50th Birthdays and Our Appalachian Trail: 4th of July Tribute to one tiny part of American landscape

A little reflection on an American hike for the 4th of July!

I am a couple years past my 50th, but one of my sisters is coming up on it, which lead me to some reflections on turning 50. Like most of the big birthdays, 50 is a milestone that freaks us all out. At age 48 I dreaded it, and at age 49 decided it was coming regardless so I might as well welcome it with open arms: If you can't beat 'em, join em. Keep your enemies close. When the going gets tough the tough get...oh never mind. I decided to come up with a year of small celebrations, to put "someday" plans into action.

My husband was also turning 50 so some of these plans involved him. One night as we were discussing the pending birthdays I recalled my adventurous Aunt Karen telling me when I was a teen-ager that her goal for her 50th birthday was to walk the Appalachian Trail. I sat up and said, "Let's walk the Appalachian Trail!" I knew Irad would love the idea.

With three kids and one and half full time jobs we weren't about to spend seven months walking the AT, but we could spend a week. We always spend a week in Vermont during late August at Family Camp (one of our most cherished traditions) so we decided to hike in to Family Camp that year. Amnon would drive his younger siblings there to meet us.

So we packed the car for the kids and flew ourselves out to the trail. For me it was a week long experience of being completely cut off form civilization, worrying only about putting one foot in front of the other, finding water, which soup we were eating on any given night, and where to set up camp.

All of this was a delightful departure from our normal lives and we both enjoyed it. The main take-away for me was how different time feels when you completely change the way you spend a day, and how easy it is to just keep walking:

 And to try and notice the world on the way:










But for Irad it was not just the week of hiking—it was the weeks of planning and reading and buying high tech equipment that I think he enjoyed every bit as much.

Even before we finished the hike Irad had us make lists of everything we needed to change in our equipment, what worked and what lacked, in preparation for the next year's hike. I felt satisfied with the small taste of it we had experienced for one week, but Irad's interest had just begun. So the next year we read a slew of books by and about the AT Trail by AT hikers, most of them pathetic literary blunders (apparently another effect of hiking the trail is the need to write your book about it!)
But the one stand-outs was A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail Bryson doesn't actually hike the entire trail, but he collects a fascinating amount of information about the trail setting it historically and sociologically, dips in enough to get the flavor of the hiking experience, and brings along his friend Katz for hilarious comic relief. There was some value to reading a bunch of the others, including people with dogs, who were seven feet tall, who had heart attacks along the way, and who hiked the trail barefoot with a sister, (we divided them up between us) as the cumulative information really gives a lot of information about the entire trail, and the similarities of experiences that emerge give an idea of what to expect.

And before the hike we had both read Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail (Vintage)
which was a fabulous preparation for the hike as well as a well written personal quest story. We often referred to it as if Cheryl were a friend we had dinner with before leaving. "Remember when Cheryl lost her...," or, "This reminds me of the time Cheryl...", or even, "Cheryl was right that..."
Irad recruited our son Aryeh to do the hike with him the following summer. They chose a more southern piece of the trail in Virginia that is supposed to be quite beautiful and challenging. Aryeh, who is a high school athlete, absoutely kicked Irad's butt on the physical parts of the hike, especially the mountain climbing (did I mention it can be very physically demanding?) but he found the endless days of hiking monotonous.








So now Irad is a yearly AT hiker. Eventually he plans on completing the entire trail, piece by piece. I expect him to live a long long life so fortunately there is also the Pacific Crest Trail on the West Coast and the Contintental Divide in the Rockies to add to his list!

And one last thing I did for myself was beginning 6 weeks before my birthday I decided to write a poem a day. I didn't actually write a poem a day, but the days I did write poems it was a great feeling and I really liked the short collection I wound up with. If I had successfully done the full 42 days I had intended to self-publish a little book of poems on some interesting handmade papers (Amnon knows how to bind books). Perhaps that is a project I can still complete someday. Not to become a poet, just to continue to scratch that little itch I have to create. Here is a sample.

Rumi

Reading Rumi

Craving Chocolate

One nourishes the soul

The other the body

But which does which?

And bottom line, reaching 50 is a lot to celebrate and we are lucky to still be here on this Earth with all the people we love.