“Love Songs & Broken Hearts (2)”

AT Day 95; LT Day 8

Miles Today: 13.8

LT Mile 118.6

(David Logan Shelter [bunk])

Today is the 14th of July…

And I didn’t realize that fact until the afternoon hours, when it struck me that I’ve felt this way before.

Today isn’t the first time I’ve been torn away from the things that I love on the 14th of July. At this point, looking back at the last three years, it would be hard not to feel like there’s something cosmic at play with this date.

I’ve been here, in this same feeling, on the 14th of July.

—

Two years ago, in 2023, I was engaged to be married to the woman I hoped to spend the rest of my life with. We’d met on the CDT, hiked 1500 miles together, and lived our lives together for the following four years.

I thought I was on top of the world. But I lost it.

On July 14th, she texted me to say that she was calling off our wedding and that she didn’t want to get married anymore. She said that she’d “had a spiritual awakening” and didn’t want to get married anymore. Not long afterwords, we permanently ended our relationship.

It destroyed me for some time. It led to a downturned spiral for the next 18 months, leading up to my departure for the Appalachian Trail.

—

Last year, on the 14th of July, the woman I’d been dating for the preceeding months called an end to that relationship as well. It was the only companionship I’d found since my engagement ended the year before. A year to the day from my wedding getting canceled, that relationship ended too.

July fucking 14th…

—

I didn’t even realize it was July 14th until later this afternoon. Up until connecting the dots and remembering the preceding years.

The morning started pleasant. We had breakfast at the Yellow Deli, and spent time lounging around at the hostel. I talked to some of the people from the 12 Tribes and told them that we hope to return after reaching Canada on the Long Trail. Plinko and I both liked it at the Yellow Deli hiker hostel. They treated us well. And yes, there’s lots of talk about their being a cult, which may or may not be true (probably is), but they weren’t too weird to us. They did serve rice with cheddar cheese melted over it for breakfast and insisted on watching us while we ate, but that only seemed weird in retrospect. Otherwise they were very hospitable and made for a nice stay in a donation basis.

We caught the bus back to trail at noon, but saying goodbye to Yama was hard. It was really hard…

I think I may have downplayed how much of a role he’s played in both my hike and Plinko’s hike. He literally started the AT on the same day as me, and as things have been going, we could have even finished together, the three of us.

Last night we stepped out to smoke together and talked with one another over Google Translate for the better part of a half an hour.

He’s become a really good friend over this trail, and I feel myself chocking up as I write this, knowing that he’ll be going back to Japan after the trail and it will be hard to see him again.

I’m crying now.

I haven’t had tears on my face like this in many weeks. I’m going to miss him.

He was with us at the bus station when we said goodbye.

Fuck. I’m really emotional over it.

Tears on my lap, sitting in the shelter table writing this.

My keyboard stopped working tonight so I’m having to write with my thumbs. It’s so much slower. What a scene this has become… crying all over myself in a musty shelter. Mosquitos flying about.

Plinko said the same. That he’s going to miss Yama, and I think only after saying goodbye did we realize how much he’s meant to us and how big a role he’s played in our thru hike.

I really hope we get to see him again in Japan!

—

We had one more mile of the AT today before reaching the “Maine Junction” where the AT departs the LT. And we turned left–to follow the Long Trail.

I knew Plinko was behind me, but I didn’t see him for around an hour after I left the AT. I wasn’t expecting it to be so emotionally challenging. But I felt it all over my body. It was only after leaving the AT that I realized how much comfort it’s brought me and how lost I felt immediately after leaving it.

Right away the LT felt quieter and more isolated. After a half hour I started to feel alone without Plinko, even thought I knew he was only right behind me. But I hadn’t seen him since the Maine Junction. And then I started to wonder if maybe he’d changed his mind. I started getting lost in my own thoughts and worries, wondering if following the Long Trail was a bad idea, whether I should turn back, wondering if Plinko was far behind, whether I’d still do this if I were alone.

I hadn’t felt alone like that in more than a thousand miles. I hadn’t even realized how important Plinko had become to me over the time we’ve been together on trail. But when he did show up at my first water stop, I told him how I’d been going crazy out here alone today. That I was playing through abandonment narratives and worrying that he may have stayed on the AT leaving me to fend for myself for the rest of the trail.

I knew it was all crazy thinking, but it’s where my mind lost itself today.

And then it hit me… Today’s July 14th. My body is literally primed for abandonment on this date! And somehow the story lines itself up in such a way that I end up having to say goodbye to my good friend Yama, goodbye to the Appalachian Trail that’s brought me so much security for 1700 miles now, and *thought* it was going to have to say goodbye to Plinko.

July 14th man…

The day of broken hearts, abandonment, and goodbyes.

Plinko smiled and told me he understood, but also that he wasn’t leaving me. The smile was at how silly a thought it had to be in the first place–that he’d just change his mind and stay on the AT after we’ve hiked together for so long and planned this out like we have… but then again… that’s happened to me before. And it’s happened on the 14th of July.

—

We’re now on the Long Trail and no longer following the AT for the next 160 miles. At the end of the LT we will reach Canada, then meet Plinko’s thru hiking friend, whose name is “Alaska.” They hiked the CDT together and she works up here in Vermont. She’ll be our ride back to Rutland where we’ll reconnect with the Appalacahin Trail at the same place we picked it up today. And from there it’ll be around 500 miles to the end in Maine.

As for the Long Trail so far, it is as promised–a different and more challenging trail. The trail is more overgrown and harder to follow. The climbs are steeper. And overall it’s just a more remote trail than the AT. It is clear that the Long Trail does not see the traffic that the AT does. And in a way that was part of what felt so scary to me; departing from the well-beaten path that’s become so familiar to me over the last 95 days.

It’s also occurred to me that my 100th day of this hike will not be spent on the Appalacahin Trail. I feel somewhat heavy about that, but I’m also accepting of it. There were great costs involved in deciding to hike the Appalacahin Teail this summer, so it shouldn’t be something new to me–accepting that there are also costs in leaving the AT to hike the Long Trail. But like the costs of the AT, Plinko and I both believe that it’s worth putting into this what we’re putting into it.

We look forward to experiencing the Long Trail in its entirety. We look forward to reaching Canada and being able to say we truly walked from Georgia to Canada. There is a lot of good that comes from this.

But… one more loss tonight had been my keyboard, and without that, writing this journal is quite challenging compared to what it normally is.

So on that note, I’m going to call it a night.

Sleeping in a shelter tonight with one other LT hiker named Sparrow. Wish I had time to write about her story–losing her husband, hiking the AT last year, and so on. But only so much time and I need to get to sleep.

It was insanely humid today, and tomorrow will be even hotter. So we will be to trail early and I need to get to sleep.

Wormwood.

With love.