Date: 2002-08-25
From: Georgia

To: GA
Miles today: 12.0

Sunday August 25, 2002Finally got on the trail at 9am.   Sat around the Gold Pond and had breakfast. There were 2 other hikers there and Sylvine was there and he is so slow so dense, but he is good guy. He says, I have my breakfast, he is French, and he can hardly speak any English.   And he wanted to go to town and get stuff and then go back out to the resort to pack his pack stuff and I wanted to get going and get on the trail. Finally I just said to him, Sylvine, You can do this stuff when you come back out here, lets go, I am ready to go to the trail. He said, No I need do this, I need do that, and I said Come On lets get going and finally we get going so here it is 9 am and I have 9. 5 miles to the next shelter. And I think I will make it okay today. Slept pretty good last night but no hot water, but they only charged 15 dollars to stay and they brought me back out to the trail.   He is going to meet me at Hwy. 17 and hopefully he will have my mail drop package with my sneakers. Blisters feel pretty good so far. As I walk along the trail here it¢s a beautiful day, nice cool breeze through the pine trees and the blue sky above. I am thinking about Bill Jass and what a good man he was. He was a friend to all and you know Chris was a lot like Bill. Everybody liked him. He created very little controversy. He was always interested in other people, I don¢t think he ever really said a bad word about anybody.   I feel sad for him but yet he did what he wanted to do, but there were tough times in his life too.   I think about that and then what I am doing. Am I doing the right thing?   I feel guilty sometimes for doing what I am doing and leaving the family to do this. Me being selfish. But it¢s a challenge and Life is Very short.   Very short. If you are going to do something you better get out and do it. It¢s such a short short time that we are here.   And it¢s short time on this trail. It seems like long time now but I know when it¢s done if I get done and I look back on it, I know it will be a very short time. I know I will be glad I did it. And I think the rest of the family and friends will too. It gives us all something to talk about. Maybe I am justifying what I am doing by saying that but I don¢t know but we will just have to wait and see how it all shakes out at the end.   I am sure Bill had things he wanted to do in life and didn¢t do them. So it always makes you think and know there are others my age that say, hey, I would like to do that. But they never do it.    Just happen to think of that song we used to hear when were kids. Must have been over the Swiss Alps. (Singing)BELDERREEBELDAHRAABELDERREEBELDAHRAABELDERREEBELDERAH HA HA HA HA HA BELDERREEWITH A KNAPSACK ON MY BACK. (DONE SINGING NOW)Met up with a mother and daughter team, Lambkin was the mother and Geargirl was the daughter, nice people.   Now I just met a man who was bringing up the year who was a Husband to Lambkin and father to Geargirl, his name was SunnyDee.   Quite a family.   Hiking the trail together. They have been on the trail for 5 months now.   I am at the Sabbath day pond shelter and it¢s 3 and it about kills me to stop this early with all this daylight left.   But I think it¢s probably best, it¢s the lords way of slowing me down, because I have all the time in the world tomorrow and meet he guy that is going to bring me my shoes. Whether they will do any good or not who knows.   But this might be an exercise in futility, but it seems the decisions I make are not always what they should be. I THINK, I THINK, I THINK, I THINK TOO MUCH. :o) Anyway we will see what happens.   Just take it day by day. I am going to have to use what I learned in the AA program here. Take it one day at a time. One step at a time, easy does it, and think, don¢t drink and let go and let god.   So I will just take my shoes off and relax and then fix some supper after while.   Beautiful place. There is a nice lake down below.