memory log: Sunday, September 6, 2009

One of the more emotional days. It was the end of the trip. The end of the journey. And everything looked different.

There was a distance now from the kid and teenager i was and the experience of walking the streets and being near and in that house in Lansdale. It's like my journey ended as i stood on the edge of my parent's property to look at the house i partially grew up in. Whatever loaded memories and negative experiences i had resided there and i was letting them stay. It felt like they didn't belong to me anymore. There's such a distance from the violence, depression, abuse, lack of hope, lack of support, lack of care. It almost felt silly to revisit it.

From standing on the edge of their property i realized that i didn't need to run it around in my head anymore. There was no need to try to make sense of how or why certain people act the way they do. I couldn't make my parents be different. I couldn't undo what they've done or what it's done to me. I realized i didn't have to be that. Of course, people meet you and they see you the way you are but you don't always see it. Then those people get confused when you act in all these contradictory ways but the whole time you're battling the self you think you are or are supposed to be and the self you are. But it's the same thing. I realized i didn't have to do anything i was supposed to do. I just had to be there and stop feeling guilty for everything or feeling that being myself was a fault that needed to be corrected.

When we took our final walk to the Lansdale train station, i filmed the entire way but it felt routine and unnecessary. The film is there, though, and the photos. Maybe after i've settled and had some time to look everything over, i'll see why i needed to film it. The memorable parts of the trip were everything leading up to that. I don't know. The journey is more interesting than the goal.

memory log: Saturday, September 5, 2009

I was right. When i told the driver that i wasn't sure if that bridge would take us across the Schuylkill he said i was right and the bridge wasn't even there anymore. They had recently taken it out. Good to know my paranoia wasn't for nothing.

It was a Saturday with a ton of people on the trail—mostly bikers. So much of the walk was out in the bare open sun that for the first time in PA, i was feeling oppressed by it. Most of the trail was right alongside the Schuylkill and it made me feel like i was flowing forward with the water. Other than being nervous about the start of the walk, I hadn't felt nervous about where we were going and how close i'd be to my parents and former home. I was excited to move again. A day of rest was good for my body but terrible for my mind. Moving myself keeps the pace with the rate that my mind speeds ahead.

But parts were off. Distances i thought would be short felt long and the ones i thought were long felt short. Suddenly we were in Norristown, then we were out of Norristown. Then in a place where streets were familiar but scenery wasn't. When i lived in Lansdale, i never had my driver's license, so my experience was very provincial. I went as far as i could walk or bus and since walking, bussing and driving are 3 entirely different experiences, i had a different impression. My sense of direction and where certain streets went was off. Nothing related. Now i knew exactly where i was and where the street would take me. Getting in a vehicle just creates blank space in between places.

I know i was walking in areas i'd been in before but everything felt new. The scenery was just itself without meaning the past. I was just myself moving through it and finding a narrow space to walk. My breath and legs and heart had a rhythm and i would just keep moving until i was at the spot i thought i should stop.

We stopped at a hotel less than one mile from my parents house. And all i could think of that night was getting up early to walk to it, just to see it.

memory log: Friday, September 4, 2009

Waking up for a day of nothing at the Holiday Inn Express in King of Prussia, PA.

Growing up, most people only knew of King of Prussia as the place where a mall was. And i think it's still the same way. I had to laugh the night before when i realized the hotel was situated directly across the street from the King of Prussia Mall. Since shopping and consuming (anything other than a large meal after walking) was the last thing on my mind, it was surreal to be forced in to the mall to find something to eat. It felt like a virtual reality ride or a 3-d reality tv show—just a few steps away from being a real experience. Or, i was becoming so accustomed to carefully observing my surroundings at a walking pace that i was actually seeing the experience of walking in a mall for the first time.

I had no desire to go back so spent most of my day in the hotel room, trying to relax and rest. There was a fine view of the turnpike from our balcony. The view indoors on the television wasn't much better but at least i could catch up with tennis on TV. It ended up being my saving grace as i lay sleepless that night. Apparently, if i'm not moving around a lot during the day, it's nearly impossible for me to sleep. I started to realize why i was so restless after working an entire day in an office. My mind was also consumed with the idea of how and where we would start the next day for the final long walk in to Lansdale. When i had reached the end of the trail in Valley Forge, there was a sign that said "bridge access to Schuylkill River Trail". The issue was getting across the river. I couldn't figure out how it was possible without walking on the turnpike or US highway—both very dangerous and illegal. The sign seemed to solve the problem but after the experience of accidentally illegally trespassing on an abandoned mental facility plus many other contradictory signs and scenarios (a crosswalk crossing a US highway next to a no-pedestrian sign, trails that started without pedestrian access and the hotel that was literally unreachable on foot) I was a little paranoid. We already would be getting a ride back to the Valley Forge trail but what if the bridge didn't exist and we were stuck again? The anxiety I had before the night of our extra-long walk was back and I was learning to trust these feelings.

I eventually managed to drop off to the repetitive rhythm of a Rafael Nadal match on ESPN. Sometimes TV can be a good thing.

memory log: Thursday, September 3, 2009

The riskiest day of walking by far. Some road shoulders narrowed to inches against a guard rail next to a steep slope with cars curving at 45mph towards me. It was the first time i had to regularly stop walking and make myself narrow along the edge until the traffic passed. Some areas had an impossibility of pedestrians. The insanity of it was that at the entrance to the Perkiomen trail was a US or state highway on ramp without any lights for pedestrians. I had to look, run and hope my way across the street, always envisioning the slam from a high speed vehicle and imagining myself silhouetted against the clear morning sky. Trail to road to front yards to road to a trail through Valley Forge National Historic Park. I kept asking Christy if she could feel the history. The course wound through trees and meadows. Meadows where people died? It's how i imagined it. I tried to look at the scene like a panoramic movie screen where depictions of soldiers stumbled along, riddled with disease. Milkweed sprouted in entire fields. Tourists took photographs next to statues with their children.

When we got out of Valley Forge and summarized the visit in the aptly name "Encampment Center" (aka gift shop), it was going to be just a short walk to the hotel in King of Prussia (non-Philadelphians pause to laugh here at the name of the town). What was a pleasant paved trail turned into climbing over guardrail underneath and overpass littered with cockleburs. They were all over me like parasites and momentarily freaked me out. The shoulder disappeared and we walked on vast lawns that surrounded a convention center and office park. When thinking of going on a hike, i think this is the last idea that would come to mind. But there it is, present in our landscape—just as much a part of it as the nicely labeled trails that walkers get corralled on to. We had one last barrier: the underpass to the PA turnpike. It could have been easy but the non-existent should didn't only disappear to nothing, it did it on a curve in the road so that no car would see us if we walked there. We would surely be dead. And there's no crossing the turnpike either. The only alternative would be to go back the way we came and walk around a circle that would take 5 miles or more and then we STILL couldn't be sure if we'd be able to reach the hotel on foot. We were literally trapped.

My fear of making phone calls dwindles in a situation like this and within minutes i managed to find a car service that serviced our hotel that would come and pick us up to take us to the other side of the bridge. And he wouldn't even let us pay him. I told him what we were doing and he told us how he lost 50 or more pounds and no longer has diabetic symptoms because he started walking the 5 mile loop through Valley Forge. Another savior, another nice guy.

We met Tina at the hotel and proceeded to have to go to the mall for dinner. But that's another surreal experience for the next day.

memory log: Wednesday, September 2, 2009

When we left the French Creek Inn, we walked a little bit to a nearby diner (love PA diners) where a few guys sitting outside actually recognized us from the previous day in Oaks. I imagined us developing a sort of local celebrity where people would start tracking the 3 women—one in a bright yellow shirt—who were walking the highways, trails and roads of PA. A local TV station would get on the scent of it and before we knew it, we'd be met by a local crew as we stopped for a bathroom and some OJ at a WaWa or Turkey Hill Minit Mart.

Once we got inside we got a few "you go girls" from the female waitresses. As much as i hate that phrase, it was nice to hear. One thing i didn't expect was how this walk might seem to some women as one of empowerment. The day we had to walk on the US highway, we got a few cars honking at us but most of them were women.

This day of walking was really short—under 7 miles—but it was a lesson in the idiocy of suburban developments. After we got through Phoenixville, which seems to have suffered/benefited from the same gentrification and yuppie-ization of their downtown (artisan soaps, gourmet soups and a ton of irish bars and celtic paraphernalia shops), we entered into heavy suburbia. Sidewalks lasted as far as the new housing development's width, which was usually around 500 yards. Whoever built these places didn't seem to want anyone to venture outside of them. I kept picturing a robot-person walking to the end of these sidewalks and going back and forth walking in place like a kid's toy that's bumped in to a wall. The "houses" were gigantic and the landscape was barren. In between developments was a heavy swath of trees and vegetation that most likely was torn down on its flanking sides to accommodate for the new gargantuan homes. Everything seemed ludicrous and garish: the superfluous amount of windows; the new trees planted to replace the hundreds-year-old trees that were once there; the isolation of the named "neighborhoods"; the lack of encouragement to go anywhere from there but by car. And i thought Phoenix was a car city.

After we managed to not get killed on the side of the road and got to our hotel, there was a lot of icing, hot baths & showers, blister lancing and bandaging. We were starting to look kind of rough. I decided to have an intervention with Tina, who's feet were nearly covered in blisters on every area that came in contact with the ground. She was having to take baby steps and move slowly to not be in terrible pain walking on such raw skin. I suggested she take a cab to the next destination where we would have an additional day of rest to let her feet heal, but i left it up to her. Mostly, i was worried about her feet getting infected and her not being able to do the walk in to Lansdale—which i know she really wanted to do. She decided to take my suggestion, to my HUGE relief. I hadn't actually seen how bad her feet were until the day before last and when i did, couldn't imagine how she managed to keep walking on them. I've seen blisters from running distance, but never that bad.

That night, being in the nicest hotel we'd be in on the whole trip, i slept like the dead.

memory log: Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Some days center themselves around one event. All of the things that happened before them are forgotten and the events after them are remembered only in comparison to that main event.

When we left Pottstown, i had to navigate us on streets until the Schuylkill River trail began again near Valley Forge. I don't necessarily remember it being so bad, only that, as verdant and pretty as it still was, I was getting tired of worrying about oncoming traffic and the noise of all the cars. Schuylkill Road was also a state highway, occasionally spattered with no pedestrian signs. I wasn't really worried about a cop giving us a ticket since i assumed those signs were for walkers walking with traffic and possibly hitchhiking. Still, i thought it would be nice to get on to a quieter road where we could actually hear each other if we wanted to talk. The 3 of us had started to get in the habit of quietly trudging along.

We passed Limerick Nuclear Power Plant, more grasshoppers and countless meadows and reached a point where the road divided to the "old" Schuylkill Road. Immediately we passed a tavern built in the late 1700s and other stone houses quietly sitting vacant on the edge of a narrow road. A few elderly ladies sat in rocking chairs on a big wooden porch and sceptically stared at us.

I had trusted Google Maps to navigate me through these smaller roads and i thought i had found a good shortcut to get through to Spring City when i started to see more no trespassing signs. I even bypassed a "no through street" sign, assuming that maybe they just didn't want cars going through here. What could be the harm in a few people? There were no people and no traces. It felt like walking in to a Stephen King book. But i trusted in the map in my hands until we passed what seemed to be a fake department of transportation building and into a giant field of an abandoned town. The deeper we walked in, the narrower the streets became as the trees and plants consumed the shoulder. I knew if i kept walking through, i'd eventually get to Spring City but imagined the beginning of a nightmare where we'd walk and walk and soon the vines, branches and weeds would be wrapped around us and we'd be lost in the woods forever. There was an eerie absence. Not just that people weren't there but that they were removed purposefully. I felt like i was in a lion's den and too deep to get out safely.

I won't go into more details since i already covered them in my post from Sept 1. Stumbling on to Pennhurst State School grounds was one of the only experiences in this walk that consumed the entire day to be of its meaning. Even though i ended up walking only 1 or 2 miles shy of the miles i walked on the hellish day 2 days before, it seemed insignificant since my mind was occupied with a creepy, special feeling. I'm still having trouble thinking of anything else of significance to mention. When something grips your mind that much at the moment, it must dim other input to put it in the forefront.

memory log: Monday, August 31, 2009

Everything was new on Monday.

After the full range of emotions i experienced on our long walk from Shillington, i felt like i had nothing left but to feel good. It seemed impossible that we were privileged enough to walk along the side of small, windy, beautiful roads on a sunny day in the summer in Pennsylvania. I rejoined the Schuylkill River Trail after a mile or 2 on other roads and was plunged into trees, plants, moss, mosquitos, birds, cicadas and all the green-ness pulsating around us. I was inside one of those children's illustrated encyclopedias that shows what the earth was like before humans evolved.

I imagine we were all sore but thinking of it now, i can't even remember the pain. The walk from Birdsboro/Douglasville to Pottstown was around 9 miles and seemed to be over so quickly i started to feel like i hadn't done enough for the day. But Pottstown was perfect...like a larger version of Lansdale with rowhomes, diners, corner stores and railroad tracks. Several times that night, a freight train rumbled through and i wondered how you'd get used to that living in the rowhomes across the street from our hotel but directly in front of the tracks.

I think it was at this point where i started to settle in to this walk like it was my new routine. Instead of waking up, making coffee and heading to work or turning on the computer, i was carbo-loading and putting on all of my gear. By about 4pm, we were finished walking and could go get an early dinner where i ate way more than i normally ever would to replace the extra 1,000 calories i was burning each day. As simplistic as it may sound, I started to realize that every day would be different. It was refreshing to veer away and then occasionally meet up with the river and watch it flow in the direction i was walking. It was refreshing to know that each time i saw it, it would be different and i would be seeing it differently. All the new connections in my brain were making the space around me alter minute by minute.

I wasn't having any trouble sleeping anymore.

memory log: Sunday, August 30, 2009

We started out by eating breakfast with a clan of Jehovah's witnesses and the most polite, respectful children you'd ever meet.

I had hardly slept...maybe 4 hours but i was still excited to get started. I thought the only way i could get rid of my fear of the unknown was by pushing forward into that very thing. The day was beautiful and warm and we walked through trails that once were railroads. It was full immersion into green.

I had originally thought that we would stop at a hotel in Gibraltar or Birdsboro, like Google Earth had shown me was there. But after we stopped in Gibraltar (the town that almost isn't a town) it started to become clear that there was nothing really ahead of us and Google Earth had randomly placed some hotels that may or may not have really existed. The people in the Turkey Hill Minit Mart weren't much help either and didn't even seem to know where they lived. This place was just one to pass through, not to linger and find anything out. People got in and out of their cars while we continued to sit at a picnic table and i continued to reach my breaking point of sleepiness, exhaustion, guilt and hopelessness. We called 411 and kept getting redirected to the wrong place. There was no car service, cab, public transit...nothing but our feet to take us to wherever we were going to spend the night. I was faced with exactly what I had asked for on this trip.

It became clear that the closest place for us to stay was off of the US422 highway and approximately 8 miles away. There was no place to camp so we had to walk to it. I felt like digging myself into a hole under the picnic table we sat at and disappearing. I knew i could make it but had to consider Christy and Tina and felt terrible for what i was inflicting on them. The whole operation seemed incredibly selfish and inconsiderate. I started to believe i was a horrible person who never considered how i might impact other people. When we started to walk, i couldn't help sobbing off an on and repeatedly apologizing for this terrible mistake i had made. Somehow it all translated to me that I hadn't planned enough and that all of this would have been preventable had i not been such an idiot.

We walked. We trudged. We took occasional breaks. When i reached the point that took us off the trail and on to the highway, i started to see that this was going to be possible. It reminded me of the times i've run half marathons and i'd be at mile 9 thinking i just wanted to stop but what's another 4 or 5 miles at that point? If i came that far, i needed to go all the way.

A euphoria came over me at that point. I had lost any sense of feeling defeated and incompetent and had switched gears into my mechanical self who just moved because my body could still move. Everything hurt under the weight of my 30lb pack but the simple act of walking seemed so basic and so possible that i became aware that eventually i would get there. There was nothing to worry about. And so i didn't. I stopped worrying.

We managed to get across the highway where there was an actual pedestrian signal next to a no-pedestrian sign. The large shoulder to the road gave us plenty of room to walk and we stepped over matted-down roadkill, socks, grasshoppers and plants. Randomly-placed historical markers sat on the edge of the road where no one but pedestrians on this US highway could read it. I imagined what devotion a driver would have to have in order to pull over to read these signs since it was impossible at 60MPH. The air was damp and green and the light was starting to dim. When we finally came over the hill and saw the sign to the hotel, i screamed in a huge sense of relief and gratitude—probably the most exhilarating moment of my life.

memory log: Saturday, August 29, 2009

I had arranged for a shuttle to take us from Philly to Reading. The driver, Maddy, made me feel at home. Maybe there's a certain way of conversing in that area or maybe it's just certain people but the ease that i talked to her with isn't something that comes easy in Phoenix. Not only did she live in the area i used to live in but actually went to the same church as my entire Urso family once did. She probably even went to school with one of my cousins. We had a great drive with her and talked the whole time. It was foggy and gloomy outside and at one point i turned to my sister and told her i was starting to get a little freaked out. I looked down into the fog-filled valley that was supposed to be the Schuylkill River and pictured myself lost and vulnerable. I really began to think i was insane to ever concoct this idea. What was i thinking? Where was i going? I felt completely unprepared.

Maddy dropped us off right in front of Holy Rosary but we couldn't get in. My fear of clergy members kept me from knocking on the door and introducing myself to someone who surely knew my grandfather at one point. We bought some bread from a disinterested or hard of hearing cashier at the ATV bakery next door and set out.

At this point, it was all finding memories or almost forcing a recall of events. This sign, that restaurant, this bus stop, that hill. I thought by putting myself in these places i would feel instant nostalgia, but strangely enough, i didn't. Things felt familiar but even as i walked right past the townhouse we lived in for 7 years, nothing specific came to mind. No flashbacks, no remembrances. The only thing that hit me was the realization that my grandfather had died in the nursing home up the street from my house. It made me feel sad to think of him dying there in the place i had to get away from, not even knowing who he was or what he was doing anymore.

The landscape was all a place i knew and one that continues to insert itself into my dreams in one way or another. The streets, sidewalks, signs, buildings had shrunken. I felt momentarily silly for going back there. Iroquois Ave used to dead end into the woods and a pond. Now it was all developments and houses on the hill. We were at the dead end but then we walked through it.

That night was the worst night. My brain wouldn't let go of the fact that the next day i was really setting out into the unknown and dragging two people with me who i felt responsible for. All of my maps looked inadequate, un-detailed and incomplete. Even though we had already walked 8 miles of the first day, i felt like i hadn't really started yet. My nervousness combined with a giant mystery spider that kept trying to land itself on me from the ceiling (wasn't this a nightmare from my childhood?—forcing me to wonder if i had hallucinated it) kept me awake for most of the night. I calculated and re-calculated the amount of hours i would be able to sleep if i fell asleep at 2am, 3am, 4am...

memory log: Friday, August 28, 2009

I spent most of my day staying busy and re-familiarizing myself with Philadelphia. There were markers of steps that brought me closer to the beginning of the trip so, since i was still in the stage of all those preparatory steps, i didn't really feel nervous.

It was raining off and on throughout the day until midday when the real rain broke and then it poured for hours. I had forgotten how much and for how long it could rain in southeastern PA. I watched from my hotel room as sheets of rain coursed down the roof of the Reading Terminal Market. Tina had my umbrella while she went to meet some friends for cheesesteaks and me and Christy went and got cheap Indian food. The Indian restaurant served everything in plastic—cups, utensils, plates, serving bowls. I imagined how much waste they must produce in the day and whether it's actually cheaper to pay for a continuous supply of plasticware rather than to pay a dishwasher.

I must have gone over my numerous maps but since I wasn't really sure where or how to begin and since looking at the maps became such a routine throughout the rest of the trip, I can't specifically remember doing it.

I decided i was going to go to the WaWa across the street in the morning for coffee and a Tastykake but beyond that, i felt overwhelmed and remedied that in my mind by trying to tell myself that the entire trip was trivial and ridiculous idea. Also, if i hadn't planned enough then it wouldn't just affect me but Tina and Christy. That gave me the hugest amount of stress.

fade, change

I want to see how memory fades or changes. Starting tomorrow, I'll recreate my trip based on the memories I have one week later.

process and order

There's the preparation and wondering--speculating before the journey. Then there's the journey and experience itself. It happens and I react. I see, think and process it. It's what's interesting at the moment and what matters.

Now it's after the journey and for me, it's putting it all in order. The days become identified by the impressions that occurred on that segment. It starts as simplistic--the hard day, the easy day, the sunny day, the day cockleburs attached themselves to my butt. Then, as my brain keeps reviewing and hard-wiring itself to fixate on strings of nuances and importances, it becomes more complicated. The hard day had varying elements that were overlooked when, filled with physical pain and exhaustion, I could only think of my sense of relief and the difficult thing I had just managed.

How to tap in to the full string of experience? Would my brain be able to handle everything? I read that maybe what becomes long-term memory are the things that are the most relevant, most traumatic, most impactful. But my expectation for what is important at that moment colors that. All of these other things are happening. The best we can do is grab on to as much as we can while it's happening. Otherwise, our memory mainly becomes a construction--tying lines from one small experience to another--fabricating their sequence and meaning.

proximity

I got up early this morning and went for a walk. It's all I could think about last night. At one point, I became consumed with the idea of getting as close as I could to my parent's house without them seeing me. The possibilities of the confrontation were too great and I've been trying to remind myself that this trip wasn't about them. But I wanted to see the house--to see the place. Even if they didn't seem concerned with having me in their life, I wanted to remind myself that it was a place I knew and I lived.

The morning was quiet, breezy and cool and I imagined waking up with my windows open. I took photos as I walked up the street and got closer to the dead end. I situated myself behind a tree that blocked their window. I walked past their neighbor's crappy 25 year old fence and was glad there wasn't the vicious black lab snarling at me anymore. I took a photo. I stared. For a little bit, I got caught up in a relaxing, reflective moment where I thought what it would be like to be in that house without anyone else. I saw that their living room light was on and figured they were drinking coffee and reading the paper. I stood there like a stalker.

Then I saw the front door open slightly and suddenly felt like a criminal. I crossed the street, pulled up my hood to cover my hair--a dead giveaway--and walked fast back the way I came, my heart racing the whole time.

I prepared myself for a hand on my shoulder but knew it would never happen. Even if they thought they saw me, I know they wouldn't investigate to see.

I walked back to the hotel, not seeing any of the things I saw on the walk over. I came all this way--82.84 miles--and came right to the edge of where I wanted to be. It's just what I had to do.

I'm not french, I'm from Lansdale

14.89 miles and almost at the final destination. I'm here but I haven't reached it yet. In town but a part of it so unfamiliar that I can pretend I'm not really there yet.

I haven't recovered any memories yet and maybe I won't. What's been recovered so far is a very general sense of how things are here. The way people talk, the smell of the plants, the buzz of bugs.

When we got off the Schuylkill River Trail to connect to the Norristown Farm Park, we stopped at a gas station for food and a bathroom. 3 backpacked women stand out--as I'm sure they would have if I'd seen them as a teenager in Lansdale. The cashier asked me if I was french and I said "no, I'm from Lansdale."--I lost my luster immediately. But it was comforting to not be a stranger. I guess I was also trying to say to not take advantage or bullshit me. It's worked so far on this trip and at least eliminates the ordinary conversation people might have where they try to introduce you to or describe the space. Instead, for me, it makes things easier. That first day driving with Maddy from Philly to Reading, Christy said I was the chattiest she's ever seen me. But I think I finally had something to chat about--an understanding, a past, a recognition. It's here.

rest

Today has been a day of rest. I was ahead of schedule so decided to take 2 days here in Valley Forge/King of Prussia. It's a strange place to stay--across from a mall and tucked away in the intersection of the turnpike and other highways. We spent most of the day inside resting. My ankle feels a million times better and Tina's feet are healing. It's ironic that we're resting here in this odd place constructed mainly for access by cars. We have to insist on being here on foot. Valley Forge was selected by Washington for its ideal location to rest his troops for the winter but also to keep a safe eye on the British army. From this vantage point, I'm keeping a safe eye on our final destination tomorrow. Tomorrow will be a long walk in to Lansdale and then the following day we will actually walk into the center of town. I am hoping, in a way, to move invisibly into town and see it with new eyes. Maybe now it will be a place like any of the others I've walked through on this trip. I'm already less intimidated by the memories that have brought me so much stress and caused me to avoid it in the first place. My parents, with their aloofness, apathy and carelessness, no longer own it.

But once I get there, will I just see where I was thrown against the car? Slapped outside of band practice? The streets I walked when I was kicked out? The places I ran to get away from a loud and crazy house? Will I see that there's peace there now?

What will I notice this time? I wonder if it will be locked in memories or a place that all those memories have fed--the ground flipped over and buried or sunken underneath.

What's happened before feels short and compressed. What's about to happen feels long and open.

This trip feels like it just started but already it's over.

navigate

What if you wanted to walk from one end of the US to the other?
I know people have done it. How do they do it? So far my experience of going from point a to b is a challenge of navigation. I see no pedestrian signs next to a button for a crosswalk, sidewalks to nowhere that spill on to a major road without a shoulder, state property, private property, trespassing signs, tangles of highway under and overpasses curving without a shoulder, bus stops planted on a curb next to another no pedestrian sign, embankments peppered with cockleburs and guard rail. Contradictions. Expectations. Confusion.

My challenge is looking at the maps and trying to understand what road is actually walkable.
Almost none of them are. With the exception of a few marked trails here, this space is not meant for people on their feet. I've spent days hugging the edge of the road with my eyes focused on whether an oncoming car is getting too close. It is me and the roadkill. Me and the squashed bugs that hit the windshield. Me and discarded cigarettes, food, underwear and condoms. Grasshoppers jump away from my feet. Everything on this road happens fast.

painfully

I have so much extra time now. By not being able to plan exactly when and where we'd find a place to stay, I'm about 2 days ahead of schedule. Today was only 6.8 miles, which felt like a simple and fast walk. It's almost like we never even left. I'm becoming concerned about my sister Tina and her blistered feet. All 3 of us are sore and in pain but she keeps pounding the pavement where it could get worse. I think I have either lightly sprained my ankles or the tendons around my feet or I'm developing some other tendon issues. Physical pain is not something I factored in to this trip and I'm hoping it doesn't become a dominant force. The walk is weakening and strengthening me at the same time. The weather has actually been equally painful in how beautiful it is. After the first day, it's been sunny, breezy and warm. I walk on the trail and side of the road next to what sometimes seems like a primordial forest. Every inch is growing whether it's next to a landfill, nuclear power plant, nature trail or abandoned mental facility--all of which I've passed.
Whatever grew when I last lived here is several feet underground being compressed, digested and feeding these new plants. I'd never really seen it before.

eerie accident

I'm disturbed today by my accidental detour into an abandoned complex full of large brick buildings, overgrown vegetation, rusted stop signs and a general eerie feeling. Once I realized I didn't want to go further because of the strangeness of it all, we managed to get observed and escorted out by a state trooper. He said it was all state property and we weren't supposed to be there at all. We had assumed that the no trespassing signs referred to the land and not the street and, without any other signs or indications, went along the way that my google map guided me.
We tried making sense of it and decided it must have been a former military base, but it kept haunting me. When we finally made it to the little French Creek Inn, I asked the hotel front desk lady that I'm calling Madge because she looks like one, what that place might be. True to old women all over PA, she told us exactly that it was the Pennhurst State School and Hospital. Opened in the early 1900s, it housed the mentally and physically disabled but was closed in the 1980s after a lawsuit of abuse and civil rights violations. The I read about it, the more eerie the experience becomes. The size of the place was less like an abandoned building and more like an abandoned town. I feel like I had a special glimpse into something rare, found completely by innocence. After our 2nd encounter with the state trooper, I had wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible, which is how I'm sure the patients there felt too.

I don't think I've ever come across something seeming so secret and odd. And now it's just consuming my thoughts.

realized

Yesterday was the test and today I came to the sudden realization that I wasn't afraid anymore. I started playing out "what if"
Scenarios and realized that, no matter what, I would figure out a way to handle it. We're still all recovering from the pain of walking over 16 miles with 20-30 pounds on our backs.

Today we walked about 9, which felt like it was almost over before it started. Pleasant, breezy and knowing we had a place to stay at the end, I could absorb the trees, water, mottled clouds and people along the way.
I feel like I'm developing a rhythm.

We are a day ahead of schedule. In Pottstown tonight which is yet another southeastern PA town that feels approachable and familiar.

Another long walk ahead tomorrow. Maybe 12 miles but I think we're ready.

difficult

Today was hard. Fear of the unknown ahead last night led to 4 hours of sleep. The actual unknown ahead led to a 16.2 mile walk before finding a hotel. In between was trees, river,sun,breezes, bugs, and by chance running into Maddy,the super nice shuttle driver who took us from Philly to Reading--who lives next to the town I grew up in, goes to the same church as my grandparents had and reminded me of how generous and genuine people can be around here.

Emotion seems to pop out in the weirdest instances fueled by lack of sleep and this strange trip. I have a realization that the past doesn't really seem so important anymore.

Exhausted, twitching, aching and sore. 16.2 miles closer. I'm amazed at my ability to move so far by moving my feet.

The hardest day.

close to it

You can be right on top of it but it's hard to get close to. Some things are maybe better from looking behind.

Standing in front of an old memory that's made distant--a combination of memories--an entire pile of time. It's like having someone tell you that a photo of you as a 2yr old is you and you believe them, then fabricate a possible memory around it. Then,later on,you tell people stories of you in that photograph that you don't remember.

I was there. I remember being there in that brick townhouse up the street from where I broke my arm and my parents sent me back to school. Earlier in the day I remember the spot that seemed familiar in the city as where I went 2 buses away with my mom when she finally took me to the emergency room. One memory cemented and a million other little ones locking this street and that turn into place. The rest is all new.

afraid

It is hard to decide that this matters--that reviewing something as personal as my life should be of interest to anyone, including me.
It's still there--i am in the middle of it and it's familiar but it is separate.

I'm afraid of being narcissistic.
I'm afraid of making it seem like I care.
It is much easier to care about others and help them figure out their way.

Vicarious living and personal avoidance.