CDT Day 74 (7/31/23)

Zero day @ with Chuck and Loraine

Verbatim

Chuck and Loraine are very fun and very kind. We played Pickleball this morning and then went shopping for shoes and groceries. I had to buy the brand Oboz for shoes, because it was a hunt/fish store rather than a hike/bike sort of outdoor store. I saw Simi again as he rolled into Ennis’ downtown. I waved to him as we drove by and he said, “you’ve got to be kidding me” and shook his head with a wry smile. That’s certainly the last time I’ll see him. But, it sure was funny to encounter him three different times in three different places.

I’ve eaten so much lasagna and egg sandwiches. My stomach and bowels are experiencing an incredible challenge. Haha. My farts this morning (8/1) are POWERFUL.

After coming back from errands Chuck and I took a four-wheeler ride up into the mountains behind their house. It was awesome. The road was really rocky. We went through grass and sage and into and through forest to a meadow. No animals, but also no bugs and plenty of wind. :) After I sat and ate and watched YouTube. It was good.

Another story from today; the lady at the grocery was double bagging my groceries (I didn’t have my backpack). She even wanted to give me a separate bag for my peaches. I was like “NOOOO!” lol

Post Note

OH YEAH SIMI! I forgot about him. I’ll share about Simi in a moment, but first!

It’s quite the scene when you, in a grocery line in Montana, actively stop your bagger from using another plastic bag. Like. It mattered to me. Enough that the realization of how socially awkward I was being didn’t dawn on me until after my blood had cooled and I realized people were looking at me. It was quite clear that no one in Montana was thinking like I was. Do NOT give me another plastic bag lady, I’m already kicking myself for not bringing my backpack to load food into (and wouldn’t that have been weird in itself) because I have to carry the bag you just used from here to Canada and it’s still like 900 miles and I’m so tired, I’m so tired, and I still have to keep adding to the burden and can we please not do that right now? Do you understand?… No, I don’t think she did understand. But she did put my peaches in the bag already being used. And that was enough.

I think maybe that was a moment when I realized some of the meaning behind my task to carry all the plastic I’d been using. Suddenly there were real, tangible, specified, qualifiable, and quantifiable detrimental affects to the choice to use plastic. It was suddenly life or death. Or at least it suddenly did actually affect my quality of life and death right now. I was willing to confront the social norm because it mattered in a way that actually mattered to me. It was worth the social ostracization of feeling like I was being ridiculed because I knew what it really meant to use the 1/100th of an ounce plastic fruit bag. I had already been a weirdo. But now I was willing to be known as a weirdo.

Ok. Simi time. Here’s a funny story about how walking is the best. Simi is from Germany and was riding his bicycle across the USA. Beautiful bike. Awesome human. I’ll ride my bike around the USA one day too. I met Simi in Dubois at the Episcopal church. We shared pizza together with some other cyclists. And then the next day we were off! Then, when I was catatonically slumped against the wall just inside the doorway of the Old Faithful visitor’s center guess who shows up. I called out, “Simi!” and he looked very surprised to see I’d beat him there. Now, biking trips don’t travel in straight lines. But let me remind you that neither do hiking trips. The lines are much squigglier when you’re walking on, around, in, and over mountains. Roads are straight and direct and efficient in comparison. That’s what makes them roads. We laughed in and chatted and then went our ways. AND THEN in Ennis MT, albeit a town about seventy miles off trail but which still required me to walk forty miles to get to, I saw him again. And there’s your story. I looked out from the back seat of the truck and smiled my biggest cheese of a smile and waved :) “Hey Simi”. He was so shocked to see I’d beat him again. It’s a good thing he didn’t crash.