The object of the plan
My second night on the trail, I was staying at Hawk Mtn. Shelter in the Chattahoochee National Forest and I wasn't having a very good time. I could not for the life of me make the psychical leap required to drift into sleep on the second night of what would ostensibly be a six month journey. I crawled in my sleeping bag at about 6:30 and didn't finally close my eyes until about four hours later. That night I decided that I didn't want to hike the entire AT. At the time I had walked about 16 miles and it had damn near killed me, the 2100 more I had left to go stretched out like a vast insufferable and infinity. Hell is scariest in the abstract, where the ideatum everywhere and always outstrips the idea.
On the other hand, I didn't, nor do I now want to quit. I figured, and can now testify on a stack of bibles, that the trail and the person become increasingly more amenable to one another as the miles slip by. Now, 270ish miles in, things cruise a lot more quickly during the day, and nights at camp can be downright convivial.
Part of this general sense of well being, however, has to do with a decision I made on the second night of my trip to constrain the distance and time I plan on spending on the trail. This decision grows increasingly reasonable with every step I take and every time I wake up a three in the morning, slip out of my sleeping bag in freezing weather and stumble to find a suitable spot to take a piss. I came out here in part to figure stuff out, and what's amazing is how quickly 'out hereness' begins to work wonders for the sort of information overload of day-to-day life amongst late capitalism's finest banal atrocities. There is no philosophy out here except of a negative sort of dialecticism. Everything--cognitive excesses of every kind are no different than excess pack weight--percolates to the top only to be sloughed off where convenient. If there is no decidedly functional logic behind carrying something, off it goes. My pack weight has gone from somewhere in the neighborhood of 45 pounds to somewhere in the neighborhood of 35. My body weight has gone from a hearty 165 to a much more hearty 155. I expect that a good bit of this loss is the simple release of neurons from electronic bondage: a sacrifice of excess ions.
So now time for the decision. I am not quitting the trail now, but I am going to quit at the end of May when I reach Harpers Ferry in West Virginia at just after 1009 miles. My plan, though it may be pie-in-the-sky depending on what the next year has in store is to flip-flop and complete the other half of the trail (southbound, Katahdin to Harpers Ferry) next summer. If I don't get around to it, so be it. I've still got 750 miles to go and I'll be whistling all the way.
On the other hand, I didn't, nor do I now want to quit. I figured, and can now testify on a stack of bibles, that the trail and the person become increasingly more amenable to one another as the miles slip by. Now, 270ish miles in, things cruise a lot more quickly during the day, and nights at camp can be downright convivial.
Part of this general sense of well being, however, has to do with a decision I made on the second night of my trip to constrain the distance and time I plan on spending on the trail. This decision grows increasingly reasonable with every step I take and every time I wake up a three in the morning, slip out of my sleeping bag in freezing weather and stumble to find a suitable spot to take a piss. I came out here in part to figure stuff out, and what's amazing is how quickly 'out hereness' begins to work wonders for the sort of information overload of day-to-day life amongst late capitalism's finest banal atrocities. There is no philosophy out here except of a negative sort of dialecticism. Everything--cognitive excesses of every kind are no different than excess pack weight--percolates to the top only to be sloughed off where convenient. If there is no decidedly functional logic behind carrying something, off it goes. My pack weight has gone from somewhere in the neighborhood of 45 pounds to somewhere in the neighborhood of 35. My body weight has gone from a hearty 165 to a much more hearty 155. I expect that a good bit of this loss is the simple release of neurons from electronic bondage: a sacrifice of excess ions.
So now time for the decision. I am not quitting the trail now, but I am going to quit at the end of May when I reach Harpers Ferry in West Virginia at just after 1009 miles. My plan, though it may be pie-in-the-sky depending on what the next year has in store is to flip-flop and complete the other half of the trail (southbound, Katahdin to Harpers Ferry) next summer. If I don't get around to it, so be it. I've still got 750 miles to go and I'll be whistling all the way.
posted by John G at 10:10 AM
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