Freedom in an Institution: Self-Actualization and the Trail

In my last post I mentioned a few ideas about the lifers. Since then the conversation has come up on the trail. The concept of institutionalization - what happens to inmates who spend so much time in prison that they are unable to assimilate once released - seems appropriate in this community. Because I have a mild form of institutionalization, I welcome your comments. In the book I'm reading: Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why, the neuroscience discussed is applicable here. Our brains are not static, and so by spending so much time in a completely different environment, our brains change. It will take time for me to remember how to be normal after the Trail. For instance, I am already forgetting to flush toilets. In a room, I'll reach for my headlamp before I reach for the lightswitch. Table manners are no longer motor reflex. For some, the freedom of the trail (and this is a flexible definition) is too tempting to leave.

What I'm playing with here, is whether it's possible to be free within an institution. Do the people who hike the Appalachian Trail and then decide they want to walk, for the rest of their lives, feel free? Is the concept of self-actualization possible within a narrow community like this? (from Goldstein via Wikipedia, the "motive to realize all of one's potentialities.") No matter how awake I am on the trail, no matter how expansive my views, this life is truly insulating. With therapeutic potential. But insulating nonetheless. So, are the lifers soothed within an institution that is safe for them? I would like to offer the conclusion that they feel freedom, out there in the wilderness when they please, living on the fringe of American society. Yet the alcoholism among this population is troubling. This is what I'm wondering about.

Comments welcome. More posts about happy things, soon.

The lifers

The number of hikers on the trail, over the last weeks, has diminished and they've spread out. However, I meet a handful of new people every day. Sometimes I meet one of what I've started calling the lifers. When I stop at a hostel or hiker-friendly town, I meet a LOT of lifers.

These are the guys (I met one lady lifer a couple days ago) who hiked the trail ages ago. People hike the trail for all sorts of reasons, but it's pretty safe to assume that they're searching for something, often hoping for some sort of realization. For this group, it takes more than once. Or, it occurred to me the other day after meeting CB, maybe they experienced that sought-after epiphany, and it is this: hike more. Some are out on their fourth or fifth thru-hike. Some do a couple hundred miles of the trail every year. The vast majority are perpetual section-hikers who live around hiker-friendly towns, helping out the hikers if they have their wits about them, or just trying to party with the young ones and share their expertise.

When I was at Standing Bear Farm, which I raved about last entry, the supply room/store had an intriguing box on display. The return address was politely crossed off, and on the blank part of the priority mail box, was written:

"This was a re-supply box for Minnesota Smith. If you have not yet met Minnesota Smith, you will. He is an expert on most things, according to himself. He will tell you about how to hike better and how you're hiking wrong, and keep in mind the weight of this box."

The box weighed 53 pounds. My pack, with 3 liters of water and four days worth of food weighs 32 pounds. The message was: Minnesota Smith doesn't know Jack and you shouldn't feel like you gotta listen to him.

When I met him three days ago, he fit the mold of the typical lifer:
Doesn't fit in society any more.
Loves the trail like I love pissing in the woods.
a) did so many drugs in the 70s that his ability to discern most social cues rubbed off, or b) somehow maintains a life back home but gets kicked out a few months a year so he can 'go bother the new hikers.'
Didn't want to do anything else after finishing the trail.
Loves his stories from hiking.
Wants, more than anything else, to help the new hikers by imparting his own knowledge-from-experience.
a) heavy drinker/smoker or b) went on the trail to quit.
Not to say that all guys re-hiking part of the trail are lifers, and certainly most section-hikers are not lifers.

A few days ago, at the singular Nolichucky Hostel and Outfitter, I met a whole boatload of lifers, and the experience got me thinking a lot. Now, I have eight to ten hours every day during which my thinking goes something like this: "whoa that's a big hill, okay here I go... not so bad... that was great! I feel terrific! Oh I bet I can get to Chicago when I finish during a road trip, that'll be an awesome time to see the city- rock garden! left foot there, right foot there, careful, careful, ooh downhill, easy knees... I wonder why these guys keep on hiking the trail over and over? They did it, if they didn't get the big epiphany by Katahdin, shouldn't they try something else to answer the big question? Or maybe that's just it! Roots! Too many roots! Shit, left foot there, right foot there, balance, I hate roots, slippery roots are hard! what was I thinking about? Oh yeah, the lifers figured out that what makes them happiest is walking. So is that realization a burden for them? Are they stuck following the white blaze?" That was fifteen minutes in my head. So I'm at the hostel, and I meet CB.

Alcoholic, chain smoker, has lived on or near the trail getting work for the last ten years. He's missing a good number of teeth on his left top row, and likes to point the gap near the person he's speaking to when he laughs. He also has the tic of repeating his last phrase after a pause. CB has hiked the trail 3 times. When I find him talking to my friend Scout late that evening, knowing he's been drinking for about 7 hours, I join the conversation. He asks why I'm walking. Then he chuckles to himself, and spurts "I respect all hikers, for whatever reason they're hiking, whatever gets them out here, you know? I have total respect, cuz it's all types of people, comin to do the same thing. the same thing. and I have respect, heh heh heh" and with the hand holding his cigarette he makes an encompassing arc, to show his acceptance. He grins towards me with his tooth gap. I never got to tell him why I was hiking, he started on about how the 1,000 mile mark, that's when the mind games start, when the 'fuck it, my knee' or 'fuck it, my ankle' quitting gets people off the trail. As he reminisced, warning us of the woes to come in his jolly drunken way, he would lean, shuffling his feet imperceptibly closer to me, so that as I listened, I would slowly step back from his cigarette tracer and gapped smile. Then, aware of his travel, he would step back, regain his spiel, and swerve again. This dance lasted a few back and forths and side to sides until I knew I'd heard all he could tell, and went to bed.

This encounter is the bread and butter of a lifer. They move slow or camp out somewhere friendly, so that every day they can meet new people to share their favorite stories and maybe give some of the advice they carry with them. But those they meet are transient, and move along, so that the next day new hikers come to town, and it all starts again.

I think it was said once before "holy shit I have knees!"

So I'm 272 miles in. That means I'm over 10% done, and have fewer than 2000 miles left. These are great milestones.

Other statistics include: 2 sunny days, 2 half sunny days, all other days wet or snowy.

Two obscene care packages and one "anonymous" postcard. High fives all around you mischievous planners you!

Words of wisdom: if it snows and then gets warm, you get mud. If you have mud and it rains all day, you get rivers and lakes. If you have rivers and lakes and it freezes all night, you get skating rinks! And that is the Smokies.

I hate the Smokies. From what I learned in one sunny day there, it is usually very beautiful. But when it is foggy and muddy, it is not beautiful. And you have to sleep in shelters, but if a weekend tourist wants to sleep in the shelter, they tell you to set up your tent in the mud. But sometimes the Smokies are very beautiful. The end.

This is really an indescribable experience. My first journal is already almost full, blathering on about emotions and exercise and plans and joys. After a day or two, every single challenge that wasn't immediately rewarding, becomes a landmark. Time goes very slow, even when I hike 3 miles per hour. We do not multitask. We talk about our feet, and our packs, how far we plan to hike that day, try to keep track of our friends days ahead of us and behind, and the food we plan on eating. We talk about why we're here and why we'll stay. We hike for 8 to 10 hours, find a place to camp, crawl in our sleeping bags at 4 pm and start making dinner. There's a community along the trail of people who still like living in this other-ness, who have started hostels and stores or shuttle services to help us out, and we are insulated from normal laws and etiquette... and hygiene.

I feel like a year has passed in the real world. I've covered so much ground and met so many people and filled my days with moments of pure bliss and then moments of animalistic exertion. In the last four days I hiked 20, 18, 15, and then 18 miles. I'm losing weight because I won't carry enough food to cover the calories I burn. My knees suddenly started talking to me yesterday, so I'm taking today off. I've planned all of 2010 for myself and a few other people. I have no idea when I'll finish, but some have told me at this rate it'll be August. September seems more likely.

This is a simple life, but it is the hardest lifestyle I have ever maintained. Every day is an achievement in my simple little brain, in my tiny little life. When people who help me along the trail show me pictures of the past hikers who sent them photos of Katahdin, I get choked up. Imagining being free of the white blaze is an odd idea. Terrifying. Powerful. Unparalleled. And I've only just begun.

With love, and hours of apologies for not being able to maintain my treasured friendships- to all my friends, I wish I could stay in your lives, updated and constant; so thank you for understanding that I cannot, and supporting me anyway. I am so lucky to have you all in my heart.

100 Miles, 1 State, and Onward!

So I was completely wrong about updating this thing often. Two reasons: I'm never near internet, and I don't want to be near internet.

Strange thing, this trail, that although I love and miss my dear ones, there is an otherness to my life during this adventure. I feel as though I'm in some sort of Narnia, removed from your reality so that I'm missing nothing, and also, not missed myself. So I will be behind, but that's alright; it will make the reunion so much sweeter!

This hiking is wonderful. I have marks on my shoulders, a couple healing blisters, I'm often wet and cold, and I exhaust my body every day. And I am so happy. I am happy on this trail. Sometimes I hike along with a group, meeting that night at a shelter or camp, or find my way to meet new friends.

They call me Joker.

I'm in North Carolina, there's a weekend-long hiker party thrown by the generous and creative Ron Haven, who is letting me use his internet right now. So I'm on my third town-stop. Funny, I've been gone what, about 9 or 10 days, and had three nights (including tonight) in hostels. But every day on the trail is it's own little universe, full of this simple, intensive journey, that I feel as though I've been lingering a long while in that otherness I was trying to describe up there. All we think about is water, food, warmth, and shelter. I don't worry (for those of you who know me well, I'm not 'picking'), I just walk. I walked 19 miles yesterday. I felt like shit, then I climbed Mount Albert (5,750 feet or so) in the rain and wind, a rock-scramble of a summit, and I felt like a million bucks. Those are my highs and lows.

Love to you all.