“Lonesome Trail”

AT Day 108

Miles Today: 21.94

AT Mile: 1741.5

(Thistle Hill Shelter [tent])

It rained heavily this morning and into the early part of the afternoon. Neither Geoff nor I had seen it coming in the forecast, so when it started and then continued to build, we found ourselves progressively more bewildered as to how such a heavy weather system could miss our observations.

Geoff was soaking wet through the morning, opting to go without rain gear and not having an umbrella. He kept saying that he didn’t mind being wet since he knew he’d be getting off trail in the early afternoon when we got to the road crossing where he’d left his car. He was only with me for a few days, and now he’s on his way back to New York.

It was profoundly good to have him here, especially yesterday. Sticking with the theme of everything happening exactly as it’s supposed to happen on this trail, I keep thinking about how much harder it would be to go through the thing with Plinko that I addressed in my last entry without having someone here with me in the transition. Geoff and I go back many years. I’ll allow myself to believe that he was here with me on trail yesterday and today because I might not have been able to take that sharp a separation without someone’s help like his.

It rained steadily until around 2:00, which is around the time we got to his parked car. He drove us to a local food stand market where a super kind lady named Dana bakes pies and a few other things, and she also lets hikers hang out on her porch while they eat said pies. When she asked me if I was going to be packing my strawberry rhubarb pie out, I politely informed her that I’d be packing it all the way out to her front porch.

For the record, it was just a mini-sized pie. But it was still amazing and filling in all the ways that I needed to find fullfillment after a rainy six or seven hours on trail.

—

It feels dramatically different hiking alone again. It’s also strikingly familiar.

In a way it’s also scary to me.

Not that I’m at all scared of hiking alone; rather, that I’m scared of hiking alone *forever*. Both figuratively and literally. And even though I know it isn’t rational thinking to equate losing a friend to being alone forever, there’s still something that moves my heart into thinking that way. It’s the reinforcement of a pattern that I’ve played through time and time again through my life–growing close to someone and then abruptly losing them.

—

One of my biggest fears in hiking with Plinko in the first place was that he would eventually get to know the authentic version of me, and then not like me for what he finds. I guess that’s what I’m afraid of with all the people I grow close to. Maybe that’s something we all fear in some way.

But I wrote about feeling that way all the way back when Plinko and I were first getting to know one another and sharing our first miles together. It’s an entirely different thing to look back and realize that the loss of this friend fits exactly into reinforcing that primal fear of not being good enough to be liked or loved.

Again… I had to say the same thing yesterday… I’m sorry for being so sappy and soppy today. It’s where my heart rests. It’s been a rainy day on trail.

—

My feet grew sore through the day, likely exacerbated by their being wet for most of the day.

Tomorrow I will get to a town to resupply. I think it will be my last day in Vermont. I need to check the maps though.

Tomorrow may be getting hot as well… Temps in the high 80s with maxed out humidity. After two days of heat it’s supposed to cool down again though.

Grateful to be back on the AT. In some ways it’s good to be back hiking alone. But no doubt that the isolation of being out by myself again–it brings back some really hard memories that I’ll no doubt be working through for some time still.

There are still many hundred miles to go before the end.

Wormwood.