Date: 2006-04-13
From: Baptist Church Hostel Troutdale

To: Baptist Church Hostel Troutdale
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: scattered clouds

It's so peacefull to sit in the shadow and watch the clouds passing by while the birds are singing and you can hear the sound of a lawn mower in the distance. Minutes are stretching to hours and it almost seems as if the earth has stopped to rotate. It doesn't matter what time it is and what weekday, even where you are is so unimportant. Life on the countryside has it's own pace. And if you have lived in a big city for your whole live as I did you enjoy the slower flow of time. People here seem to be content with the way they life (at least this is my impression. But I can be deadly wrong) even if no fortunes can be made in this small community.Today I sat almost 3 hours in the Trading Post and while having breakfast and dinner I watched and listend to the people. They have a fine sense of humor although people from the city would call them "Rednecks". I like this kind of people. They are friendly, cheerful and if you act in an appropriate manner they accept you even if you are a stranger. We have a saying in Gemany that translates "how you yell into the wood so it comes back" and that's something that is true almost all over the world. Getting along well with other people is so easy if you keep in mind this simple rule: Treat everybody as you want to be treated. The only thing people here should work on is their accent ;-) If they are talking to me I almost understand 100% but if they are talking to each other I have a hard time figuring out what the heck they are talking about. But I think this would be the same where I come from. It's amazing though how my language skills have improved in the past weeks. If you remember how fearful I was in the beginning it's really a non brainer now. It seems like the only way to get used to a language is to travel to a country where it is spoken. School is a good beginning but it doesn't teach you everything. The only thing that puzzles me again and again is that while having a conversation after a couple of minutes somebody askes me where I am from. How do they know that I'm an alien? I must have an accent too ;-) But I work hard on that. It doesn't really help though to meet people from all over the country because everybody has his own way to speak. So it's hard for me to pick up a special accent.I'm still the only hiker in the hostel and even if I saw 3 fellow hikers in town today they only went to the grocery store and then back to the trail. I'm not dissatisfied with that because the conversation in the last time was almost only about how many miles one has made in a certain time. Lastly I heard the term "Rat Race" which describes pretty good what I'm talking about. Although there are days I like to challenge myself I don't see it as the only purpose of this journey to make as many miles as possible (isn't it funny how my view on this has changed since I started this journal? In the beginning I even plnned to do the whole trail in 88 days. How ridicolous this was in retrospect). You can see this easily at the fact that after 2 months I'm only 500 miles away from Springer Mountain although I should be past Pearisburg at this time. Blame my knees or my natural lazyness, but it doesn't really matter. The only thing that matters is that I have to go back in less than a month. I don't want to think about that yet but sometimes it comes to my mind. So if there is any good looking (negotiable), wealthy (a relative term) and lonesome women out there that is looking for a middle aged overweight chain smoker (exaggerated, at least the latter) who loves to spent his time getting to know the country, let me know, because: I'm your man Mam! I'm really undemanding and even know how to cook and to clean the dishes afterwards. The only thing I don't like is to work for a living so if you are just looking for a cheap janitor I'm sorry Mam, look elsewhere. Applications with short CV, actual picture and bank statemant to mitterhofer[at]pocketmail.com (change [at] in @) will be answered promptly. But be warned: It's said that I snore although I think that's only gossip ;-)