When most people enter their seventies, they might consider gentle walks in the park or casual fishing trips as their outdoor activities of choice. Not Rand Timmerman. At 72 years old, he laced up his hiking boots to tackle one of America’s most challenging trails – the Appalachian Trail – alongside his 71-year-old brother Ronnie. But this wasn’t just a physical journey; it was a profound spiritual passage that represented the culmination of decades of struggle, healing, and ultimately, redemption.
Photos Courtesy of Rand Timmerman
Rand’s early life was marked by hardship. Growing up in upstate New York near the Canadian border, his family faced poverty after his father contracted polio and was paralyzed from the waist down. Despite these challenges, Rand excelled in school and athletics, but he discovered alcohol at age 13 – a discovery that would shape the next several decades of his life. As he describes it, that first drink transformed him from a skinny 5’8″, 110-pound teenager into “Clint Eastwood” in his own mind.
The Vietnam War pulled Rand away from college and drinking. In an impulsive decision after a night of heavy drinking, he enlisted in the Marine Corps and soon found himself in the thick of combat. Both he and his brother Ronnie served as machine gunners on helicopters, though in different regions of Vietnam. The war experiences left deep psychological wounds that would manifest years later as PTSD, though the term wasn’t even recognized when they returned home.
After the war, Rand pursued a career in law, eventually spending 40 years as an attorney. Throughout this time, he maintained what many would consider a “functional” relationship with alcohol – working hard, running marathons, and excelling professionally while still drinking heavily in private. But as he entered his sixties, the alcohol began to take greater control. His body could no longer withstand both the physical demands he placed on it and the punishment of alcohol.
The turning point came when Rand found himself hospitalized on suicide watch, entering the VA hospital for the first time at age 65 – in handcuffs. This bottoming out eventually led him to sobriety through a 12-step program and a newfound relationship with a higher power – something he had long resisted despite his brother’s strong faith.
Meanwhile, Ronnie had followed a different path. After Vietnam, he married their mother’s best friend (14 years his senior and a divorced mother of seven), converted to Mormonism, became a commercial pilot, and eventually a bishop in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. When his wife Edie died after years of declining health from strokes, Ronnie was devastated. His solution: hike the Appalachian Trail to find healing in nature.
What followed was an extraordinary journey of two brothers in their seventies tackling the 2,190-mile trail that crosses 600 mountains with 465,000 feet of elevation changes. Despite artificial knees, bone-on-bone pain, infections, and countless falls, they persevered – Rand ultimately completing 1,863 miles before a serious injury and hip damage forced him to stop, while Ronnie completed the entire trail with his son. 
The physical journey paralleled their spiritual one. On a mountain in New Jersey, Rand experienced a profound spiritual awakening, looking out at creation and finally seeing God’s hand in everything around him. For Ronnie, a similar moment came on Father’s Day in 2018, when a single ray of light broke through on an otherwise dark, miserable day – a moment captured in a photograph that Rand describes as transformative for his brother.
Today, Rand remains sober, walks eight miles daily despite his physical limitations, and devotes hours each day to helping other men overcome addiction. His message is simple but powerful: “Just don’t drink today, no matter what.” His story, captured in his book “A Spiritual Passage,” serves as inspiration that it’s never too late to change direction, find faith, and discover purpose – even if it takes walking nearly 2,000 miles to get there.
To learn more about Rand and his book check out www.randtimmerman.com.
