Date: 2005-08-17
From: Dalton, MA... er Cheshire?

To: Bennington...?
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: broken clouds

It's been a fun-filled past several days, involving a lot of hitching, some riding of buses, being adopted by a tremendous family in Williamstown, an unproductive trip to the ER, a slew of phone calls, a side-trip to the Stop n' Shop pharmacy, returning to Dalton (again), more hitches, a productive trip to a walk-in clinic, and not a whole lot of hiking. The verdict? Well, I've succumbed to the American mentality of "medicate first and ask questions later". Yes, me, the reluctant-(at best) user-of-drugs, I'm now taking a course of antibiotics, at the (somewhat forceful) recommendation of...who to begin with? Mom heads the list, with Poet, Serenity, Free (fellow sufferer of the evil L-disease, although I _still_ maintain that I don't have it) all acting as surrogate moms in her absence. And then there are all of the medical folks -- Dad, Becky, Craig (although he encouraged getting tested first, a route I too would have preferred), Alex P. Even under this onslaught, I may have been able to resist, had I not personally come to the realization, during the horrendously steep descent from Mt Greylock, that I physically could not keep hiking. Exhasution, fatigue, plain flat-out absense of energy. The low-grade headache I'd learned to deal w/ (or at least _cope_ w/), although I now concede that it is _not_, in fact, a migraine, but something else entirely. (I still defend that it's _not_ a symptom of Lyme Disease, but it may, possibly, be indicative of some other bug in my system. Maybe.) But this fatigue? The need to stop every 15-friggin' minutes, sit down and rest, just in order to be able to creep along for another 15-friggin' minutes before stopping again? That's what did me in. Hiking just ain't fun when you can't walk, ya know? The last 10 days or so actually reminded me fairly vividly of my last few weeks on the trail last year. During that time, I wasn't really hiking to enjoy myself, I was hiking solely to get to the next destination; I had myself fixed on where I wanted to be at the end of the day, and I just kept walking 'til I got there. Then, I got up and did the same thing the next day. And the next. Well, the past two weeks, it's been a similar mental game. Just eliminate most of the hiking. The few days I actually _have_ managed to hike, it seems like I have to expend all of my energy on simply making forward progress. Which is frustrating, to say the least. I just wasn't able to enjoy what I saw. And, the views have been pretty tremendous of late. At least, I _think_ they are. As I said, my mind hasn't been on the hike of late. But, although being sick sucks, I certainly can't complain about the people. My fellow Pod members have been unparalleled friends -- taking care of me, taking over the decision-making process when I wasn't able to, being stubborn when I was acting like-wise, and just being there for me. It's been a rough handful of days, and I _hate_ having to depend on other people (as much as I _hate_ it when my body can't keep up w/ what I ask of it). But, as much as I bullheadedly tried to go off and deal w/ this by myself, they just as bullheadedly refused and stuck w/ me. It's more than I ever could have asked for, and more than I ever could have expected. Folks who have never personally experienced the AT and its surrounding community always seem surprised when I say that the best thing about the trail is the people. But, it's unequivocally true. The people _are_ the trail. Okay, now that I've waxed poetic... An update on my whereabouts. Since I'm currently physically incapable of hiking (I set a marginal goal for myself, of walking from the motel in to downtown Bennington, a distance of maybe 1/2 mile. Yeah, it whipped my butt, that 1/2-mile of flat sidewalk.), I'm taking a few more days off, to allow the antibiotics to work their magic. Rumor tells of a free shuttle that runs up to Manchester Center, and I know (b/c Grandma and Grandpa used to live in that neck o' the woods) of a fabulous bookstore up there... ??I've been devouring books lately (since I'm physically incapable of much else), and am always on the lookout for more. So, I may hop up to Manchester later today. I'll definitely be there on Thursday, b/c the Pod will be rolling in, and I refuse to lose those guys. So, another three days off my feet, and I will literally _crawl_ back on the trail if I have to. But that won't be necessary, b/c I'll be 100% (or even 75. I'll settle for 75.) recovered by then. Thanks to all of you for all of your support. I'm sorry that my e-mails have had very little to do w/ hiking and the trail lately, but I promise that that will change. Soon. Drop me a line when you can. Maybe I'll even have time to write some personal e-mails over the next few days...