Appalachian Trail Thru Hike 2011

Ok, so I’m hiking the Appalachian Trail, from Springer Mountain in Georgia to Mount Katahdin, ME. And I’m not really in shape.

Despite having almost two weeks to go I’m not really keeping up with everything that I should be doing. There are a multitude of things to finish and finalize.

To top it all off I only finalized these plans a few months ago. Most people take between six months to a year to plan this hike. I’m thinking grab a backpack, some snickers, a water filter and hit the road.

Everything else is over thinking.

So I went hiking recently. Not a good idea.

Turns out you use leg muscles while walking. Leg muscles that don’t get used in everyday life. And by everyday life I mean sitting in a chair, wether it is behind a desk welcoming customers to the restaurant or in the library staring at the computer for hours at a time.

Anyway…

I’m hiking the Appalachian Trail.

Something must be wrong with me, several people have asked, trying to ascertain exactly what may be wrong, what exactly caused me to think this way.

Wasting my time, why try, why do it, how will you pay your bills, how will you pay for retirement?

Today I stood in the Central Pond, previously the resivoir for most of Pawtucket, with snow falling. The dark chocolate colored mud oozed around my sneakers after crunching past shells abandoned by hibernating or long dead crustations. Rusting pieces of garbage lay half exposed, decaying, rotting.

And I felt alive. I felt awake and alert.

I heard the birds, the sound of snow hitting decaying leaves turning to mulch blanketing the floor of the woods ringing the disused resivoir.

And I was alone, in a mile in every direction.

Thats why I want to hike.

That is why I want to leave the awful Rhode Island drivers, all traffic jams really, behind. I want to stop worrying about finding a smoke free place to work on the computer, I want to get away from bad sitcoms.

I want the challenge that the thruhike represents.