The Long Awaited Halfway Post

"I think that I cannot preserve my health and spirits, unless I spend four hours a day at least-and it is commonly more than that-sauntering through the woods and over the hills and fields, absolutely free from all wordly engagements...When sometimes I am reminded that the mechanics and shopkeepers stay in their shops not only all the fornoon, but all the afternoon too, sitting with crossed legs, so many of them-as if legs were made to sit upon, and not to stand or walk upon-I think that they deserve some credit for not having all commuted suicide long ago" --Henry David Thoreau

Well. I'm halfway there.

Over halfway, actually. Here are some stats.

Steps taken-2,500,000

Miles walked-1,208.1

Miles remaining-976.1

Days in the woods-88

Days remaining-Approx 47

Times tripped, stumbled, stubbed, slipped, or fallen- 4,224 (4 times per hour, twelve hours per day...conservativly.)

Tick bites- 0

Mosquito/fly bites-infinate

Wildlife seen- two rattlesnakes, one copperhead, two moose, no eagles, a flock of turkeys, and endless deer, frogs, toads, newts, salamanders, crayfish, trout, and non-venimous snakes.

Injuries-blisters, cuts, scrapes, bruises, soft tissue pain, achy knees and feet, split heels, stomach ailments, and one headache.

Injuries avoided (thus far)-Broken bones, sprains, twists, colds, the flu, hangovers, and (for the absolute first time I can remember) zero allergy symptoms.

Days spent without walking at least five miles-4

Things gained and lost...

Well, this requires some more careful thought.

First of all, I've lost one pack cover, countless pens, one trecking pole, one spoon, and thirty five pounds. I miss the spoon the most. It was a good spoon and I carried it nearly nine hundred miles before leaving it on a rock after lunch. After that I whittled chopsticks until I was given a replacement by a section hiker fifty miles later.

I also started losing my hair more rapidly, a battle I've been fighting for five years (I'm 27!) and so as of this typing I have shorn it down to a short crop. I was getting tired of it being dirty all the time anyway. In return I've gained a few more strands of snowy white in my beard. (This is a great adventure but never assume that any day is easy out here.) But more on gains later.

When I started this hike I was sick. No physical problems, other than my weight, no, this was a spiritual sickness. Congestion of the soul, if you will.

Too many years spent in the same place and not enough travel. Too many days wasted in front of a flickering screen, both professionally and in my leisure time. Too many hours fluttered away on frivolities and trivialities. Too many friends ignored, phone calls unreturned, and way, way too much time spent feeling underpaid, overworked, and unappreciated.

Some of these things were my fault, some of them were situations I found myself in because of my decisions, and some of them were beyond my control. I'm a fool (are not we all?) but as I wrote some time ago I am not fool enough to think that simply walking from Maine to Georgia will solve my problems or make me a better person (or even a different person)

But I'll tell you what it has done. I feel scooped out, empty and clean, like somebody has poured half a gallon of metaphsical drano down my pipes. Like with every step I take the poision is leaching out of my shoes and in to the ground.

I feel like all the shit is gone.

I'm sorry to put it crudly and I don't mean to offend, but that word applies more than any of the substitutes we have for it.

Is it the woods? The relative solitude? The kindness and generousity of total strangers,the startling moments of beauty,the time spent pouring endlessly over my life just to occupy my thoughts?

Probably some combination of all. But most of all I think it's the walking itself. The trudge, the daily jaunt, the total scope of the journey itself.

I think there is a reason so many cultures sent their young men on journies to usher them into adulthood.

It's just walking. Nothing to it. You learn it at age two and unless something goes wrong you do it every day.

But here I have learned that sometimes the walk pushes all else aside, sometimes the walk is all there is. The walk is all encompassing, the walk is total, the walk is, once you get past the gear and the miles and the surface of it all, the most pure and simple thing I have ever done.

And it is shifting all my gears back into neutral.

I dunno. Maybe I feel like I have a fresh start because when I get home my life will be totally different. My stuff (what little I own could fit easily into a pick up truck) and most of my friends are in Georgia, but my family is scattered, my love is in Ohio and my work is wherever I next find it. So who knows? All these feelings I am trying to describe could very well be the product of every circumstance OTHER than the walk.

But I don't really think that's the case...do you?

Will this new found sense of purity last? I have my doubts. If my suspicions are correct and the walk is the genesis of all this, no doubt the vitriol will start to seep back in the moment I step off the trail. I guess it's up to me to take a fresh start (such a rare commodity and much to be treasured, indeed, I do with all my heart) and make the best go of it that I can.

I have high hopes. I've got a good woman behind me, a brain that works halfway decent when I get out of it's way, and some friends and family that will go to bat for me every time. Great things have been accomplished on far less.

I am both excited and absolutley terrified about my life starting a month and a half from now, because the unknown future is always that way. But by God if there is one thing this walk has taught me, it's that you never get anywhere if you don't keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Keep moving. Always, keep moving.

In the meantime, philosophy aside, there are more miles to walk, Virginia and North Carolina and Tennessee and Georgia to conquer, more mountians to climb, more weight to lose, and more shit (though not much now, no, not very much at all) to leach from my soul.

These few lines of Robert Frost are much quoted and thus diminished, but good poetry always rings true in the right moments, and never have I fully grasped their meaning like I grasp them now.

"The woods are lovely, dark and deep/ but I have promises to keep/ and miles to go before I sleep/and miles to go before I sleep."

Happy trails
PAWN