[pct-l] Options

[Jeffrey Olson]

One of the nice things about being in my late 50s is I have lots of time 
to plan, and lots of options.  I've applied for another faculty position 
in a warmer climate.  I'm not counting on it happening, so a month or so 
ago I got on Craig's Planner and laid out a three month trip (July 
through September) from Bend to Mt. Whitney.  I got the ok to take the 
fall semester off if I wanted, so that's hanging out in the wind.  If 
they want me back they'll pay my medical insurance...

One friend has said he's interested in hiking the last month with me.  
Another would meet me for a week in Seiad.  My brother-in-law is primed 
for a week.  That's enough company to keep me from getting too far into 
my head I think.  Having done numerous long section hikes I am leery of 
hiking alone for too long.  I get a little crazy.

I'm one of those people who can't listen to books on tape because what's 
happening in my head is far more interesting.  And left alone for too 
long, the paths I travel tend to get distorted with emotion.  I used to 
think hiking alone was the be all, end all.  I remember snorting 
internally when a young man hiking north shared he couldn't handle 
hiking alone.  He had a haunted look in his eyes, beseeching almost.  I 
was alone on a section hike, and he was seeking validation.  I gave it 
to him, but remember holding myself aloof.  What a jerk I was...

My girlfriend and I were all stoked to hike for a couple months in 1994 
when a week before we were to leave she got a job she couldn't turn 
down.  There I was, all primed to repeat an experience we'd had a couple 
years previously that was the best hiking I'd ever done.  There is 
nothing like hiking with a partner/lover - nothing at all.  Some of my 
clearest and fondest life memories come from that trip...

I took off from I-5 near Callahans and headed north to Canada.  I think 
I was still in shock and actually headed out to do the trip just because 
the momentum to do it - the planning - carried me along.  To be honest, 
I wasn't prepared to spend day after day alone.  I was part of the 
proverbial "We!"  And then I was alone.  Rip, tear, rend and shatter...

About 10 days into the trip I was hiking on a flat section of the Oregon 
desert - that part that seems to go on for miles of sand and 50' pines 
and no undergrowth or water.  I was hot and tired and thirsty and hungry 
and realized that I'd been keeping "my reality" at bey since I'd found 
out Janey wasn't coming along.  I just flat out wasn't enjoying myself.  
Everything was stark, timeless, an eternal moment stretching outwards to 
temporal infinity.  Sure I'd lose myself in coping, in setting up camp 
or a beautiful view.  But the foreground moment was deep and weighty - 
portentous.

It was about 11 in the morning and I was walking and hot and tired and 
thirsty and hungry.  I let out a groan, and then a soft scream, and then 
a huge ARGHHH.  I continued to walk.  Tears started coursing down my 
cheeks.  All I could think of was how lonely I was, how much I'd rather 
be hanging out with my friends and drinking beer or whatever.  I 
continued to walk.

"I'm not having any fun."  I sputtered.  "I want my Mom!"

I moaned and cried and blubbered down the trail.  I could feel the ten 
days of hiking and two weeks of being without Janey just come crashing 
through me in my sobbing.  I walked and cried and bawled and mewed and 
walked and made sure that no one was coming down the trail to see me 
like this.  There was a rational part of me watching me just break down 
emotionally.  But that was like 5% of where I was.  The rest of me just 
hurt intensely as I walked.

I bawled in great gasps and hitchings of breath.  One foot in front of 
the other, the constant - I'd stop for a emotionally for a moment and 
notice my rhythm, and just melt again.  I could feel my face screw up 
into an unattractive prune time after time as the wave of pain coursed 
through me, my body sliding down a washboard time after time after time 
sloughing off into sobbing and blubbering.

After 10 minutes or so my sobs lost their shuddering depth.  I'd moan 
and catch my breath and inhale with little quavers and continue to 
walk.  I started taking more regular breaths that weren't as driven by 
my pain.  I'd inhale deeply and let out my breath.  Inhale and release.  
Inhale and release.

I could feel the pain.  I could feel it just like I could feel the 
breeze caress my cheek.  I could feel my chest just expand and expand 
with it as I put one foot in front of the other.  Where only minutes 
before I'd been riding the crest of two weeks of denial I was hurting, 
now I was on the ebb tide, the pain flatter and morphing.  Morphing...  
It was changing.  I waited for the next wave to wind my guts into 
sobbing emoting, for an unexpected twisting.  A breeze now, a wafting 
thing outside of me - this pain.

It wasn't sudden, but suddenly I found myself walking without touching 
the trail.  My body suddenly had parts moving in synchronous counterpart 
to one another.  I was light as a feather, riding a rhythm emerging from 
my exhausted emotionality.  I was dancing down the trail, my heart 
shining through every movement, every step, every twist of my body as I 
put one foot in front of the other.  I reveled.  Where only minutes 
earlier I'd been trodding with the weight of my pained world bearing my 
shoulders down, ever down into complex, dense emotion, one foot in front 
of the other, now I was leaping and cavorting within putting one foot in 
front of the other - walking down the trail.

Cognitively I was awakening within an emotional space rare in my life.  
I was in harmonious balance inside the hiking.  I realized I was not 
having fun, that this trip was perhaps a bad choice.  But I also 
realized I was not a ping pong ball, a victim of my emotions, my choices 
driven by the depths of raw suffering.  I may not have been having fun, 
but dammit if I was going to leave the trail because I was overly 
emotional.  I was a "Man" - capable of feeling deeply without being 
driven by deep feeling to act irrationally because I hurt.

What became apparent as the days marched on, was that my emotions rode a 
roller coaster.  I'd go down, and I'd walk.  I'd go up, and I'd walk.  I 
was this emotional being putting one step in front of the other to 
achieve the goal of continuing to put one foot in front of the other.  
Up and down, up and down - my day was so rich with feeling and the 
wonderings that come from unbridled freedom to just be.  Think about 
it.  How often are we able to just be in the moment, one after the next, 
with no external controls on anything???

I knew I couldn't leave the trail because I hurt.  For the next 25 days 
I rode the tail of the emotional beast as I walked.  I think I became 
"healthy" during these 25 days.  I hurt deeply, intensely, and cried 
more often than I want to remember.  I also felt the exquisite rhythm in 
walking where I was part of a universe mostly invisible but light and 
palpable and threading through emotions grounded in an ecstasy I've not 
managed to experience since.  To fall so far down into an emotional 
gravity well and then find myself riding the crest of balance of all 
forces - all in a half hour.  Up and down and up and down, all the while 
putting one foot in front of the other hiking the Pacific Crest Trail 
north to the end of my hike.

I did hike for 25 more days.  I got used to letting myself feel deeply.  
The constant, the center, the core of the most intense emotional 
experience of my 42 years was putting one foot in front of the other on 
the trail.  I took away a sense of "who" I was that I can't imagine 
finding anywhere else.  Where else can a moment to moment activity 
support such emotional exploration?  I am a child of the universe, of 
God, of Samadhi, of The Eternal, of Taku Ksan Ksan..

The power of my emotions came from being released from the strictures of 
day to day life in the world.  My resolution was finding myself as the 
center within the amplitudinal extremes.  I was high and depressed - 
both expressing release from the norms that limit and define.

"I" am the center of their coursing flow.  I continue to walk, to put 
one foot in front of the other.  I walk in the wondering realization 
that all of us walk in the grand adventure of living.

And to think I very well might have 90 days this summer and fall to once 
again put one foot in front of the other and hike until my trip is 
over.  I'm excited and scared...

Jeffrey Olson
Martin, SD