Date: 2005-04-24
From: Damascus, VA

To: Damascus, VA
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: light rain

Zero day in Damascus.My opinion of Southern life, manners and hospitality has changed for the better since hiking the Appalachian Trail and exists in sharp contrast to the opinion I formed during my 17 years living in the Tidewater area of Virginia. The small southern towns I have encountered are absolutely lovely and the people generous and friednly. I hesitate to ue the word quaint when describing the mountain hamlets because it seems so "Yankee" and condescending, but a better word does not easily come to mind.Thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail has only in recent years begin to appreciably grow in numbers and because of that there are few businesses that are completely structured to support the thru-hiker be it in food, lodging, or hiking supplies. Most are mom-and-pop operations in the widest, most expansive all-inclusive use of the term. Throw together a few pieces of plywood and 2x4's to make bunk beds in your old detached 1 car garage, toss in an old 1970's-period broken spring couch and some old paperback novels and you have a hiker hostel will hold 8 people at $10 to $20 per night. Throw in laundry for $2.00 to $3.00 per loads and $5.00 for breakfast and you have a nice little cottage business for 6 months of the year. This morning's breakfast experience truly exemplifies what I'm trying to say.There is a little local restaurant offering bargain prices housed within what may have been the local auto repair shop. I really doesn't look much different today, but the sign said "All you can eat pancakes", and that's all it took to draw me in, that and the lingering memory of eating across the street the morning before.It was barely 7:00AM and though the sign advertised 8:00 as opening, I walked in since it just seemed to be, well, "open". And it was. The friendly lady explained that she always opened early every day just in case they got a customer, but at the same time I did not pick up on this little bit of foreshadowing. I was hungry!I ordered the super-breakfast special of 3 eggs, bacon, hashbrowns, biscuits and gravy, and coffee for $5.95. The biscuits and gravy were passable, coffee somehow extremely black and oily, runny eggs and hashbrowns made of almost mashed-up tater tots. The bacon also sucked. But the people were just so nice that you just wanted to stay there and have lunch. Really!For physiological reasons unknown to me, the bowel habits of thru-hikers undergo a remarkable transformation. Eating scant food while on the trail and burning more than 6000 calories per day, one may go 4 to 5 days without the need to visit a privy. Oh, as one less gentle than I stated, "It's hard to form a turd under conditions like that". And then one day it happens without warning. It may be necessary to squat right where you stand; there is no longer any advance warning. Your sleeping colon has awakened and will not wait for you to find a bush to hide behind or do little more than drop trou and grunt. I can tell you from personal experience that it is unwise to barter with this natural phenomenon. The operative word is "NOW".So, halfway through the breakfast it hits me. Recognizing the only pre-emptive symptom I'll ever get I run up to the counter and ask where the bathroom is. The waitress laconically states that it's "over yonder" and gestures to the building across the way. She also mentions that it is locked and hands me the key. Not wasting time I run across the parking lot in that disabled and crabwise way that is required when trying to speed to the objective while not shaking anything loose. I try one key with no result and then the other with a similar lack of success. Even more crablike I return to the restaurant. The kind-hearted waitress explains that the key is for the ladies' room and it's the only one open on weekends and so I hobble back and somehow get the door unlocked.Somehow I make it safely to the seat and slump exhaustedly forward to rumblings that I refuse to further describe. Soon the job is finished but for the paperwork and eyes darting about, I spot the ominously empty toilet paper rooler. Damn! I crane my neck around the corner to the paper towel dispenser. Also empty! Double damn! I search my pockets for a handkerchief. Nothing! My socks are brand new, no dice there. Stretching my head around the corner once again I make a more complete visual search and spot a new roll of paper towels up high on a shelf. Salvation is at hand and I am saved. Praise the Lord!Returning to the restaurant I resume the assault on the congealed yolk of my eggs and shortly finish the meal. Soon I'm laughing at the situation. It's just another Appalachian Trail adventure. Would I go back? Why not? Hell, I even left them a tip!