We've been taking the past few days off staying with Caroline's parents in Chapelhill, NC and this morning, we're heading BACK to Damascus, VA for a festival called "trail days". Neither of us knows exactly what to expect, except that trail days is apparently something EVERY hiker HAS to go to. Most of the big name gear companies will be there doing repairs, replacements, selling new gear, etc. there is everything from foot massages and showers to live music, cheap beer and free food. This past string of days, followed by trail days will be the longest stretch of time we've taken off BY FAR since we started, which, surprisingly, seems not to be the norm. I briefly touched on this in previous posts but it is truly fascinating how many different ways there are to hike this trail. Even the word "hike" is loosely defined. There are a variety of different takes on the original "white blazing" which originated from the white painted marks or "blazes" that mark the path of the Appalachian trail.
Beyond the different ways of "blazing", there are just a variety of hiking paces, schedules, mentalities, personality types and reasons for hiking the trail that create fundamentally different experiences for hikers. One of the most common sayings on the trail and the number one piece of advice that I got from past Thru hikers is: Hike your own hike. People warned though that this is easier said than done and even the phrase itself can be defined differently. Like any subculture (and the AT very much IS its own subculture), there are expectations placed on you by others, norms, implied social obligations, forms of inclusion/exclusion, it's own language and just general components of community and socialization. For some, mainly college-aged students, the trail is a social experience. The shelters are places to talk, drink, share food, have fires, play music, often creating a bit of a party scene. The trail is about meeting people and experiencing new places. The towns the trail passes through are as much a part of the experience as the trail itself. The people, both hikers and local townies, play an integral role in the journey. Some stay in towns for days or even weeks, while others only stop for a few hours to restock their food. For others (Caroline and I belong to this camp), the trail is an internal, reflective experience.
I spend most of my day alone, often only seeing even Caroline in the morning and evening. At night, Caroline and I camp away from the shelters in pretty, cozy little secluded campsites. We often cook on our own and then head into our shelters to read or journal. I've enjoyed the times I've spent talking to people and hiking with others intermittently but I took on the trail as an internal journey and a time to think, reflect and be in conversation with myself. Thanks to the transformative Summers I spent working for the Appalachian Mountain Club at Echo Lake camp in Maine, I got that social-in-the-woods experience. Those Summers played a crucial role in the person I am today. In fact, I don't think I'd be hiking this trail at all had I not worked at Echo Lake with Caroline. That being said, I'm looking for something different at this point in my life. For the first time, I have no social obligations. There are no social repercussions. If I'm not in the mood to talk, I don't have to. I'm an introvert by nature, which may surprise some people who know me, because I'm fairly outgoing, but at the end of the day, I recharge alone. My respite and my way of working through things is internal. I have felt guilty my entire life for that. I wanted to be one of those people who spent all their time surrounded by others. Despite my desperate need for alone time, I judged and criticized myself whenever I wasn't with others. I didn't understand why I felt different and it took me years to accept that there is nothing wrong with that. Introversion is very different from shyness, unfriendliness or anti sociability. For me, it is most prominent in the way I process information and work through things. I am still learning to accept my introversion but, on the trail, for the first time in my life, I am allowing myself take as much alone time as I need. I can accept that THAT is what I want. I may want to want to have a social hike, but at the end of the day, I have to hike my own hike. Really, if I'm honest with myself, what I want an internal journey. This trail is teaching me to accept that. And to listen, rather than judge or fight myself. This is part of being in honest conversation with myself. Often more difficult than examining yourself, is being kind and accepting and just quietly listening to yourself.
All that is not to say that either Caroline or I is unfriendly or antisocial, but rather that this is an internal journey for us. But it is NOT that way for everyone.
Again, as I have often found during experiences like this whether it's traveling or moving somewhere new, being exposed to a new culture, there is no one, right way to be human. Over and over again, the trail has illustrated itself as a microcosm of the world and life. Only without the distractions and complications of daily life as most of us know it, everything is clearer. I wake up and face almost no decisions whatsoever. I have a limited amount of food to eat and I know exactly what I will be doing all day. We walk. Yet the same phenomena that classify human nature exist everywhere, only they are easier to see and understand in their unclouded presentation. Similarly, the same patterns and behaviors I see in myself in "real life" (like my introversion) also exist on the trail, but in a clearer, more discernible form, which is easier to examine. I don't know where that clarity will lead me or what it will teach me about myself and the world around me. Those lessons are still solidifying but one thing is for sure, I'm looking through a lens I've never known before.
There is nothing like looking, if you want to find something. You certainly usually find something, if you look, but it is not always quite the something you were after.
P.S. Wild ponies EXIST!!!!
