Date: 2005-04-14
From: New Roaring Fork Shelter, (NC/TN?)

To: Deer Park Mtn. Shelter, (NC/TN?)
Miles today: 15.6

Day 32, in which Jess waits out the rain, loses some water weight, brings hungry boys to their knees, bears witness to Rick Santorum's deepest fears as a hiker experiements with a platypus, speculates about the eating habits of political leaders, and gains a cult following: ¢The thing is, Break a Leg, weather conditions, extreme ones - they make you proud. They challenge the human spirit. Like Linux at horseshoes.¢ -Pacman¢I led every single game.¢ -LinuxThe night was long and rainy and I spent most of it curled in a fetal position, sliding downhill into the tent wall while simultaneously trying to convince myself I didn¢t really have to pee. The morning was frosty but clear, with the sun slowly making its way down into the valley. CJ and Scholar had both gotten soaked the night before and took off early, intending to make the push into Hot Springs. Pacman, Linux and I spread our wet and frozen gear over the pile of logs and waited for it to dry. And waited. Six hours later, we were ready to go. And thus was born the heyday of Go Light Go Easy: fifteen miles after 2pm.By the time we finally began walking, the sun was shining brightly, the day was beautiful, and even my shoes were almost dry. I was glad to have left several pounds of waterlogging weight behind. So we walked and we talked and the conversation turned to discussions of small-scale anarchy, empathic listening, and the degree to which Pacman is not full of shit - what could be better? We stopped for a break and the boys, who are almost entirely out of food, actually fell on their knees when I offered them wasabi peas; then Pacman ate an entire handful at once and doubled over in pain, while Linux busied himself experimenting with a platypus and a packet of Living Fuel powder. We moved on and spent the next four miles discussing a)the anthropomorphization of quintessentially evil pigs and b) what selected historical figures would eat for dinner (e.g. Churchill: port, mutton, plum pudding; Napoleon: suckling pig; Lincoln: the livelihood of the Southern gentry).Six miles from the shelter we ran into Feeling Free and Andy. Pacman began preaching the GLGE way. He said he needed to pass out cards with my picture on them, in order to attract disciples. Is this more like a Jesus thing or a Mao thing, I wanted to know, and he said it was more of a Mao thing, that I wasn¢t a religion yet. That¢s fine, I said, but I¢d like to point out that for the duration of this break I have been sitting down with my pack off and the two of you have been standing there with your packs on. Pacman and Linux looked at each other, and then sat down. Feeling Free was visibly tempted by urges to rest in Hot Springs and then join the Way; by the time we left she had appointed herself GLGE Social Officer and was talking vaguely about kegs. L., P., and I pushed on; we stopped for dinner a couple of miles further up and ate with Lefty and Poncho, then kept walking. It grew dark. I stared at the narrow spot of light cast on the ground by my headlamp while Pacman told creepy stories about Uraca Mesa in New Mexico, which is supposedly haunted. We reached the shelter at a quarter past ten - the air grew suddenly cooler when we reached the stream that was the shelter¢s water source - and threw our groundsheets down on the ground, pulled out our sleeping bags, and collapsed. Stupendous day.