Date: 2014-02-24
To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

You know what's great about hiking? It's slow. It's a natural pace. You can contemplate, speculate, meditate, and even ovulate (assuming you have ovaries) while hiking. You can develop a better relationship with the Earth you walk on that you can't appreciate as well when driving over it.I'll probably keep returning to this same statement over and over throughout my journal starting with the words "I wish more people would..." There are a ton of things I'm sure I could be doing better, but today's posting will be about the value of going slower. I wish more people could take the time to go slower and take in what's around them from a different perspective or simply enjoy the same perspective slowed down or while stopped. You know how you can keep rewatching a movie you've seen 5 times and still notice something new every time? What if you applied that to everything you can without rushing?Guess how many things I learned from school. I have to think really really hard to name something I learned from a lecture hall. I've spent a lot of time there and what do I have to show for it? I don't know... I crammed it all in and let it go as soon as finals was over. I didn't learn a damn thing besides getting better at speed reading, practicing the art of bull shittery in essay form, and procrastination management. The value of my college education was exercising the discipline of getting things done that I really did not want to do.You tend to remember that you bought a $220 textbook that the professor wrote and used approximately 13 pages of it for his class. None of the material in those 13 pages are included in your memory banks but what you do know is that the next semester means the 26th edition comes out and all the students taking the class after you have to buy the new edition because a few paragraphs were moved around.Do the professors really care whether or not you learn anything? Sometimes, I guess. What seems to matter more is if their salary changes. What if we were to slow down and actually learn something valuable though? There actually is value in those textbooks (if not just spiteful bonfire fuel). But no one cares as long as they get what they came for which unfortunately tends to be the grade/end goal of moving on as fast as possible.Slowing down is important. The Appalachian Trail is important to me. So I will take it in slowly. I will write about it so I can get more out of the experience. This whole journal entry has been written as another reminder to myself. It follows an underlying theme that I'm trying to obtain from this AT thru hike - enjoy all that you can while you can. Unfortunately my time and money is limited. But I'll try. My daily reminder will come in the form of a book. It was comprised of a series of reflections to the author's own self, but it is now known as his Meditations. The author being Marcus Aurelius, the roman emperor who died in 180 AD. I hope to use this book as a pacing mechanism. I will read a few lines everyday and study them in an attempt to squeeze every bit of revelation out of those artfully crafted passages only to reread the whole thing again and again. It will be like my bible. Maybe I'll become like Samuel L Jackon in Pulp Fiction reciting those famous lines. Minus accidentally shooting people in the face like John Travolta.In other news, I submitted an application to be an Appalachian Trials blogger the other day. Zach Davis, AKA the Good Badger, is the author of The Appalachian Trials. Never heard of it before stumbling upon the website. I admitted to not having read the book myself on my application which was submitted one month past the deadline. On top of that, the 2014 Appalachian Trial bloggers have already been selected. Just got an invitation to join the ranks anyway.You know the part of the process where you have to show why you should be considered? Mine involved a description of how hippos poop. I must have made a good impression. I'm just going to assume my application got Zach Davis to look up a video of hippos pooping. Go ahead. Youtube "hippo poops everywhere". Do it.