Date: 2006-05-08
To: Acquiring New Gear
Miles today: 0.0

Time is whizzing by with the rapidity at which rumors spread. It seems that I just got off the trail, but already it is almost time to re-embark on this adventure. Few people understand the desire to return once again to a life filled with treading endless miles on foot and sleeping on the ground.   Last year I concocted varied explanations in a nervous and unrelenting attempt to make people understand why I wanted to hike from Georgia to Maine. This year I have resolved myself to the certainty that non-hikers are essentially incapable of comprehending this aspiration. Instead I confidently assure those question-laden-worry-filled non-hikers that I do know what I am doing and am confident I¢ll have an excellent time.Preparations for our hike this year have been startlingly stress-free. Last year Souleman and I each researched gear obsessively.   We were terrified of choosing the wrong expensively priced item and consequently being stranded in some remote section of the woods. By the time we left the trail, half of our carefully selected items had been mailed home or left in hiker-boxes along the way. This time we have the confidence of knowing we made it 1100 miles and would be completely fine without any new selections. But, in an effort to lighten our packs and update our gear choices (we¢re closet gear-heads) we have been making some new purchases. This year there is only excitement at the prospect of updating some piece of gear. We eagerly await each new purchase and immediately plan a time to test it.The most recently acquired piece of gear is my Mountain Hardwear (MHW) Exodus Backpack. I entered a contest to win a free pack from MHW and was one of 35 applicants selected for their Exodus Tester Group. On Friday a MHW Rep fitted my pack for me. It¢s a unique pack design and has many exciting features including Velcro tabs that prevent excess strap material from dangling and making that annoying slap-smack-slap-smack sound, many stretchable pockets on the exterior, a removable water bottle pouch ¢¦! I¢m psyched to demo this pack on my trip! Souleman has a terrific new pack too ¢ an Osprey Aether 60. He picked this out for his birthday present (from me) and has been very pleased so far. Other new purchases include a summer weight sleeping bag for Souleman, replacement gaiters for me, and a new tent! After much debate (and one near-disaster in which we ordered, tested, and returned a much-hated tent) we have settled on a Big Agnes SuperLight2 tent. It is significantly lighter than last years ¢mansion¢ (Northface Roadrunner 23), though it is actually far roomier. The Big Agnes has numerous storage pockets which I am in love with and is tall enough that we can both comfortably sit up at the same time. It shall serve nicely as the Trailside Honeymoon Hotel. We received our first wedding present last week from Jake Brake and Low Gear, our beloved hiking friends from last year. They sent us an REI gift card which we of course promptly spent on hiking paraphernalia. The shipment should arrive tomorrow so we will be hurrying home to check the mail and vying to be the one to scoop the package off the steps and thus earn opening rights.   In scarcely more than a month we¢ll be standing on the trail saying our vows. And then before we know it we¢ll be back out in the woods hiking determinedly toward Maine. The excitement of returning to hike surpasses the explainable ¢ it most closely resembles the barely containable excitement a six-year-old feels on Christmas Eve (the restless euphoric inability to sleep or lay still). That alone is enough to keep a person on edge and excited. But when combined with the excitement and nervousness of a rapidly approaching wedding, the anticipation is barely controllable. It seems we¢re in the relentless pattern of saying ¢a month from now we¢ll be X¢¦¢ There are a hundred variables that fit that sentence, but when it is all summed up, a little more than a month from now we will be married and back on the AT. What more could a person want?