Date: 2014-02-23
To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

I really am an advocate of something I call catastrophic probability. Its basically Murphy's Law and there's no avoiding bad things happening to you no matter what. Its just a matter of time. So I don't worry about it. Enjoy the risks you do take, but consider doing so wisely while preventing as many problems as you can. With that premise, you should be fully ready to accept the consequences of your decisions no matter what outcome or fault arises. Look at meteors for example. Meteors don't discriminate against the location of it's landing... In fact, that meteor got pulled toward it's destination, it's not the meteor's doing. It's your own fault for just existing.Well I guess suck at explaining my philosophy. Basically just have fun with your life even though you're indefinitely stuck in some kind of sadistic minefield for no apparent reason. Surprise! Can you imagine if you were a fish or something? Your whole life would be a never ending game of tag with no cheats. Getting tagged would mean getting eaten by something. Death by nothing but a face. Or getting swooped on by cold as ice, dinosaur eyed, flamboyantly feathered, talon toting eagle things. Or maybe a bear. That would be kind of cool.Anyways.These journal entries have been labeled "preparations". They're not for the most part and honestly my preparations are kind of minimal. They're mostly mental. The only things I have read up on regarding the AT was Paul Stutzman's Hiking Through (because it was free on amazon kindle), skimming through Becoming Odyssa by Jennifer Phar Davis (because I had a couple hours to kill at Barnes & Noble, and glimpsing at a few trail journals. The thing is that I don't really want the spoiler alerts. I want to discover it for myself. I'm not wandering off into the woods totally blind, but I'm also not going to try to control the adventure. I'm leaving room for errors to be made and also accounting for the fact that shit happens.This thru hike attempt is my solo project. It's my own personal adventure. Everything comes out of my pocket and there's no sponsorship. No favors are asked or expected. Just to get myself into such a position, I took advantage of living with my parents since graduating college. This one simple life decision has saved me over $1000 a month (a conservative estimate). Despite all my hard work, I wouldn't have much of a savings account if I had to pay rent out here on the west coast. I also wouldn't have a savings account if I wasn't frugal. That meant staying focused, refraining from dating, not getting any pets, and refining your hobbies. Despite being a business major, I didn't even bother investing what little cash I have. Experience is more valuable to me than gold. There's a reason why the patients at the rehab I worked for claimed I was older than them (most of them successful 40-60+ year old people.) I've had my sights fixed on this particular turn in life for a long time. The costs don't scare me and I'm always ready to adapt to whatever I have to work with.I've already spent over $1500 and counting preparing for this thru hike. There's a lot of different expenses. One of the first things was paying a visit to my physician even though I'm a healthy person. Took the opportunity to get a prescription for antibiotics (just in case). I also got an extra set of Epi-pens (epinephrine since I'm deathly allergic to bee stings). I even got a prescribed inhaler because I had childhood asthma. I haven't even had an asthma problem since middle school but you never know. If someone tells you that medical training for the wilderness doesn't do anything but add weight to your pack... it's kind of true. Make a mental note that epi-pens are about $300 a pop.If you think that's crazy... well I'm on the fence about getting LASIK surgery. It would be nearly $4000 but could mean not having to deal with contacts/glasses until I'm an old man. Those 4000 dollars alone could probably fund my whole thru hike by itself. But it would be really nice to not have to deal with my nearsightedness on the AT!On top of that, I'm wondering what the chances are that I'll get wisdom teeth related problems while on the trail. I opted not to get them removed last year because I didn't see much of a reason to do so. They haven't given me any problems up to this day. If they did start causing a problem while I was still working, it would have almost been a nonevent to just go get them extracted. Different story if I would have to do that in the middle of my thru hike. Probably more costly too due to complications if that were to be the case. Will look into how much that will cost. Maybe another $800+?I don't know. You also think you could do this in 4 months, but what if it takes 6? Maybe you'll be explorationally lazy and stay in more towns than you anticipate. Maybe you might need a trip to the hospital or have some kind of unforeseeable emergency. You budget for double or triple what you think it'll cost and account for the expenses that will undoubtedly occur or are a standard repeating occurrence such as your student loans, insurance, and miscellaneous expenses.Still have money leftover? Ok, what about the costs after you're all done? Oh, you want to check out if Portland, Oregon would be a cool place to move to? How long can you last before running out of money? Minimum wage won't even keep you afloat - it just will make drowning slower and living more exhaustive until you hopefully get a break and someone tosses you a lifesaver in the form of a decent job.If you're a young aspiring broke college student who doesn't have people bankrolling you to go do whatever you want after you graduate - just look at me. If you want to make life a party for the rest of your life, you can do that as well. But if this is what you really want, you really have to sacrifice. Just go get it. It's a matter of time and resilience. A river has all the time in the world to break through a rock as long as it keeps getting fed. In your current form, you're living this one life on this Earth and life will be the longest thing you do. It's also the shortest.Side note: I can't wait to see what kind of dreams I'll have while sleeping on the trail. The thought came to me because I can't recall the last time I even remember having a dream. It's gotten to the point that I forgot what it's like to dream because the past couple of years has mostly been work all day, shut down, reboot, and get back to work. I forgot how camping/backpacking dreams tend to be a trip in and of themselves.I need to revive my inner hippy and start meditating again. I just don't have a little sanctuary to do it Extra side note: Story time!"Two monks were on a pilgrimage. One day, they came to a deep river. At the edge of the river, a young woman sat weeping, because she was afraid to cross the river without help. She begged the two monks to help her. The younger monk turned his back. The members of their order were forbidden to touch a woman.But the older monk picked up the woman without a word and carried her across the river. He put her down on the far side and continued his journey. The younger monk came after him and after several hours of walking in silence, he began scolding the older Monk for breaking his vows. Finally, at the end of the day the older monk turned to the younger one. ¢I only carried her across the river, brother, but you have been carrying her all day.¢