“Father, Farther, Feather”

AT Day 67

Miles Today: 12.0

AT Mile: 1196.7

(501 Shelter)

The text message pinged my phone while I was waiting for them to call my number: 746. There were so many other noises and distractions from the back-of-the-house that I almost missed noticing the buzz on my wrist when it came through.

I turned my watch to read the first part of the text message notification, but it was too small and I misread it at first.

I thought that it said “This is your father…”

The next text read “Img. 024.” My Garmin doesn’t show photo texts. But when I opened my phone to see who it was from, I literally started leaping up and down in excitement, not even caring that I was standing amidst a crowd in a busy McDonalds…

—

Last night I paid $10 for a tent site at the Sawata hostel (or whatever it was called; it’s hard for me to keep track with all the place names along this trail). And I wore earplugs, this time because the front yard camping area is immediately adjacent to a highway and there’s traffic zipping by at all hours.

Apparently the ear plugs worked, because I didn’t even wake to the sound of rain until it must have been falling down for some time already. My bag was fortunately under the tent vestibule, but my shoes got more wet than they already had been.

Oh well. Add it to a long list of small discomforts and troubles that you get to deal with along a thru trail. I’ll probably still live.

The rain gave me an excuse to sleep in, but I was still on trail before 8am. It was a 12 mile walk to the HWY501 road crossing where I’d catch a ride into Pine Grove. There were notes that the 501 has historically been a difficult hitch, so I arranged with a shuttle driver in town to get picked up at noon today.

It ended up raining the whole f*cking way today. From the hostel where I camped to the 501. Once again however, I’m grateful to have the full rain setup that I’ve carried this far. The Patagonia rain jacket and umbrella make a pretty unbeatable combo. I even had my rain pants on for a bit this morning, as it was so cold when I left back to trail, but they shed within the first 5 miles.

Ride into town.

Post office for new shoes.

Shipped old shoes back home to a friend–yes, I collect all my old shoes after I’ve worn them out. I’ll do something with them someday. For now I have somewhere around 35 pairs collected from all the trails. Always the same shoe–Solomon XA Pro 3D.

—

I was at the McDonalds, about to get my food and take my ride back to trail, when the text from an unknown number came through.

It didn’t say “This is your father…” though.

Nor did it say “This is your Farther?”

It said “Is this your *feather*?”

Attached was a picture of the owl feather that I carried with me for the first thousand miles of trail, then lost a week ago.

She was a southbound hiker whom I’d met the evening that I lost my feather. It was an hour after I realized I’d dropped it. Then another half hour before I met the SOBO. She was going to camp there for the night, but I introduced myself and had her take a picture of my business card. I told her the story about carrying the feather for so 62 days, and asked that if she finds it tomorrow that she reach out to me by text.

Well… today she texted me while I was standing in line at a McDonalds.

She’s sending the feather up trail!

I was so excited that I leapt up and down. But stranger scenes have surely been seen inside of that McDonald’s.

—

The rain was enough that when I got back to trail I was quick to get up to the first shelter, which isn’t much of a shelter at all. On the contrary, it’s more of a cabin, with 12 wooden bunks.

It was barely 100 yards up trail from the 501.

Unlike the last time I got a ride into town, with Stranger, this guy was chipper and a joy to ride along with. I told him about the last Uber ride who was all bad news and refused to see any good in life.

I’ve been here at the shelter for the last couple of hours, listening to the rain on the roof as more hikers arrive and take refuge from the rain.

I may stay here for the night or I may go on if the rain clears. If I stay it’s a short day–only 12 miles. But I have no real reason to hurry along. I’ll get to Maine when I get to Maine. But I don’t want to get there and miss out on enjoying myself in the process.

Contemplative as always–

Wormwood.