was over 60% of the days were rainy and even those non rain days were wet
and soggy and mucky.
And there were, I'm not even exaggerating states miles and miles and miles of nothing
but mud.
And if you can think about what that is, it's basically paid vegetation.
So if you take a bag of spinach that's rotten and then hail, that's what I stopped like.
Oh, that's the mud.
And so I'm slipping and sliding in that mud.
And literally there was one day where I was just trying, I mean, I slipped three times
in quick succession.
I just could not go in a straight line.
And I took my, my stick pole, am I allowed to cuss?
Sure.
I was fine.
I was in my pole and I'm sitting in this mud and I'm literally dripped all over because
this is the third time I fell that day.
And I took my stick and I go, you fucking beat you.
I screamed just because it was, it was, it just could not walk in a straight line.
It was so hard.
And then if that's not finished, then you have technical climbing.
So literally you're climbing up rock faces and I've never climbed before and I've got
this big pack and my balance is off.
You did like practice or train or you just did it.
You know what, all what I was doing sounds like something silly or I'm gonna say stupid
that I would do.
Let's just do it.
The success rate is only 20%, 20, 25% depending on who you talk to.
Wow.
I would not be surprised if it's less than 20% this year because twice we had states
of emergency, we had the fires, the Canadian fires.
First thing.
Yeah, that really caused me an adverse atubation, which required me to get some medical attention.
ASAP, I was, I couldn't even say the words, I can't breathe.
Oh, wow.
That was too hard for me.
And there was a hurricane, two days after the hurricane, there was another flood that
came, it was two days of bolting rain.
So when I went through the 100 mile wilderness, which is right before you reach Katahata in
Maine, really rugged area, the river crossings were up to your waist and it was so strong.
We did have one guy who died, we had another guy who got trapped under the water and had
to get popped out of a stick.
So they did have some workarounds, I took the workarounds, but that added like 15 miles
to the trail.
So it was just dangerous at every turn.
But in that process, you know, you type 12 hours a day, you have to collect your water,
you have to filter your water, you have to certify and boil your water before you can
drink anything.
So you do all of those things and you just wake up and you do it again.
You are exhausted and you are at your core.
And what I found in all of that, besides we can do hard things, but it stripped you away
of all of the things, right?
We surround ourselves with pink and fluffy and crystal like I'm doing here.
You know, you surround yourself with I drive a fancy car, that makes me cool, you know,
before you have these friends or you had this makeup to hide, you know, the wrinkles, you
know, all the things.
I was raw.
I was vulnerable.
I was at my, my most vulnerable moments.
And what I found was I'm enough.
I'm enough as I am.
I can do this.
I will do this.
And so I emerge with this kind of sense of power that's inside of me of knowing that I
don't need all the things.
I'm unstoppable as I am without all the props.
So that was,
You were pretty unstoppable before.
All your Ironman and success and stuff in your business.
Yeah.
Well, I've always had that, you know, kind of innate drive to do tough things, but this,
this doesn't lie to candle to anything because it's such a, such a paradox to who I am,
right?
Yeah.
You know, even doing an Ironman, you know, at the end of the day, you go back home to
a shower and fresh clothes and a bed, you know, when you're done.
Yeah.
Here you go to bed with those wet, soggy, muddy clothes that smells like decayed spinach
and you wear those clothes day in and day out.
I was going to say, are there, there stops places that you.
Yeah, but there's places to stop.
There's places to do hostels, do laundry, people there.
Yeah.
About every five days or so on average depends on where you are.
So at the beginning and at the end, you're more out wilderness and it's more rugged and
there might be, you know, five to seven days before getting to a town and a hostel that
will take you in and do laundry and you have a bed to sleep in.
Right.
So the middle states from Virginia to about New York, it's a lot more populated.
And so if you want to, you can go into town every day.
Not everybody does that.
So you have a lot more choices in those times.
So did you have people come and hike with you that you knew and join you?
Yeah.
Yeah, that was really cool.
So I blogged and I just kind of like the Piper, the further along I went, the more people
I accumulated, which was really fun.
So I'm sorry.
I said, that's fun that people are joining you.
Yeah.
And like my old professor from business school, he came out and I had another friend who actually
he's a friend now.
I actually never met him, but he's in the industry.
He's a medical device.
He's got like 16 patents in his name.
He's completely obsessed with the story and he came out on trail and gave me some new
shoes.
Wow.
And then I went to lunch, that was really special and then there's like random strangers
who would also come out and they would set up hamburgers.
They would grill hamburgers for you.
They would take your trash that you've been accumulating.
You have to hike out your trash.
They would give you a chair to sit in.
That was glorious, a chair.
And then they would, various snacks or whatever.
And that was called trail magic and you get a lot of trail magic, but he's random people
for random acts of kindness.
Yeah.
It was really cool.
Oh, that's really cool.
You still have a motivator.
You want to do it.
So fun.
Did you hike?
You didn't say it was fun.
Do you hike with people the whole time or are there parts where you're by yourself?
So you're with a bubble.
So I was by myself, but I was never alone.
So you could sit at a shelter, which is a three-sided structure to help you get out of
the rain.
And those are about every eight miles or so.
And so you could sit in one of those shelters and sit there for an hour and you'll have
maybe three people who will pass you.
Two of them you might already know and it will be this long lost reunion.
And then one person you just met that day.
So you end up, if you've ever run a race or a marathon or something, you know, it's always
crowded at the beginning, but then towards the end, you end up kind of leapfrogging
with the same people who are your pace.
And that's about what it's like.
Yeah.
Were there people that go the other direction or does everybody go north?
About 80% of the trail goes from south to north and then the rest of them goes from
north to south, they have to start around July because of the snow and the rain and
all that.
And then other people do flip-flops.
So they'll do kind of sections of the trail and flip around to get theirs done.
But significant majority goes from south to north.
To hike the whole trail, is it you do it all in one time or do some people do a little
bit here and a little bit there?
Also what your goal is to be called a through hiker and to be recognized by ATC, which is
the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, you need to do all 2,200 miles within the same calendar
year.
So most people don't have luxury of an entire year to do this.
So they might split it up a little bit and have some more rest.
Other people, they are not interested in the title through hiker.
And they just do a weekend and 3 weeks at a time and it will take them 20 years to do
the whole trail.
And then other people not even interested in doing the whole trail, they'll just do section
hikers and they'll do a sections at a time.
So we're all mixed together.
Yeah.
So how many people did it like you, start to finish?
About, I think the number is 3,000 each year.
Wow.
Why?
Maybe 20% or so, maybe a little bit more, maybe a little bit less, actually finish.
Wow.
So many cool, I'm sure you have so many lessons and stories and.
Yes, yes, I've been doing a lot of talks, which is really fun.
So I do give a talk about setting big audacious goals and sticking with it and all that other
stuff.
So I've been quick to my alma mater and a couple of universities and whatnot.
So it's really fun.
I'm really happy to, if anybody's listening, that he's looking for a speaker, I love it.
I can talk about it all day.
I've actually thought about taking this podcast and making it into more of a membership that
people can join and they get more access to whoever the speaker is.
I have a couple of things to do book clubs with.
I don't know.
We'll talk about that.
These other fun ideas.
Yeah.
So did you go back to work?
Well, it was a piece of cake.
With the company, my division was sold off.
And so, and honestly, it's time for a new chapter.
And so I am interested.
So I'm just now starting my interview process.
I took a month off.
So the month of October, I just really slept.
I mean, consistently slept and recovered.
My knees still are really jacked up and all my tendons are messed up.
And so November is when I really have just started the networking and looking for a job.
So it'll be a while.
Looking for something totally different.
No, I'm going to stay in the same industry by a pharmaceutical and because I'm looking
for a leadership position, those are those are a little bit harder to come by.
So the right moment will show up when it's ready.
You never know who might listen to podcasts.
Who knows?
Yeah.
So what was the biggest thing you missed about the luxuries of home?
Flumming.
Yeah.
There's one blog that I wrote right about and that's Pooping in the Woods.
It is a whole other experience.
Like normally our business, what I call it, normally we just don't even think about it,
right?
Right.
But you have to move about your business.
Out in wilderness.
It is kind of take a hole.
You have to make sure you're not going to fall down into that hole.
You got to hold onto a tree.
Hopefully you're not, you know, you're on this big slant and, you know, God help you
if there's snakes and prism.
And bears and it's like just to do the one thing that we all have to do.
It's much more complicated.
Oh wow.
Did you see bears and snakes?
20.
Yeah.
20 bears.
One of them, most of them, they're very, there's nothing to be afraid of.
And but there was one that was a little bit more curious and hung around more than that
I would like him to.
So we tried to scoot him off and he was just too hungry and too curious to know what was
going on.
Snakes.
Oh my gosh.
Let's just say I'm not afraid of snakes before I was afraid of snakes, but now I guess
through repeat exposure, I am no longer afraid of snakes.
There's tons of them.
Rattlers, black snakes, red snakes, spiders and everything in between.
All the bugs.
Yeah.
So what's your next adventure?
You know, I don't know.
I don't know.
So I think my first goal is to get a new job and to, you know, got to replace the coffers,
you know, living a year without income and really without health insurance to speak of.
That's a consideration.
So I've got to be responsible again.
But you know, who knows, like I'm volunteering out on the trail.
I just got certified as a hike leader by the Potomac Appalachian Trail.
I plan to volunteer and do some trail maintenance.
I want to go out there and do some trail magic and give a bunch of happiness and love to
random strangers.
I think that's, I can't wait to do that.
And then I started, you know, now that I know that I can walk like a chimp.
I'm starting to race walk, which is a whole other thing.
So I, I, I'm just, my goal is to race walk a marathon.
So that's, so it's not running anymore, but by golly, I can walk the thing.
I can walk, but I'm not going to race walk, but I'll walk around Lake Ann with you anytime.
I will do that anytime.
In fact, we're doing a turkey trot for Thanksgiving.
We do walking around Lake Ann, which for those person that aren't local, it's a whole mile
and a half around.
And we're so strenuous that we literally, at the first time I did it, I said it was
a 10K and my brother's like, it is not a 10K.
Well my last name is Kane.
I'm like, there are at least 10 of us there.
But we walk around half the lake and you know, when you have your water stop, we have mimosas
stop.
So we have to walk around the lake for mimosas.
Cause you know,
We're going to get along this fine.
Yes, exactly.
So how I always ask people, how would you empower somebody else to do the courageous thing
to say why not today?
Not necessarily have to do an Ironman or a Appalachian trail hunt, but how would you
refer somebody else?
This is a little bit extreme and I don't think the message is to do this.
But I think, you know, we, we need to go back to our core.
We need to remember who we are and the things that we love and dare to be that person.
If it's, you've always wanted to be an artist and really good when you were a kid, you know,
drawing and it took you away and you lost time, do that, you know, or if you like to
cook, you know, take some cooking classes, but don't be afraid to live and it just takes
small steps.
It doesn't have to be quit your job and do nothing for five months.
You know, it's, you know, you can just do it spread into your existing day, but give
back to yourself and remember that core person.
And when you give back to yourself and you remember who you are, then you're just so
much better at giving to others because you have that full tank.
So great.
And that's one of the reasons I do this is really to encourage people and it doesn't
have to be the big, it could be the little like, you know, some days it's just getting
out of bed.
And what are the things you enjoy and you want to do?
And yeah, we got to live our life and not be so tied down.
I did interview somebody off to go back and listen to the episode with Charlene Willis
and she wrote a book about, I think it's called I am enough, which tied into what you're
talking about, but she went to the ranks, the high ranks of corporate America and got
cancer twice and finally is like done.
Like I need to live my life.
And you know, we were talking about the whole health insurance thing when I quit my job,
people like, what are you going to do about insurance?
I'm like, I'm going to pay for it.
She's like, I had amazing insurance and my job that paid me, they gave me the main amazing
insurance made me sick with all the stress.
So you know, there's definitely trade off.
So yeah, you got to live your life.
So I love stories and can't wait to read some of your blogs and follow.
So I always try to connect back to my dad.
And I think, you know, he had definitely a similar mentality.
Just do it.
Figure it out.
Just take the leap and he did some crazy things in his life.
And he was still active.
He had had strokes and he still did things like went skiing and body surfing and couldn't
use half his body because of the stroke and he only had one eye most of his life, but
he still did all the things and lived his life.
And you know, I think also the connection you live in Reston and I mentioned you, we
have mutual friends who you know from Reston Runners, which was a good friend of my dad's.
So it's a small world.
So I'm going to share all the ways to get in touch with Chris.
Is there any particular way that you like people to find you?
I'll just cut it in your blog details and we'll share that.
So you know, if you like the podcast, share it with somebody like it, pass it on, review
it.
I'm really trying to grow the brand.
So I do have for those watching or listening, I have why not today T-shirts and for people
to say why not today?
And why not?
Why not today cups and all the fun things to really encourage people just to be brave.
So thank you Chris for your story.
I'm excited to give you to know you better and thanks for everybody that listened.
And remember, just say why not today?
You never know.
That's great.