Eliza has proclaimed today the best day yet on the PCT.
We got up with the dozen or so others at the Casa de Luna and enjoyed a big pancake breakfast, with good strong coffee and real Vermont maple syrup.
At around 8:30, the Andersons starting snapping peoples' pictures in front of the welcome sign painted on the front of their garage, and piling hikers into their little cars to start the process of getting people back on the trail. The photo routine, along with jotting down some info about who we are, where we're from, e-mail, comments, etc. is pretty standard when taking leave of a trail angel. This morning was laid back, with time for seconds and thirds of Terrie's waffles and pancakes. The whole process was atypically slow -- hikers are usually itching to go well before 7. We went with the last load, back up to Hughes Lake Road where we had finished our packless walk yesterday afternoon. Before leaving, I had time while waiting to call Greg and catch him at his office, which was nice. It was a good start to the day.
We started up Sawmill Mountain at 9:30. The sun was burning pretty high already and we were swimming in sweat before long. The hike, while not extraordinarily spectacular, was very nice, affording great views of the sweltering Antelope Valley below to our north and east. Insects were swarming around our legs and faces, not biting, just swarming. We had lots of shade once we ascended high enough to find some trees. Black oaks and incense cedars were our main source of cover. Dry, gravel-strewn stream beds crossed the path often. Water was sparser today than usual. However all of these random aspects of our day fit together, we loved it. We both felt rested and strong. The heat was a bearable and uplifting reminder of the fast aproaching summer.
At 1:30, we stopped for lunch atop a nice ridgetop meadow, under an gnarly oak tree. It is the first meal we had cooked on our little alcohol stove since before arriving in Agua Dulce over a week ago. Digesting our oatmeal, we decided we would try once again to get in touch with someone who might be able to help us find our missing bounce bucket. We'd had the central USPS lost package center working on it as of a few days ago, but hadn't heard back, so we tried calling one of the post offices to which it may have been forwarded -- the first one we found listed in our data book was Big Bear City, so I gave it a try. Mail Guy answers, I tell him who I am and what my situation is. He says, "Foster? A bucket? Yeah, I'm looking at it right now." What? I am floored. Not only was I 99% sure that this bucket of ours was spilled all over some loading dock somewhere on the outskirts of LA, the contents drifting away on the wind like so many tangles of tumble weed -- but to call up and hear from the first guy I ask that it's sitting right in front of him, fully intact? Ask and thou shalt receive! All my pessimism, all my faithless indignation has suddenly vanished. Oh, humanity! Oh, civilization! I was even able to give him a different forwarding address over the phone, so as to have the whole lot waiting for us in LA before we flip up to Canada in a few weeks.
This was an amazing and unexpected turn of events. Life felt grand, no worries. We were just out on a mountainside, digesting our whole grains, thinking of nothing, feeling the moment completely. At least for one moment. Soon the vacant gap of frustration left by the discovery of our missing package was bein crowded in upon by other, heretofore lesser worries. There was still this pesky thing with the returned camera which I haven't had any confirmation on yet . . . and my teeth have been bothering me since having some cavities filled last month . . . what else? There will certainly be something else turning up tomorrow. Something to perturb my tranquility. There is sure to always be something -- some stain on the carpet, a smudge on the glass just over the perfect sunset horizon.
I have a very vivid, clear memory of a time -- I must have been in the 2nd or 3rd grade -- I was sitting in our dining room in Caton, NY reading a National Geographic, or rather, looking at the pictures, and I had the thought that everything was just then all right. Life was a purity, a perfect hovering sphere, blessed and contenting, full of infinite promise. A stillness may have occurred. But before I could grasp this moment, my heart had sunk. There were things that bothered me, things that lived like viruses inside my mind -- secrets and dark guilty fears. And this disease, Lupus. How could this be my life, I wondered, fearfully, incredulously? I often recall this childhood realization as my earliest moment of maturation.
***
Today, nothing much matured in me . . .
We cat-napped on our ground cloth after lunch, got up after an hour and enjoyed an easy afternoon. We set up camp early, around 5:00, ate two dinners and climbed into our little yellow tent before dark.
The bugs came out vicious and hungry as dusk approached. I got frustrated as hell and by the time I climbed into the tent I felt like this entire day had been spoiled. The end of the day can do this, we've found. Even the coldest, wettest, most miserable day can end up just fine and be soon forgotten if the sun comes out for just a brief moment and preparations for sleep can be done in peace.
blah blah blah.
Good night.
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