Colorado Trail Post Hike 19 August 2018
/I am in Ohio. I have been here for the past 2 weeks sorting through complicated post hike reflection and thoughts. It’s now the middle of August. The hot humid summer air feels radically different from the arid heat I left in colorful Colorado. Sometimes the rich Ohio air wraps me in sincere comfort and other times I experience the oppressive sweltering residue clinging to my sticky skin. Right now, all I know for certain is that am I not prepared to be back in Ohio. I should still be on the Colorado Trail somewhere along the steep grades and treeless summits of Segments 17 or 18 or 19. But what one wishes with conviction is not always what one receives. And life goes on.
The hydrangea in front of my father’s house are in full fluffy white bloom. Three large green ferns hang from the roof of the overhead deck, their serrated green blades clinging to lengthy slender stalks. The mornings are peaceful, quiet and thick with contemplation. I sip hot black coffee while sitting on either the porch swing or an outside rocking chair. I watch the birds sweep in and out of the nearby trees, their chirps and tweets composing short melodic bursts that carry over and across the spacious green lawns. Occasionally the neighbor’s dog Teddy will stop by and stare at me with excited beady eyes before dashing off with enthusiastic momentum. I notice the cows in the distance wandering listlessly along the nearby pastures that sweep up broad grassy hillsides. Morning breezes cascade through the trees and then sweep downward through the dips and channels of the sloping landscape. Everything around me is calm and utterly gentle. And yet I am filled with aching anxiety and occasional stale loss which funnels along and through the stained recent ruins of my 2 thru hike attempts. I truly do miss the trail. And I know that one day I will hike again. I know that for certain. But the lingering questions surging through my mind – heady questions that keep me up at night – take me back to the pivotal moment when I resolutely decided to leave my gallery position, vacate my apartment, drive away from New York City and then attempt to thru hike the Pacific Crest Trail. Hindsight is brutal. One moment I staunchly believe that I made the proper spirited choice to attempt these lengthy hikes. And then that belief is shattered with brittle regret. The one thing I promised myself I would not have to face in the long run of this adventurous summer was regret. And sometimes in hallowed pinpricked moments leading toward furtive inward glances, I am breaking that promise. But only sometimes. And then to my great relief, I quickly turn away, move on and regret nothing - even the hike ending challenges. For I wanted an adventure. And an adventure is supposed to be filled with triumph and adversity. Whether I finished these trails or not, I travelled there and back again with every fantastic demanding second forever etched in my life.
As the days slide away, I need to locate a careful reckoning as a way toward the next inevitable journey. And right now, I simply don’t know exactly what that means. I am taking stock of skills, experience, interests, education as a way of hopefully opening up a pathway that will return me to the world of biweekly paychecks, Monday through Friday routines, laughter filled dinners with close friends, standard weekly domestic duties and hopefully the comfort of familiarity and security. And whether that path leads back to New York City or remains in rural Ohio or takes me further to places I have never experienced, I just don’t know. I cannot see through the haze that hangs in front of these crossroad decisions. This moment is both fantastic and terrifying. I’d like just a little more time to dwell and exist without certainty. I’d like just a little more time to gather and surround myself with the rapid rush of imagery I experienced on either side of narrow dusty trails that stretch onward for miles and miles.
But life does go on.
A small bird has made a tiny bustling nest in one of my father’s hanging flowered plants. The flowers have since wilted, dried up and fallen away, the leaves have lost their robust form and now hang weary and limp. But because the bird recently laid 5 miniature eggs gathered in the hidden wrappings of twisted fabric around the plant soil, we have to leave the plant hanging. For days now I have watched the mother bird fly into the nest with small worms dangling from her long narrow beak while hearing the faint cries from the hungry newborn hatchlings. Today I noticed one of the new chicks attempting to stick out its beak from the nest, pausing in the new air before retreating back to the safety in the clumps of twigs. The hatchlings are curious about the world outside this nest. And one day soon, they will be taught how to use their tiny wings to eventually soar through the air. And they will fly far away into the wonder of a brave unknown.