Date: 2008-04-10
From: The Last Half

To: PA
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: fog

   My journal is under the psuedonym 'Crash Into Things' because when I set out to write these entries I had planned to make these essays as honest as possible. I didn't need the whole trail world knowing about my inner-most thoughts and feelings, I wanted to share with only the select few I felt comfortable with. Many people who read this are strangers to me in the real-life sense but I hope that through my honesty I am not a stranger to them. Each time I write I try to really draw my audience in with vivid stories about all the experiences I have out here and I hope that my writing has touched people in the way I intended it to. Every posting thus far has been true to me. I have not allowed myself, no matter how hard the truth was, to lie or leave out the parts that really mattered. Though the truth I am about to share is as challenging or even more challenging than many others I have revealed I feel as if I must be responsible for my own truth and share it. 'Poppins,' the woman traipsing about in the forest on the adventure of a lifetime is working to be as vivacious, brave and honest as 'Crash Into Things.' If Poppins is who I am, Crash is who I want to embody; every journal I write is a physical manifestation of the transformation I am going through to reach the high standards I have set for myself through Crash. These entries are more than silly essays about bears and what I ate for lunch, they delve into my inner sanctum of secret thoughts and they serve as meditations to realizing my potential. I am establishing here and now that I do not especially want to take responsibility for this certain truth I am about to write about, but because I have set a trend in my journal of sustained honesty, and in order to live up to the good name of Crash, I must share this with you.   I am a yellow blazer. I am a yellow blazer. I AM A YELLOW BLAZER!       (A hiker who skips an unspecified amount of miles by hitching)   There isn't a single 'purist' (someone who only hikes the trail, aka white blazer) out here who respects yellow blazers. They are pariahs and social outcasts and 'true' thru-hikers don't associate with non-purists like me. They talk behind my back and act as judge and jury. Regardless of my reasons I am and forever will be, despite the fact that I went over one-thousand miles without hitching and the fact that I plan to stop hitching as soon as my feet are healed, a cheater. A wuss. A yellow blazer.   This truth may seem a bit soft considering how I hyped it up, but to me, a person who wants to hike to Maine, it is a very, very hard truth. My original goal was not to thru-hike but after I set my heart to finishing I never wanted to cheat. For me, this trip was supposed to break me of the habit of taking the easy way out and every time I hitch I feel a bit sick because my goals are being compromised. Purists looking on see a cheater, and I see a cheater but after talking to my mom about how I was feeling, I have another truth that may be hard for the white blazers to swallow.         I am a thru-hiker. I am a thru-hiker. I AM A THRU-HIKER!   Regardless of what other hikers say I am not comparable to the scum sticking to the side of a dirty pool. If anything I am the glint and shine of the sunlight as the rays reflect off the water. In a land where many people have, and are, quitting because their hikes are not satisfying and have become tedious I still have the desire and werewithal to continue this pilgrimage. Since the beginning I acknowledged the fact that I would hurt on this hike, thus the name Crash Into Things. Any girl who has diligently held the nickname Crash close to her chest since she was three has certain expectations of what she would go through. Never, at any point when I was planning this trip, did I imagine I would get anywhere scot-free and since day one I have haurt. In fact, of 127 days, I have been pain free for two of them. In the past two weeks I have been trying to cope with Plantar Fasciitis, and because my original partner ended her hike because of this problem, I am taking it seriously. We can't afford to stop making miles all together so we plan normal days and hike maybe 10 of 16, then hitch the last six. Since day one my body has been riddled with health problems and I have dealt with them much better than any other person who came out here and quit. Feeling guilty about yellow blazing will only hurt me in the end. I called my mom and we talked a bit because I was feeling like a cheater and my stomach was a gaping pit of anxiety and what she said made me feel much better. "Sarah, don't feel guilty," she said, "you have made it further than most and you have hurt more than many. People who traveled West to get to California all did it differently. Some walked the whole way, some rode horses the whole way, and some did both, but in the end getting to California was the only thing that mattered. No matter how each individual did it, no one felt bad because they rode in a wagon part of the way, and everyone could hold their head high with pride. So what? You walked, and you rode, but in the end the only thing that matters is the fact that you got to the end and not how you got there."    I refuse to let others put me on a guilt trip; I am my own person and I will own my hike. I have hurt so much on this trip, that a car ride won't kill me and I feel it is the least I deserve. My spirit is strong, stronger than most and if physical handicap can't stop, I can't allow people to enforce a mental handcap upon me.    I am a Yellow Blazer, yes.    I am a thru-hiker too.      But most importantly,    I sustain the fact that I am a purist because I have never compromised my    own goals to hike another persons hike.    I have learned that purity is all relative, and if I am heckled for   protecting my own health and my own hike, I can open a pretty big can   of 'Whoop Ass'.