Miles 1801.5 | I slept in, reunited with old coworkers at Starbucks, blogged, and slowly found my footing back home. As the overwhelm of town life set in — TVs, driving, chores, and shifting identities — Miles and I made a big decision: we would slackpack the White Mountains. With help from my mom, I cleaned my gear, resupplied, and tried to balance everything I’d learned on trail with the person everyone at home still knew.
I slept in really late. When I woke up I went out and woke Miles up, too. We went to Starbucks, where I worked before trail and I said hi to my old friends. I sat there and blogged for a while and Miles played chess and uploaded his photos. We were finally on stable ground again. My mom offered, again, to slackpack us through the Whites. The more we looked at the guidebook the more impossible it felt but we decided, on this day that we would do it.
My mom helped me clean my pack when I got home and my sleeping pad and sleeping bag.
We went and got snacks at WalMart. Being home, in general, felt really overwhelming. The TV being on, driving around, maintaining the things I've learned on trail while simultaneously still being the person that people know me as was really hard. Doing chores around the house again felt surprisingly stressful. I didn't sleep well.
