Date: 2004-05-25
From: Reeds Gap, VA 664

To: Waynesboro, VA
Miles today: 19.4
Weather: scattered clouds

About 2 feet.   That's how far away I will come from stepping on a Timber Rattlesnake today.   Of course, I won't know that until it actually happens, and that's probably for the best.    Everything else that will happen to me today, before and after that moment, won't be quite as adventuresome.    I'll talk to Danny, whom I met on the trail yesterday, about splitting a hotel room in Waynesboro.   I'll take the first half of my day slowly, not wanting to exhaust myself on the long uphill.   I'll haul ass the rest of the day, trying to get to the Rockfish Gap Visitor Center by it's 5:00 closing time to catch one of the many trail angels that offer rides to Waynesboro.   None of this, however, will be nearly as exciting as standing five feet from a creature that can kill me with one bite.   Nor will be meeting a guy within the final mile or so who tells me, "Oh, it's all downhill from here. Well, it's mostly downhill. Actually. Well, there's SOME downhill." It might be amusing, but it won't be exciting.   Nor will be arriving at Rockfish Gap and discovering that I won't even have to find a ride; a ride will find me. An SUV will slow down as I cross the parking lot and a young woman named Pam will holler out the rolled-down passenger side window, "You need a ride into town?" It will be appreciated, but it won't be exhilarating.   Nor will be finding Danny at the Quality Inn, getting my body and clothing clean, eating Domino's pizza, and talking to my friends JT and Shaun who agree to come down and hike with me in Shenandoah National Park after realizing how depressed I've been. This will all make me feel comforted and refreshed, but it won't come close to making me feel in tune with nature.   Within the last 10 miles of my day, I'll be walking downhill, watching my feet move at an accelerated pace, and the corner of my eye will catch a brown clump resting where the trail blends into the brush. As I walk right by, planting my left foot about 2 feet from it, my brain won't even register what I'm looking at until I'm another step past it.    It won't move, and I'll stand there getting my camera out and waiting to warn two thru-hikers, Tennessee Mule and Just Do It, that I passed only a couple of minutes ago.    In the morning, if someone had told me that I would come about 2 feet from stepping on a Timber Rattlesnake and feel completely calm, I would wonder if maybe they'd been in the woods too long. When I stand there with Tennessee Mule and Just Do It, actually creeping SLOWLY AND CAREFULLY closer to click a better picture, I'll wonder if maybe I've been in the woods too long.   The snake won't stir until someone lets the tip of their trekking pole hit a rock. The first time this happens, it will jerk it's head, suddenly awake if it had indeed been sleeping. The second time it happens, I'll learn the menacing sound that warns us, "I'll do it; I don't want to, but I WILL do it," as it gracefully uncoils it's body and drapes itself across a few branches of a low-lying shrub, still watching us, waiting until it needs to take agressive action.   The surprising thing will be that I'll feel completely safe the entire time. As if I know what it's thinking. As if I understand that it wants less to do with us than we do of it. Most people don't realize that a snake DOESN'T WANT to bite you. Oh it will, make no mistake about that, but it doesn't want to. You are bigger than it. It has no intention of eating you and, therefore, would rather not waste it's venom on you.    But it will. If it has to, it will.   In the moment, however, I will feel so comfortable and confident that, when I see the rattler start to slither toward the soil, I will actually be tempted to crouch down with my nose close to the ground to see how close the snake will come, actually hoping that it brushes up against me.    I'll think about this, look at my watch, and then wonder what the hell I would do if it draped itself across the bridge of my nose and decided that that was a nice, new resting place. Concluding that I simply don't have time for that, I'll move on.   In the future, about 912 months from this day, I'll be sitting at my desk in my bedroom in Taunton, Massachusetts, typing a journal entry for May 25, 2004 on my Gateway computer. I'll think about this moment with the rattlesnake and how I actually considered crouching down so that it could examine the contours of my face with it's body. I'll think about it and be amazed at just how close I felt with nature.   And, maybe due to being out of the woods for awhile and perhaps having stumbled back into the mindset of "the rest of the world," I'll wonder...   What the f**k was I thinking!?