Date: 2010-03-04
To: Sometimes I feel like...
Miles today: 0.0

Sometimes I feel like Sally Fields when she won that Oscar. You remember her reaction? ¢You LIKE me!¢ she said. ¢You REALLY LIKE me!¢   That¢s pretty much how I feel whenever someone writes to tell me they are enjoying my journal, or that some particular entry has struck a chord with them. Maybe not with quite the same ¢shock and awe¢ that it struck Sallie Fields, but it really does make my day. It¢s also a reminder to me about how the Trail just seems to bring out the best in me. I don¢t even have to be hiking, necessarily ¢ just thinking about the trail, or writing about it, seems to work.   As I mentioned in an earlier entry, I get to return to what I think of as my ¢core self¢ after I am out in the woods climbing mountains for a few weeks. Unfortunately, when I return home, I tend to get into the same old rut again, so it doesn¢t seem to last. It¢s like my wife sometimes says: ¢Some days, I just wake up grumpy! Other times¢¦ I let him sleep.¢   Ba-da-bing!When I first started a journal, before my ¢05 hike, I wasn¢t sure what to expect. I¢d read some other peoples¢ journals, and they all seemed to be very different. Some elegant, some rather plain; some very detailed, others rather cryptic; some with a lot of pre-hike entries, others with just the bare minimum three needed to post a journal onto this site. The process grew on me, however, and became sort of an outlet for all of the excitement and angst I was feeling about the launch of this epic adventure. It was also rather fun, writing what I wanted to write, and how I wanted to write. I compared it with all the academic stuff I used to have to write, and then all the stuffy reports I¢d had to write as part of earning a living. My journal became an outlet for that part of me yearning to be free of restrictions, and formality, and all the other constraining features of my work-life existence. I wanted to be FREE ¢ I wanted to be ME! And I could be, and I was, and it was great. I had fun with it last year, too, right up to the point where I was forced off the trail. This year, frankly, I had mixed emotions ¢ not just about the trail, but about my journal. I thought about not even bothering to do one. It would save me time, and would eliminate the weight of the Pocketmail composer from my pack, and I could just concentrate on enjoying life on the trail. But then I thought about how my family seemed to like knowing where I was and how I was doing and stuff, and I¢ve got some good friends who have also said they like to follow along, sort of hiking the trail vicariously, and then there¢s that Class of ¢62 Memorial Scholarship Fund thing, so I finally gave in and started a new journal. At this point, I¢m glad I did. I just didn¢t plan on doing so many entries! My preference is to just do them when I have time, and when I feel like there¢s some particular thing I want to write about. I would never have thought to try to keep up a daily blog-type thing. For one thing, I would never have thought I could come up with enough topics. I¢d also prefer to spend time writing, and polishing, a piece that represents some decent writing ¢ which is not something you can do if you try to produce an entry like every single day!Then someone wrote to say they liked what I was doing, as my steam-of-consciousness/what¢s-on-my-mind-today type of entry helped them to understand what I am all about. My entries were painting a kind of revealing picture of the life and times, and the sometimes rather warped world view, of this character I¢ve been sort of making up as I go along ¢ this Private Second Class Walter M. (for Mitty) Longhaul, intrepid hiker guy. Apparently, some of you find that kind of thing entertaining, which frankly really calls into question the extent to which you might need to, like, at least THINK about getting a life or something! (Just kidding ¢ that one was directed at certain people who shall remain nameless, but you probably already know who you are!)   And then certain OTHER folks (well, some of them are the same ones I just mentioned) started to complain if I missed a day, which really kind of weirded me out, if you know what I mean. ¢But hey¢, I thought ¢it¢s all just good clean fun, so why not?¢ So now I¢m pretty much committed to putting something up after my morning coffee and before I head for the shower. If I¢m lucky, I get the idea for something the day before and use my lunch hour to make a start on the entry. Sometimes, however, it¢s the morning newspaper that provides that day¢s material. As long as I can somehow relate it to the trail, I figure that¢s good enough. And I may as well try to be regular now because it isn¢t looking too good for ¢regularity¢ on the trail. No, not that kind of regularity ¢ I mean posting journal entries. I¢m still working on an alternative to Pocketmail, but I¢m not there yet. I¢ll keep you posted, and I¢ll do my best. But only because I know now that YOU LIKE ME. YOU REALLY DO LIKE ME!   ?Hmmm. I wonder if that means I could start charging for subscriptions¢¦.