Personal Post | 1 | Why the trail? Why now?

As I sat down a few weeks ago to write this post, I figured it would be a breeze.  I'd write a few sentences, maybe talk about my gear, where I've come from, but every time I sat down to write it, I stared blankly at the screen until I tabbed to reddit or netflix.  It's not like I had writer's block or anything, I simply had no way to phrase what I wanted to get on to paper.  This is a measly attempt to do so.

Three years ago I hit a plateau. Motivation level: -10. It was early in the semester of my senior year, a few weeks before the holidays and winter break. I was 90% to my degree with nothing but time and a thesis between myself and graduation.  Senior year was supposed to be stress free.  A time of relaxation, cooking classes, and beer classes to fill credit requirements.  It was anything but.  But let's rewind back to freshman year.

Freshman year.  Figured I knew everything already.  Typical freshman behavior.  I knew what I wanted to do.  I enrolled as a Forensics Science major.  First class: Criminal Justice 100.  The absolute, most boring class I have ever taken.  Don't get me wrong, Danny Maxwell was a pretty fantastic professor, but the material.  Oh jeeze.  I slept more in that class than I'd like to admit.  Combined with 4 question multiple choice "tests," I hated every second.  Fast forward a few weeks, a couple days of asking myself, "what the fuck am I going to do?" and you end up with the decision to move to Marine Biology.  I thought I found my calling.  I loved the ocean, the sea, the smell of salt water, and mud.  This, this was my calling.  Yea, well, apparently not. Damn. Fast forward back to senior year.

It's senior year, thesis deadlines approach, winter break is approaching, and I have less confidence in my life choices than ever before.  A few beers later I decided my fate.  I was going to graduate school and that was that.  I would get a Master's and start working.  I quit my Resident Assistant position to concentrate on getting into graduate school.  Three years of Reslife and I had had it.  A workplace filled with backstabbing and brown nosers. Better to concentrate on my future instead of the current. Hundreds of dollars later, the GREs, and a few more beers, my applications were in.  Months roll by.  Constant waiting.

I withdraw all of my applications.

 I decide I don't want to spend my life writing papers, hoping funding will come through and I won't be fired or let go.  Time ticks and it's 4 months to graduation.  A few friends, Kristina and Andrea (Thanks guys!), recommend I check out AmeriCorps.  I apply for a traditional Corps Member position.  It seems right up my alley.  Outdoor manual labor combined with a team environment.  It's a plan. It's now July, I'm waitlisted, and mom's nagging me about my future.  "I'll figure it out, I always do."  First week of July, Beth calls and offers me a FEMA Corps Team Lead position.  It's not what I wanted, but clearly I can't decline the leadership opportunities.  

FEMA Corps is a whirlwind.  11 months of Logistics Support has left me with more knowledge and leadership than ever before.  Mom asks, "going to get a real job yet?"  "No."

I move to Denver, CO and take a position with NCCC as a Support Team Lead.  11 months absolutely whizz by and I finally have a single idea of what I'd like to do.  Probably the 10000 time, "So do you have a plan yet?"  "Yes, yes mom, I do."  I lay out my plan.

"You want to do what?" Mom asks.  "Why?"

My dad sits there smugly, having hiked large portions of the AT.  

"I have a plan, I'm going to thru hike the AT."

And here we are.  To answer the question, "Why?"

I've always been interested in the outdoors.  The leaves, the sounds of the oceans, the big blue sky, the rain.  It's always fascinated me.  It's the reason I moved to marine biology in the first place.  Sometimes you follow a tangent and it doesn't work out.  Sometimes it does.  I'm hiking the AT to follow a tangent.  

I talk about AmeriCorps a lot.  It's something tangential to where I am today.  After choosing to not go to graduate school, I thought I'd be stuck.  I thought I'd lead to terrible things.  Instead, I found NCCC.  AmeriCorps taught me a lot.  Independence, leadership, perseverance, stress management, and how to make cheap food.  All traits critical to a successful AT thru hike.  It was during my time in AmeriCorps that I discovered something: I hated school.  It wasn't the classes, it wasn't the people, it was the automated feeling of the whole thing, start to finish.  You go to school, graduate, go to college, get a degree, then find a job.  We don't teach to learn, we teach to pass exams, standardized tests, and move through the system.  Critical thinking, leadership, independence, completely ignored.  It's 2015 and students don't even know basics such as how credit cards work.  But back to the point.

If I could do it all over again, I probably wouldn't go to college.  While I don't regret any of the friendships I've made or the life lessons I've learned, I regret following a tangent I had no further interest in.  And that brings me back to the AT. We strive the learn and teach each other.  I want to get people outside.  To explore the outdoors, the wilderness, and the peace and quiet of a mountain top.  The AT is my way of getting there.  That's why.