Date: 2004-08-24
From: Campsite near Guilder Pond

To: Mt.Wilcox South Lean-To
Miles today: 3.3

We had ambitious plans to do nineteen miles today and fell short, partly because of a late start but mainly because of continuing lack of motivation. I'm not sure it's a problem, though. We resolved back at Wade's (Karl's friend in Connecticut), when it became clear that Hanover by the thirty-first was unrealistic and my brother told me that he was leaving early anyway, that we would not be destination-driven. We resolved to relax and have fun, whatever that entailed, even if it meant missing Katahdin.It's difficult not to panic sometimes, but I'd much rather calm myself and walk in peace and rest when I want and enjoy the journey than I would stress out about the goal. This has been the dynamic that has haunted my thru-hike, that maybe haunts every thru-hike. Am I out here to experience wilderness, enjoy nature and other people, be led by the grace of God, have fun--or am I out here to push myself to the limits of my endurance and get to Katahdin no matter what the cost? Limitations exist with either purpose. And lessons are to be learned with either. Which lessons do I want to learn? I waver back and forth between the two, the destination haunting me one day, the journey the next. Isn't this balance what haunts everyone, though, every life? Maybe negotiating this balance is precisely what I am here to learn. I'm unsure how good of a job I'm doing. But I'm learning. My resolve to make it to Katahdin if it kills me remains, even if I have to climb it illegally, alone, in the dead of winter. I'd learn something then, too, if only how to die well. That's not encouraging to friends and family, and maybe it's foolhardy. It's definitely unrealistic. I'll be done long before then, and I have a companion, now, who has a lot of experience on snowy mountains. But the danger remains. The line between thru-hiking and hardcore mountaineering is maybe thinner than we admit. We are close to death out here, in the Whites, or Katahdin, even on the rollercoaster in the heat of Virginia. But being close to death is what stimulates us to life. Those who are truly dead are they who deny their own coming death. Those who are alive are they who grapple with coming death, who recognize it's eternal presence, who live with that awareness continually and shake their fists in its face. The truly dead are those with wan half-lives, who live in fear, or as Thoreau says "quiet desperation." I refuse.Pretty heavy for a three-mile day. But we spent most of the day lounging by an exquisite glacial lake. I've had Annie Dillard's 'Pigrim At Tinker Creek' sent to me, and I read the first chapter out-loud to County while we sat. It's an exquisite book, maybe the most beautiful I know, in Thoreau's tradition. And it's set along the trail in southern Virginia, on, of course, Tinker Creek, which we crossed coming into Daleville. I've been looking for the book ever since, and my Mom sent it to me in the mail drop that SteveO helped us pick up today in Great Barrington.Great Barrington was an intersting town, very cultured, with Thai food and antique stores and a ton of theaters, at least in the summer. Very walkable, too, with a quaint downtown. We're in the Berkshires now, an area I had heard of but never really placed. All these summer resort communities we keep walking through--the Poconos, the Hamptons, now the Berkshires--seem nebulous and undefined, hazy areas that we drift into and out of without really knowing we're there, other than the presence of rich people and SUVs. It's an odd sort of homeless feeling. But it's nice to see these places, Great Barrington especially. I wish we could've spent more time there. But we got subs and left, were driven back to the trail. The rest of the gang is headed nineteen miles, but we found our lake and decided to stay on this perfect summer day. County did faux yoga on the rocks and I dipped my feet in the water. It's good to be alone after spending a couple of days with other thru-hikers. And then, at dusk, we hiked to the next shelter.One other thru-hiker is here, an Israeli southbounder named Rocks. He's named that because he started in Pennsylvania, so I guess he's really a flip-flopper. He started in the worst of it, at Lehigh Gap--I can't believe he's still on the trail. His family said his trail name should be "Back in a Week," but on the contrary he made it to Waynesboro and caught a ride to Katahdin so he could actually do the whole trail. He didn't decide to do it until a week before he started. And he started with a sixty-pound pack. I can't imagine doing Pennsylvania with a sixty-pound pack. He's the third Israeli I've met on the trail, and the fifth that I know of on the trail, outdoing every nationality except Americans. I don't know why the trail has so captured the Israeli imagination. I would have never guessed. He's a great guy, though, and we had a nice talk with him around a fire we built to ward off mosquitoes. They're atrocious here and in Massachusetts in general. There's a great spring here, though, our first in a while. I think we'll pitch, just to avoid the bugs.