Date: 2008-02-19
To: Holding the tension of the opposites
Miles today: 0.0

Tuesday night, home from work, finished supper and am sitting here awash in amazement at the tidal waves of anxiety and delight that course through my days now. We had a guest last night, an '07 and soon to be '08 long distance hiker from Vermont, Bad Influence, who is now heading up to Greenville with Uncle Tom to join Rangoon and a few other fellows that love winter camping. Were I not preparing to leave for the AT in a week, I'd have gone along as well. I loved Mark's enthusiasm for trail life, and his instant understanding of the way that I am currently feeling. We had a great chat about the home built bush buddy woodstove he has taken to using, and some thoughts about hiking with siblings, taking care of feet and not needing large amounts of food the first two weeks. I realized today that I am maxxing out on balancing the requisite activities of closure for my finances and work obligations, with decisions about supplies and schedules for the actual hike. Its too much, my brain is bursting with details. I'm processing the stratified sequences of tasks over and over again, tucking in a forgotten item here, and moving around a neglected task to there. Its really not the trail that's getting to me: its the proliferation of to-do's required to separate from job, family and finances for the five or six months this trip could take. As it is, I have the house to myself for a few days, except for the pets, whose border skirmishes punctuate the evening with yips and ruffs. Its a bit of a relief to have the uninterrupted quiet in which to think and plan. I want to set up the empty stuff sacks in the living room, across the sectional sofa. Then place the necesary items on the designated sacks. After that I can bundle up the excess and store it neatly in the cellar, some of it labeled so that Tom can send me a replacement or an addition while I am on the trail.In the kitchen area I can set out 4 cartons plus a food bag, and get the supplies parceled out between them. V8 and I discussed resupply and decided to do a few mail drops sent to the establishments at which we will be staying. Inbetween those stops we can buy food locally. Sounds good at the moment, and that's the best we can do. I have an insulated pullover kit called a Kinsman from Thru Hiker.com, which is partially cut out and residing on my office floor here at the house. It looks like the ideal layer for winter trail life. Its bugging me that I don't have the oomph to work on it at night, so I have been thinking i will make a big push and do it over the weekend and on the couple of days before we leave. I have to decide what the greater need is, for that specific jacket or for a bit more slack cut into my schedule. I have options that I might not have been excercising, it seems.Three more days of work before I am on leave. My expectation is that I will be greatly relieved on Friday evening. But I have said good bye to quite a few people with whom I have been working lately, and with some it has been oddly sad, a feeling of genuine loss. I don't shed that kind of feeling easily or quickly.So a tangle of emotion is tumbling about inside while I try to be sharp about decisions and planning. To do anything really new or different requires tolerance for risk and change. I hadn't known til now that it takes a lot of patience and persistence, as well. So here we all are, leaving lives that mean a great deal to us, to head out onto a voyage that has the potential to alter it all, but which we hope will augment it ias well. Jung talked about a capacity for holding the tension of the opposites as a signature of growth. In a way, you can see how this might be the case. Its easier to choose one pole around which to orient one's actions: good or evil, stay or leave, yes or no, always or never. Its stressful to accept and to invite the whole catastrophe in for dinner. I just went through the list of '08 trail journals from back to front, and was able to read a few new ones that I had missed earlier. Wit and Wiley, Yellowjacket and Wrongway, are some more of the growing gang heading out soon from Springer. As cannibal would say, "Tick tock tick tock..."