Trail of Dreams

Photo by davis pratt on Pexels.com

Happy New Year!  I hope we have a fabulous year and decade ahead.  Remember, as you hike the trails, be they the Appalachian Trail, or just a random footpath in your neighborhood, to breathe in on each step.  And remember, you’re here on Earth to accomplish something with your life; find out what that is and live it out.  Time really is too short to waste on useless and selfish dreams!  I remember 40 like it was a minute ago; now I’m going on 67 years of age.  It really does move fast!  Invest in yourself, invest in others.  Have the courage and tenacity to find out what real truth is, not what some website or media outlet tells you it is.  Don’t ever let anyone tell you that someone is your enemy because they believe differently than you do.  You’ll cheat yourself by doing so.  Be independent!  Check out the facts.  Get to know the person, stranger or neighbor.  Who knows how they will bless your life or you will bless theirs!  Blaze a trail of love from your heart, to your front door, into your community and city, and into the world.  Put aside factions and politics.  Remember why we’re all here on this little world.  Risk loving, even when it hurts (especially when you’re feeling the pain), because glory and dreams are on the other side of that wall of reluctance.  Put the past to rest.  Recover your soul and spirit.  Be fully in the moment; and when you forget to be, just get “back on the train.”  They’ll wait.  Forge the future with the iron of your spirit, the sweat of your brow, the muscle of your hand and heart.  Bring together people with differences and listen; don’t divide.  Humanity is born whole.  We are not meant to be divided!  Lastly, remember your moment will come; that day or night when your breath comes hard and your spirit yearns to be free of the body.  Live for that threshold.  Look into eternity while you’re alive, so you’ll know what to do when you arrive there.  You’ll want to have no regrets.  You’ll want the companionship of those who love you.  You’ll want to know you made a difference.  Like the trails you love to hike, take up the burden of the pack of daily living and move out.  There’s wonder and awe ahead of you.  Just waiting around the bend…

Love, Timothy

A Lesson In Subtracting Fear

The tower was a medieval-looking structure – a tripod constructed of massive timbers which looked like over-sized telephone poles.  Wrapped with ropes the thickness of my upper arm, the structure rose into the grey afternoon sky.  There were climbing holds stapled along the legs at various points, and climbing ropes draped from its height.  There was a platform on top where one could stand and look out over the Connecticut countryside.  

My first impression was that it looked like a siege weapon from a Lord of the Rings movie, only missing a few attendant orcs.  It was at once challenging and forbidding.  And the closer I walked toward it the more uncomfortable I felt.

It was the afternoon break during a conference.  Participants could snooze, chat, read, play ball or –as in my case — check out the “ropes course.”  But this was unlike any challenge course I had seen.  Instead of cables strung between treetops there was this lone structure in a field, tended by a staff of three whose task it was to ensure the safety of climbers who would ascend while belayed in harnesses.

I was the first to arrive, and wandered below the three-legged device.  I looked up and felt slightly dizzy.  No one had come to climb the tower yet, and I had no intention of trying to climb it.  My plan was to hang out and watch more valiant souls do it.

Being curious, I peppered the climbing safety team with questions, such as who made the tower, how it was used, and how safe it was.  Admittedly, deep down, I had always wanted to address my own long-standing fear of heights.  Sure, I’d had limited encounters with vertical space, such as clambering up the Forehead of Mount Mansfield in Vermont and scaling Katahdin in Maine.  But those, while risky, never involved as much anxiety as the notion of climbing this tower seemed to stimulate.

After a few questions, one team members offered a candid comment.  “Even kids love climbing this thing,” she said.  OK, I could understand how fearless children, restrained with rope and safety harness, would not hesitate to tackle this over-sized Tinker Toy.  But then came the clincher.

“They even climb it blindfolded!”

They climb it — blindfolded?”

The statement stunned me.  How gutsy was that?  A troop of kids exuberantly clambering up a height without the benefit of sight to maneuver.

I kept walking around the tower, looking up.  I checked to see if anyone else was coming to climb, but no one had yet arrived.  I stared up once again, and kept walking around the looming structure.  The climbing ropes trailing from the top battered against the timbers in the wind.  I heard carabiners clink and bang together like wind chimes in a gale.

The notion of tackling a ropes course made my stomach twist in a knot.  But the idea of doing it — sightless!?

Yet, there was something else beneath my amazement.  Something that bothered me, which I could not uncover —

I stopped in my tracks, frozen in place by an experience I rarely have: what’s called an “Aha!” moment.

Of course!  It was completely counter-intuitive to anything I’d experienced — the notion of tackling a long-held fear by simply subtracting an element of that fear — namely, sight.

Moments later I was breathing deeply to suppress my anxiety as I was strapped into a climbing harness and roped to the tower by the belaying team.  My head swam with thoughts, my gut with emotion.  I had just blurted out that I wanted to try a blindfold tower climb.  I was amazed the words came out at all!  But, I had crossed the Rubicon on this one, so I walked to the nearest timber and, with guidance, I slipped the blindfold over my eyes and reached out to feel for my first handhold.

My focus remained on moving up, working to discover my next gripping point with my right hand, and launching my body upward with my left leg.  Any sense of anxiety evaporated as my concentration increased, and I alternated between pulling myself up with my hands while using my legs to push, and feeling for hand holds farther along the timber.  I lost count of my maneuvers and put my effort and energy into scaling my way up.  My breathing was steady but slightly labored, and – most of all – I noticed a remarkable absence of fear.

A few minutes later I paused to catch my breath.  “How’s it going?” I heard a voice below me say.  It was good to know my climbing team was keenly focused on my well-being.  “Good,” I said.  “I think I’d like to take a look around.”

Surprised, again, by my unexpected boldness, I used a hand to lift the blindfold so I could see.  I was struck by my continuing absence of anxiety or fear.  In fact, I marveled that the solution to my dread lay in simply doing something completely counter-intuitive.

Have I overcome my fear of heights since that pivotal experience?  Not totally — but to a great degree.  More importantly, I’ve learned there is more than one way to handle fear, and a means to manage it may be found by considering an outrageous-sounding, out-of-the-box solution.

How far is it? Tips on mileage and time on the Appalachian Trail

Roads go ever on, the author said. Often the question is not where one is going, but how long it takes to get there. Does anyone know?

Write in Front of Me

Photo courtesy Nicholas_T at Flickr

Not long into my hike on the Appalachian Trail I met day-hikers and southbounders asking me a common question: how far is it to _____?  (campsite, shelter, road crossing, etc.)  I would provide my best estimate, they’d be on their way, but I was left feeling a bit incomplete about the encounter, as if the information I had given was not of much use.  Later on I learned that a mile is an easy hike for one person and a grueling trek for another.  In those cases, distance has less meaning that time.  As a result, I would tell someone “how far” based on how long it had taken me to leave that particular point.  For instance, I would say “It’s about half an hour,” if it had taken me that long to walk from the requested landmark.  I would modify this advice depending on…

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Five minutes that could change your Appalachian Trail experience

Bobcat courtesy Base Camp Baker at Flickr

Over coffee one day a fellow backpacker commiserated about his recent Appalachian Trail hike.  “I really like being out there,” he said, “but I just seem to walk and walk without seeing any wildlife.  Where do the animals go?  Am I frightening everything off?”

I smiled and sipped my dark roast.  “I think I can help you change that in about five minutes…”

Here’s what those “five minutes” are all about.

Hikers and backpackers sometimes get caught up in putting down miles.  Certainly even competitiveness has arisen among long distance walkers, whose sights are on finishing trails in specified time frames or chalking up double-digit daily miles.  While reaching this goal they often miss seeing the animals who call the forest home.  Their single-minded passage alarms the greenwood ruminants, who take notice and scurry for protection.

Moose courtesy Douglas Brown at Flickr

The simple “five minute” secret to seeing the wild creatures involves breaking free of the mileage pressure and following these steps:

• Pick a time of day for wildlife observation.  This can be during a rest break, at lunch, or after dinner.
• Shed your pack and find a rock or tree you can sit against and become still.  If you’re in a group encourage your fellow hikers to join you in your wildlife watching time.  Conversation has no place here, just become silent and still.
• Within a few minutes (about five) the wild things will become active again, since the disturbance and noise is over.  It usually begins with birds, whose songs may have ceased when you came near.  Take some time to enjoy the renewal of their songs.  It’s a good idea to check your bird identification skills from the calls they make.  Other forest residents will start to move, such as whitetail deer and smaller mammals.  Simply sit quietly and observe.
• You’ll discover this exercise works best during times of good weather.  Heavy rain and threatening storms usually force animals to take cover, so you are unlikely to have as much success in your viewing.
• When you’re ready to move on, try to ease into your backpack quietly.  Move down the trail as noiselessly as you can.  You will likely continue to be delighted by the song birds as you move through their home, and other animals may cross your path.Racoon courtesy Sherwood411 @ Flickr