Date: 2010-02-27
To: OH NO...!
Miles today: 0.0

The closer I get to my hike, the more things seem to be going my way. That¢s good, right? Depending on how you look at it. Is this string of things falling neatly into place a happy omen of what is to come over the next six months? Or am I simply being set up?I was thinking about that over my coffee and newspaper reading this morning. As faithful readers know, I suffer from this lingering angst about whether injuries may force me off the trail before I get to Katahdin again this year. I try to keep my paranoia under control, but sometimes it¢s hard. That¢s when I start thinking about how very disappointed I¢m going to be if I fail to finish ¢ two years in a row! Ok, disappointed is way too lame a word to describe how I¢ll feel, but I think of this as a ¢family channel.¢ I suspect that¢s one reason that people who fall of the trail due to injuries don¢t update their journal entries for months afterwards ¢ if at all. Expressing their true feelings at the time it happens is not just hard, it¢s unlikely to get them even a PG-13 rating. This morning, however, I¢ve managed to come up with a little better perspective on the possibility of failure. Not surprisingly, it comes from the Sports Sections ¢ the coverage of yesterday's events at the Olympic Games. Two items caught my attention. The first was speed skater Apolo Ohno who crossed the finish line in second place in the final heat of the men¢s 500-meter event, only to be disqualified for a bumping incident in which he took out two of the other competitors. So Ohno got no medal at all for that event ¢ to go with the other six or seven medals he¢s won at Vancouver and previous Olympics. The other was a comment about Lindsey Vonn, who left Vancouver after winning only two medals, and ¢failing to finish three of her five races.¢ Like she¢s some kind of a failure for that! Ok, it¢s reality check time! What are some of the ¢take-aways¢ from their experience that would apply to moi?First, you¢ve got to show up if you¢re going to compete, right? Just making it to Springer Mountain in one piece, ready to go, is already a victory in a lot of ways. OK, maybe it¢s not fully comparable to making it into the Olympics, but for some of us, it¢s about as close as we¢re going to get, so let¢s just rejoice in the fact that we are able to be there at all! Call me ¢Eddie the Eagle¢ ¢ I don¢t care. I¢m just thrilled to be on the slopes. Second, expectations ¢ especially Olympic medal-type expectations ¢ can set you up to look and feel like a failure even when you¢ve accomplished more than most people could if they tried their best. Not that most people would WANT to hike the AT, but that¢s not the point. My 400 miles last year was not a personal best, but it¢s not like I didn¢t want to keep going, or that I wouldn¢t have except for things outside my control. It just seems to me that the athletes who have the best time at the Olympics are those for whom the expectations are more modest. Then, when they win, they are the most excited people on the planet ¢ and rightfully so. Like the U.S. men¢s ice hockey team at the moment. Third, even with the best of preparation and training, shit happens! Hiking from Georgia to Maine has a lot in common with the Winter Olympics ¢ and I¢m not talking about all the snow and ice that Second Stage, Fahmah and others have endured over the past three weeks. I¢m just saying that it only takes one little miscue, one little ¢putting of the foot wrong¢ to send you off the Giant Slalom course and into the fence, like Lindsey Vonn. Hopefully, you won¢t take two other hikers out when make that little mistake, like Apolo Ohno, but here¢s the main point of all this:Anything can happen when the starter says: ¢take your marks ¢ GO!¢ Anything. That¢s part of the game. Not one can control what happens after that. No one. If you win, great: celebrate! You¢ve earned it, you deserve it. But if you don¢t, then you have to try to keep things in perspective. Hopefully, you wont¢ have done something absolutely stupid ¢ like the speed skating coach who yelled at the likely gold medal winner in one event to change lanes, when the skater was already in the correct lane. ¢Opps ¢ my bad¢ didn¢t go over very well with the disqualified competitor, but at least it wasn¢t HIS mistake. And even if it were, like I said, shit happens. So how am I trying to keep the possibility of failure ¢ of not making it all the way to Katahdin ¢ in perspective? Well, I remembered the time I ran my first ¢road race¢ ¢ the Cherry Blossom Ten Miler. I had never done that before, so I was really nervous. I certainly didn¢t want to embarrass myself by not finishing, but I had other concerns as well. So I wrote down my top five goals, and prioritized them, and that helped me to put things in perspective. I¢ve just done the same thing for my AT hike. Funnily enough, getting to Katahdin doesn¢t come in first.1.        Be safe2.        Have fun3.        Make friends4.        Lose weight5.        Do my best to finish OK, NOW I¢m ready to go.   Well, except for that little ¢fear of heights¢ thing. But that¢s a story for another day¢¦