Chasing averages
“Some men are born mediocre, others achieve mediocrity, and others have mediocrity imposed on them.”
– Joseph Heller, Catch 22
METROIt is said that mathematics is the language of the Universe. I don’t speak that language fluently, but I know their swear words. Averages! Half! Median! Hell, even the brain rot of the Alpha generation knows this. That’s so average… Me too.
Either we chase averages or we run like hell from them. Slower than average and with less stamina, I tend to be the chasing type when it comes to hiking, and I would run to exhaustion in that chase right now. He hated the climbs, he hated the views, he hated even the fresh mountain air and the precious little white partridges that pecked away his survival in the alpine meadows. All these hatreds were projections. I hated my own weakness, I hated that recovery never seemed to come, that sleep, rest or zeros never filled the tank. Little by little I dried up until each act became a negotiation with my objectives. If I stopped smoking, things would be easy these days. I would leave him, go home, and free myself from self-inflicted suffering. But I’m not one to give up, so I try to find a mental way out of the trap. Reasons…excuses. Does psoriatic arthritis weaken me and make me less able to recover? Do the arthritically fused bones in my feet slow me down or make it difficult for me to walk? There is definitely pain in every step, even without the ingrown toenails, which were also a pain in my metaphorical butt. Or maybe the conspiracy theories were correct and the Covid I’d had on the Bob just screwed me for life. Was it my age? Not according to people like Law and Order, a sexagenarian who crushed the AT in four months. Maybe the problem is my mind, my will, my inner strength? Maybe everyone else tries harder and has more discipline. Maybe I need to lose ten kilos, gluttony weakens me. Maybe I’m a mess with so many flaws that none of them could explain why all I want to do is sleep. I walked anyway, mostly. Always trying to put on a good face and a good attitude for Ice Cream. Once on the AT I asked him to go ahead without me. «Misery loves company,» I said, «but not mine.» But now we were married, closer, closer. Did that matter? Did that change things? I wasn’t sure.
Weakness. Weakness. Weakness. Strength requires no explanation. The same is not true of weakness. The final answer is always the same. It doesn’t matter. What matters is not giving up. Ice Cream and I walked through the highlands, mostly open countryside filled with tired gray boulders, withered trees, and lonely, half-white ptarmigans on their way to winter. We met Handy during our lunch break near the trail. We met him at the AZT and also in Glacier. I hadn’t seen him since and barely recognized him when he passed. His beard was long and thick and he wore sunglasses. Still, I stared at him as he passed and finally said, «Is that Handy?»
He heard me and turned around. «Hey, Zen! Ice cream!» I took advantage of my reservations and gave my best enthusiastic social impression. Handy deserved it and I didn’t want to give the impression that I suddenly disliked him.
We chatted a little, but he was trying to get to the top of a mountain with some service. Always the father of the trail, he was central to the next CDT trail days meeting his tram was planning. He invited us and we told him that we would be happy to join them if we made it to the trial days, but that we had other plans that might interfere. He said goodbye to us when he found a signal.
We kept walking and found it again at a trailhead a few miles ahead. We hung out more, talked more and then, naturally, I went to the local Durkin Hut. There was a pile of trash in the corner, McDonald’s bags and empty plastic cups. «Damn, why not just pack it up?» -I asked the flies that fluttered around the opaque window. Buzz buzz buzz, the same reason some people peed in the shower at Llama Farm, they responded. One landed on my face and I punched it in a bad mood, only hitting myself.
The daily problem fell, I went back out and found a cute couple getting ready to go out with a couple of pack goats. They gave me a cold drink, some hippie fruit fizz. It was pretty good. I took him to Ice Cream. As we shared it, I thought, «We could use pack goats on the PCT. Then when we’re done, we can eat them.»
«Oh my god!» she half laughed. «I thought you were going to say to keep them on a farm or something. By then they’d be our friends! We can’t eat them.»
Then we heard: «Damn!» They come from the bathroom at the trailhead. We all turned towards the voice. A while later, the older brother of the Colorado Bros. came out. Sleeveless shirt, long surfer hair, clean shaven, six foot four and full of muscles like a man from Australia.
«Are you OK?» I asked.
«Damn pile of trash in there. McDonald’s bags and shit, man. Who does that?»
I shrugged. «I thought the same thing. It sucks.»
Neither he nor I pack the trash. Not having a car was my excuse. I didn’t ask Down Under what theirs was. I figured any man who could throw me off the side of a mountain with a curl of his biceps doesn’t need his morality examined.
The brother headed to the mountains, presumably to explore hunting grounds. Handy waited for more of his infinite supply of friends to arrive. Ice Cream and I continued. The waves of exhaustion ebbed and flowed but never ceased. Burnout and I seem to have that in common.
***
The trails change as they approach cities. Better maintained and busier mountain bikes and day hikers are starting to show up with small backpacks or maybe just a bottle of water. Steamboat Springs was nearby.
We passed through a herd of sheep, which panicked in completely different ways than cattle. They flowed around us toward their guard dogs, barking from the top of the hills. We reached the beginning of the trail and then the road. I was busy. We stuck out our thumbs and watched car after car, truck after truck go by. Vroom, vroom, vroom, hiss, hiss. The sun was hot, the air was cold and the world smelled of asphalt and optimism that slowly expired. The city was waiting. Batteries charged, literal and metaphorical, but first: begging disguised as adventure.
A white Ford stopped. The taxi was full of four college students. «Where are you going?» The driver had a German accent. We called it Steamboat.
A young woman stuck her arm out the back window. «We can make room here.» His accent was Australian.
I sniffed the wind and said, «We can ride in the back.»
«Sure?» said another boy with another accent that I couldn’t identify. Not French, but something similar.
We assured them we would be fine and climbed in, settling around the spare tire that slid, homeless in the bed of the truck.
Warp speed. Wind. We flew down the narrow two-lane road. Occasionally, my sphincter would tighten as the young man behind the wheel attempted to overtake a vehicle in front of us, only to back off as oncoming traffic revealed itself around a bend. This was a lesson he never seemed to learn and the muscles in my butt began to relax, not out of a sense of security but out of resignation. Ice Cream lay down to take a nap and only managed to slide on the spare tire until he sat back down. The wind took his hair and tangled it like a mad hairdresser. He tried, almost successfully, to stuff it inside his hood.
The kids dropped us off in the supermarket parking lot and gave us their leftover bagels and cream cheese. Ice Cream took them gratefully. I looked around. Civilization sometimes seems very strange during the first few hours. Strange, familiar, beautiful, strangely ugly, like a beautiful face with bad makeup. Strategically placed billboards and commercial signs, concrete and decorative trees. “I’m very happy to be here,” I told Ice Cream.
She patted me on the shoulder. «I know. Let’s go get some food.»
***
We had chosen a nearby Mexican place and when we left I was feeling better. Fifty percent towards good, which was better than smoke. We toured the city. I replaced my cursed shoes with a new pair of Olympus 6s. They were tall and narrow compared to the flattened, hoof-shaped expanse of the pair I’d snagged from the hiker’s box in Pinedale. I also bought a new wide-brimmed hat. The straw hat he had taken from Rawlins was dying, with the left side almost broken. A few more things and we were off. Resupply, a bus to the visitor center, which was very friendly. They give hikers a small care package, nothing big, but still nice, and the welcome is worth more than the items themselves. Ice Cream and I sat at the picnic table and loaded up on the outside exit while we discussed plans. Probably something similar to what we had done in Bozeman. City stealth. Highest grade garbage bag. But then Handy arrived with his army and mentioned that Trip and Chupadogra had looked for a place to stay at a tracker angel’s house. There was no room for the army, but there would probably be room for two more. Useful to win again. Ice Cream texted Trip and we agreed to meet up.
After all, we wouldn’t be looking for a place to sleep in the city. It’s time to rest and recharge in a real house.
