April 10, 2022 177.7 miles
Let’s walk, each step with care, and breathe; for every inhale and exhale, recognize how your mind, body and the earth are one.
Connected
Walking the Appalachian Trail is new everyday. Some say that the trail is monotonous. The scenery is the same, days with no views to write home about. When we are used to living each day in constant external stimulation, perhaps the similar surroundings day after day, offer very little. We are so accustomed to being bombarded with external stimulants. Billboards, ads, music, cellphones, alarms and constant sensational news of the world, events caused and created by us humans. Meanwhile the creatures of the mountains just go about their day. The trail, the nature, is a quiet giant with forceful energy underneath our feet, if, you seek to pay attention. We are certainly their guests when we enter their world. Nature does not discriminate or change their way to accommodate us. They envelope you with their giant blanket of leaves, trees and atmosphere, giving us what we need if we desire, restoring what we destroy along the way, without complaint, patiently. Like a wise old soul watching us toddlers stumble about their living room, knocking over a tree, muddying up the creek, stepping and crushing the delicate wild flowers, awkwardly agitating a carefully organized system. With our meek eyesight and numbed senses, we do not see the creatures, while they watch us from a safe distance. They take caution of our synthetic smells and fabric, our hurried speedy gait to get to the next mile marker.
So hikers, walkers, slow down, and you will find. Be quiet and listen then you will hear. It is an energy you must seek to find. If you are looking, there are life and creatures bubbling around you, welcoming, to show the wonders of their living room.