CDT Day 107 (9/2/23)

Miles 2569.6 (Red line 2912.5)- 2598.2 (Red line 2941.1) (28.6 miles)

Verbatim

• Grizzly Sow + 2 Cubs :)

• Fire w/Allie, Tom, Megan +Friend

• Extra Pizza :)

• Elvis!

Today’s walk to Many Glacier was the real walk through the park. There were some really populated sections, including a section with a walk towards a waterfall. At the bottom of this walk was a bridge you could jump into the water from. Twister and I passed it together but were in the mind to catch Billy, who was racing off to the ranger’s station to secure permits before 4:30 when they closed.

Earlier that morning I’d hoped locate the correct map position for a short cut. I felt good about that. The other two were ahead and had passed the spot already. I called to Billy who called to Twister. We crossed a river and cut two miles. It was nice. :)

Next came a beautiful lake walk, then the waterfall, crowded with people until the bottom of a pass, and then up the pass! That pass was steep but lovely. It’s good to get into a climb. There are only a few climbs left on this trail, so they’re not worth taking for granted. It was wonderful to make time up the slope. Elvis was on that climb. Soon after I passed him things leveled out and I enjoyed a curved alpine area. There was a trail merger and suddenly there were day hikers everywhere. Just before the top of this pass I saw my first Grizzly Bear! A Sow and two Cubs were digging out ground Squirrel nests by flipping rocks and digging holes. Later we passed a section of trails with seven or eight large digs on either side of the trail. Those digs can be massive! So much work for just a little Squirrel. I sat and watched those Bears for a long time. They were beautiful. I thought to myself that those Bears were better than any terminus.

Down the climb and into Many Glacier. Twister and I were blocked from another shortcut by path construction. We made it to the village and shared dinner together and w/Elvis. I got two pizzas for the price of one because my pizza fell apart in the oven and my food was delayed. I shared with Elvis who had come late to dinner.

We shared a fire with those camped near us. Allie and I talked about separation and divorce in the firelight. It was good to have had a fire. I miss the opportunity to make new friends. Those moments of connection come far and few between.

Post Note

Ah man. Allie. I’ve sat down at this computer to journal maybe twenty or thirty times now? I usually can write a number of posts in one day. Sometimes I try and can’t write even one. I just sort of go catatonic and then am overwhelmed by all the memories of my trip which I don’t share here. It can be a lot. But Allie, I’ve looked forward to writing about Allie at least half of those moments of “sitting down” to write.

I love fire. I love campfires especially. I love women too (haha). I think I sort of loved Allie especially too(?). I met lots of wonderful and interesting women while on the CDT. There was L, there was Monster, Jen at Ghost Ranch, Piper in Platoro, there was that random biker girl in Salida, there was LeLou, there was Amelia Earhart, there was Joani, Biggy, Camille, Evelyn, ect… There’s probably more I can’t remember anymore! But again, please know that I know and expect you to know that when I have a reaction to someone it’s about what’s going on inside me. What I feel has much less to do with the quality of the people I met. I only ever talked to any of them for a few hours at most. All of these people are beautiful to me because I had some sort of reaction to them from the emotional and physical place I was at at that point in time. Some of them showed me kindness. Some of them showed me grace I didn’t know was coming and didn’t feel like I deserved. All of them stand alone as wonderful individuals who are awesome.

I write the above because I feel anxious about writing about women who move me, especially in light of the relational themes in this blog. I was so lonely and so hurt. So many times I longed to wash what I was feeling away in the embrace of another’s attention. That feeling was actually cyclically triggering for me. I was angry at myself for generally feeling that way because I was angry about how people feel that way. I was also angry at myself for feeling that sort of out of control longing while interacting in person with some of these people. The berating internal monologue sometimes went like this, “WHY IS THE ONLY THING YOU CAN THINK OF YOUR OWN LONELINESS AND CRAVING FOR INTIMACY WHEN THERE’S SOMEONE SO BEAUTIFUL RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU? Can you just appreciate them for who they are”?

Allie was extra special though, because we got to stare into a fire while other people around us were talking and laughing and struggling(?) to make conversation. Allie and I just sat on the ground and didn’t even have to look at each other and found out that we had a lot in common. Getting to know someone while looking at something else really takes the pressure off. I think this is why people like to go to the movies on initial dates. I hate the movies, by the way. But, I would go watch a movie if it was for a cute date. I do think it’s much better to stare at something like the ocean, or the sunset on the mountains, or fire. A lot of people would claim these things are romantic. Maybe too romantic for a first interaction. I would say these things aren’t inherently “romantic”, although they certainly can become so. They’re just beautiful and they put us in our place. These things are wonder. And when you share the experience of beauty and wonder with someone else you find quite naturally opening yourself up to the beauty and wonder of the other person as well! It’s really beautiful and wondrous; isn’t it? You can definitely loose your head though. So many of us are so desperate romance that we forget to stay grounded in the realism of what actually might be going on.

So Allie and I talked. It was kind of her to sit next to me. I don’t do well in overly stimulating circumstances (I either cocoon up or go sort of manic), and the initial twenty minutes of jovial laughter standing around the fire was too much for me. I had to sit down. So I sat down and watched everyone else above me for a while. Then I watched the fire. Allie had been talking with Billy for a while. Billy is. so. cool. Twister was the life of the party on the other side making everyone laugh. He is such a lovely story teller.

I’d initiated the fireplace hang by asking Allie’s group if we could join them for a fire. I manufactured the courage to initiate by telling myself (and I firmly believed this before I started asking) that I was asking so Twister and Billy could channel their charisma and go sweet on some new friends for an evening. As I walked over and started talking, however, I felt the sort of lurch inside where the ball drops from your head through your heart and into your gut and then you know subconsciously, like a second voice is talking beneath your concentration on the actual words you’re saying, that there’s more going on. Yeah. I realized I wanted to talk to pretty girls. Aw crap. Now I’m nervous. And then a half hour later I was so overstimulated standing around the fire watching my friends be so much better at just existing in social spaces than I was and so I sat down and gave up all hope of making any sort of strange peacocking maneuver myself. Instead it was just me and the flames washing me away.

And then Allie sat next to me. I think she was probably tired too. It’s hard for me to remember specifics, but I think I made some sort of stab at conversation. I don’t remember what was said but I do remember how awkward I felt for the first few minutes. I think I gave up again and just looked at the fire. Maybe I said something like, “I’m so tired”. Which I was. And then the walls came down. I learned she was from CO(?) and moved to LA. She and her sister dominated the beach volleyball scene there for a while. She traveled a lot as well, to Central America, and works for (or was it started?) a non-profit that helps young girls in some Central American country in some way I can’t remember. I shared that I was a hiker bum who has his masters but can’t get a job with it. I don't remember. We talked. It became easy to talk. She asked how my hike was (which is a basic ass question except that we’d put the ground work in for me to actually want to share with her). I ran circles through thruhiking monologues and eventually I shared about the emotional distress which had dominated my CDT experience. She could relate to that, she was going through a divorce. I asked her about that, but she said she didn’t want to talk about it. I said ok, and asked what she did want to talk about. She asked more about thruhiking again and then shared about her own travels and then eventually started to talk about her divorce. I listened. She talked more. It was terrific. What a human she is.

She said she needed a change in her life and I think at one point her sister interjected from across the fireplace that she should go on her own thruhike. So Allie started to imagine what that would be like for her to walk on the PCT. I totally approved and then answered some more of her practical questions in the sort of short practical way which is actually useful. Eventually the fire grew dim and we looked at each other and knew it was time. We all said goodnight. My heart was so full. She was so beautiful. I went to my tarp and crawled into my sleeping bag and Twister, or was it Billy, let out the biggest fart ever. We all laughed.

The next morning I felt what I imagine it feels like to be hung over. We were to bed late with the fire and up early to walk. It would be the last full day on trail and we had a thirty to crush. Allie and her crew were still fast asleep because they’re not thruhikers. They had something like eight miles to walk. I wrote a note out from a torn page in my journal. Yep. Just checked. The last page is torn away. I scribbled some encouragement down, told Allie how incredible I thought she was, and then told her I’d look forward to seeing her on trail one day. I signed it Haystack. I did NOT leave ANY information by which she could potentially track me down. No number. No handle. No email. No last name. The point wasn’t to get something from her. Hell, I went through a breakup and don’t have the emotional stability to engage someone new. I can’t even imagine what it would be to like to be going through a divorce. Obviously the parameters of the emotional weight of a separation isn’t delineated by titles like “breakup” or “divorce”. I didn’t have that thick a grasp on her emotional experience anyways. But I think all the logistical things of a marriage ending would just be so overwhelming. So yeah. Space.

No, the point wasn't to get something from her. I’d found that loved her. Not like the fanciful infatuation love (though I definitely could have found the motivation for that). But the sort of “love” which came through my listening to her (as much as she was comfortable sharing) and finding that that who she was was wonderful. Fundamentally extraordinary. I love lots of people like that! I wanted to respond to that, to honor that, and to remind her she was special. I felt like that was a gift I could give. If I’d left any sort of follow up it would have ruined the whole thing. So yeah I woke up and wrote a little note out to her and didn’t write anything other than my positive regard for her. And yes I knew as I was writing that there was a part of me that was desperate for more. But the more I wanted was just the continuing opportunity to share the gift of happiness and peace and looking at a fire with her. So I did. And I knew that the best way to honor my desire to celebrate Allie would be to acknowledge that this was the last time I could celebrate Allie. Elvis saw me leave the note under one of their trekking poles on the picnic table, though I tried to be really sneaky, and smirked at me.

I don’t know! Now I feel self conscious. I hope it came across well.