#201 Hanover NH to Velvet Rocks Shelter - Day 122: MM1750.3 - MM1752.3
"But can I do it?" That is the one question I’ve never entered the wilderness with, but here it is, lingering over me, this dark cloud of doubt.
8-30-24
It was easier in the past to come to the trail because I constantly felt the need to escape from so much - to search for so much.
It’s difficult this year to return to the trail, with so many things in life moving in the right direction.
But this trail and I have unfinished business……
I bid my driver Jim adieu, grab my pack, and start walking towards the bridge.
Ready or not, here I go....
I walk through the protestors on the along the bridge until, part way across the Connecticut River, on the Ledyard Free Bridge, along the pedestrian walkway, engraved into one of the pillars, lies the VT/NH state line sign.
I stop at the state line for my ceremonial selfie. The protestors don’t interfere with me or the college student, looking a bit nervous, as she crosses the bridge from the other side.
The hustles and bustle of Hanover reminds me of last year’s finish. Busy people on their way to their busy lives.
I arrived last year on a beautiful day like this, carrying an aura of victory and satisfaction after hiking all spring to get here.
Today, I carry an aura of duality - part of me wants more than anything to hike to Katahdin, though my physical ability is questionable, as I’m once again twenty lbs. heavier than I should be.
The other part of me would rather be back in Kentucky, where we moved back to four months ago, where two months ago I resurrected remnants of my old business, and it has taken off nicely.
Through town, I hike past historic homes and college buildings. I hike past the Co-Op Food Store and ground graffiti of the Appalachian Trail (AT). I hike along the edge of one of college soccer fields, and near the baseball field where the trail turns off into the woods.
Several hiker’s tents are scattered around with gear lying nearby just inside tree line, their owners are most likely in town at the Co-Op and in the restaurants filling their bellies with burgers and beer.
The trail leans into a gentle grade, but my breathing starts to become labored. I begin doubting my ability to hike this trail over the next five or six weeks as I slowly walk the mile uphill until reaching Velvet Rocks Shelter.
There are four hikers sitting at a picnic table near the shelter with their little camp stoves hissing.
I find a flat spot to drop my pack, thereby claiming my spot for the night, before going over to meet my neighbors.
Beagle and Rib-eye are thru hiking the trail, Chip and Doc are out for a week or so.
Some of us sit at the table as the sunlight fades from the western sky, eating and talking of all manner of topics.
Chip tells of a guy she met on the trail, who, as a self-proclaimed “anti-capitalist,” boasts proudly that he has been financing his hike by selling drugs and the hemp bracelets he weaves. I, being an entrepreneur, suggest to my new friends that this guy, while falsely wrapping himself in some kind of self-righteousness, is not only unwittingly participating in the purest form of capitalism, but has become an entrepreneur, though peddling illegal products.
My new friends pause, laugh in agreement with the assessment, then we all move on to the next subject.
I didn’t share that story with you just now to wrap myself in some kind of self-righteousness, but to show the contrast between the free-spirited mindset I left the trail with last year and the matter-of-fact mindset the world has ingrained back into me over the past eighteen months.
I hope the trail can undo in me what the world does to all of us.
I lay in my tent thinking about the difficult journey ahead, both mentally and physically. I’ve proven so many times that I have the will, I have the time, and unlike last year’s journey, I have the money.
"But can I do it?" That is the one question I’ve never entered the wilderness with, but here it is, lingering over me, this dark cloud of doubt.
It is said that when a North Bound (NOBO) hiker reaches the spot where I lay tonight, they’ve done about 80% of the trail but only 20% of the work.
From my short experiences with New Hampshire and Maine in the past, I’m inclined to believe it.
If I had kept going last year when my body and mind were fine-tuned, I wouldn’t have doubted Raw Sprawl for a second.
Weakened in mind and body from eighteen months of civilized lifestyle, Soft Sprawl is reentering the wilderness, with this haunting question -
Can I do it?
