12.06.2024

Ok. A little perspective goes a long way. A lot to process during and after the Colorado Trail. I knew I wanted to do a formal summation blog outside of the journal entries but I really had to sit with with it. Also, it's just been a busy season. I didn't have time to decompress before we headed back to Switzerland to see everyone again. It was the first time in four years for me so my headspace was occupied with Swiss things for awhile. We've had a few dinners with friends and family since then and of course, the trail comes up and I haven't always known how to describe it because I was still wrestling with a few aspects of the overall takeaways and lessons. These things happen slowly for me. It was years after the PCT before I felt like I had any sort of grasp on what it meant, but these adventures are better captured in the moment. Exhausted, falling into a coma post-dinner, trying to hold my prone self up with my elbows to fill a few lines in a damp journal. That's the best stuff. That's why I published Time in the Year of the Bluebird in such an ad-hoc / seat of the pants / non-linear way. It was the most "real" I could stuff into 382 pages. In the end, I wasn't overly concerned if it translated into a formal novel or if people "got it". At that point, it was more important to say what I had to say. It was a matter of posterity for me and my family. Anyway, the CT had more than enough content for another book. I've already outlined the major stories. The truth is that it was a brutal, unforgiving, and almost comically strange month, even compared to the two months on the AZT. There were obvious factors like bringing Bjørn, whose fuzzy presence offered logistical factors both in and out of town, but I'm speaking more about the trail itself. It. Was. Just. Brutal. A near-constant grind with all the ensuing surreal hilarity that made it one for the books. I won't go into the specific things that added to the circus because I want to save it for a full rundown but I will say we spent half of it sick with girardia, Hanne almost quit in Silverton, everything that could go wrong went wrong up until the day AFTER the trail and yet somehow, we still made it. A week after finishing we conceded that we were glad to have done it. The stunned look on our faces wore off and we started gaining weight again and talking about it. It was really something on its own, outside of the nonsense. The San Juans were absolutely stunning in the early autumn. Miles of barren 13k tundra with white-frosted rolling geology in the distance. Miniature vertical switchbacks carved into scree that held onto the edges of monster plateaus. As always, despite the lack of a visible community due to our later bid, the wonderful kindness and random encounters with helpful, earnest humans are felt. In the end, somehow I always remember the people that hitched us in and out of towns, gave us some extra food for no reason, or just sat there by a fire talking. Another reason it took awhile to process was something else; another ineffable quality that had us facing ourselves as thru-hikers, outdoor adventure people, whatever you want to call it. We'd walked well over 5,000 miles in the past six years, not even counting the routine weekend day hikes and multi-day camping around the southwest. I really have no idea but 5,000 is a conservative estimate with everything in Switzerland. Some big questions arose. "Are we getting older?" "Is this still the thing?" "Do we just convert a Sprinter and keep going or are we becoming a little more domestic?" My return to full-time music engineering/production had been a factor. I'd swept it all under the rug (as much as I could) for four good years. I'd written about it plenty of times before. I was conflicted about it. Music never really "leaves" me. It's like blood or air, but I'd had to contend with and accept and wrestle with that reality for a long time. I also had striking, horrific, repetitive dreams on the CT that were saying something about my childhood, my mom, letting go, and so forth. It was this, more than anything that left me considering the what these journeys really meant in the end. I'm also trying to be more open about my experiences on thrus as I get more experience and perspective. At first, I felt obligated to the communal "Spirit of the Trail", parroting the common sentiments and ideology and reasons. I wanted to be on the Completion Lists. I wanted the oversize brass belt buckle from the AZT and so forth, but I can't deny that I think I was having a very different experience than most people I came across. Everyone does of course, but the spiritual aspects and even those that bordered on the paranormal, I left in the journals. I wasn't sure how "The Community", whoever and whatever that is, would interpret it. I'm committed now, to including the full picture in whatever future publishing happens. The truth is that a thru is a profoundly personal experience and while I've had plenty of wonderful moments out there with scores of people, I've never had a desire to become part of a "tramily" or compromise my experience to fit into someone else's pace, timeline, narrative. The most rewarding moments have been deep inside. It's difficult to explain but in the future, I want to do a better job of elucidating my own experience instead of writing what I think approximates "good writing". These are learning curves. Writing a book was much harder than writing an album. I just hadn't done it before. Even on a simple blog, you don't know who's reading, judging, inferring, evaluating. I've met people who were greatly inspired by the blogs, stories, and such and I clung to a sort of adventure story template. I also had a comment a long time ago that was something like "Is it a Christian book? Because I hate Christian books." While it was a weird/stupid comment, I was triggered enough to reply "Uh, no. I'm not a Christian, so..." I felt like a had to justify everything for some reason to make everything palatable and yeah...something happened out there on the CT that said in no uncertain terms: "Hey, stop doing that." Be you. Who cares who likes it? You're compromising your own life." I should know these things at 45. It dovetails into the music world as well, obviously. I've been on many stages, put myself out there, endured the usual criticism and misunderstanding that any artist does and I used to take it all very personally but that's what I love to do. What I feel I had to come to terms with on the CT was the fact that I'm different. I've always felt different. Even felt that I was treated differently or held to a different standard for some reason. I went through hell in my early years for being who I was but anyway, I finally went through a battery of tests and came out well within the autistic spectrum which wasn't surprising to me at all. It might surprise people who don't know what masking is (I've only recently learned that as well) The other reason I'm not surprised is because...well, if you knew my family on my mom's side, you'd just know. What it does mean is that I've either been a typical over-sharer, or shared nothing at all. Flat effect. No response. "You don't get to know me. Sorry." When you don't have the same filters as others, you inevitably run into trouble. Enter masking. It's called a "spectrum" right? I don't rock back and forth in chairs (usually) My stemming is incessant air-drumming and tapping, which works out for a musician as you can imagine. The funny thing is that I was forced to take part in the school band as young as ten because they figured it would stop the tapping. Hanne knows all about it. We've had some good long talks. It's interesting to consider at my age. Some people have speculated that the autistic are rather hyper-empathetic and simply get overloaded and shut down. I get that. I have my daily supplements for metabolism, brain health, etc. I control everything about my diet. For audio engineering and writing, hyper-focus is invaluable so I have managed to align my physiology with my profession which is good. I can't say certain synesthetic elements have been a detriment to music either, but they can be lead you in the wrong direction occasionally. So, I just put myself out there because...it's time. A few other friends know. There's a lot of things that had to pass through the sieve after this thru. Things to come to terms with. I would never wear a diagnosis as a badge. It only serves as a lens to finally understand many, many things...why neon lights make you sick to your stomach while everyone else is doing fine. And so forth. And so on. And on. And on. There. It's done.