I need to start with a clarification for yesterday's post. K did not actually say that I looked like a child molester. I've been picking at her about it because in her earnestness to assure me that my haircut was fine, she ended up making it sound like she was agreeing with me. She was a little upset with me this morning when she read the post. I'm not sure why. It's I who end up sounding like a loser in that post, not her. I still stand by what I said about Mickey, though, but only because he hasn't complained yet.
About a month ago, I had a fairly solid plan with what I was going to do with two of my next seven days. I was going to go backpacking either solo or with Mickey on the Florida Trail where it passes through the Juniper Prairie Wilderness. When it became pretty clear that Mickey wasn't going, I ran the idea past K to see if she would be interested in going with me. She actually was enthusiastic, and we even went so far as to get her some bare minimum gear. I'm not making her take a full-size pack, so I planned for me to take most of our larger items in my large pack and give her a smaller backpack for the stuff that wouldn't fit in mine. We found a really good deal at REI for a day pack that was on clearance, so she has a pack designed for hiking instead of my trusty old LL Bean pack. The old green LL Bean held up to six years of heavy academic usage in high school and college as well as being my regular luggage for the five years since I graduated college. It's an excellent backpack, but not exactly designed for hiking. K will be much more comfortable with the new pack.
It wasn't until today that my plans got thrown for a loop. My mom mentioned that she and my dad were going to go camping at Pine Mountain on the days K and I had planned on backpacking (and needing them to keep E). I made the mistake of mentioning that there's a 30-mile trail at Pine Mountain and all of the sudden, my plans were changed to backpacking that trail instead. Normally, I wouldn't have an issue with that, except that I've been planning my Florida trip for weeks now and had gotten a little attached to the idea. After a while, I grew to accept the idea. After all, it would make it easier for my parents to keep E and I started to realize that to do the Juniper Prairie right, K and I would either need to leave home before 7 a.m. on the first day of our hike or have to ask my parents to babysit for two nights so we could drive down the night before.
Now, a couple hours after I finally accepted the change in location of our backpacking trip, things may have been changed again. My parents suddenly decided to cancel their camping trip, which means there's no real reason to do the Pine Mountain Trail. Both Pine Mountain and Juniper Prairie are about four-hour trips for us, meaning either an early-morning start or a two-night excursion for either location now that my parents won't already be at one of the two locations.
I just e-mailed my mom back to see if she'd still be able to keep E for us during that time, so until I hear back from her tomorrow, I won't even know if K and I will be able to make the trip at all. I know I'm going out for an over-nighter sometime between now and when I go back to school. I have a free week and a bunch of new hiking gear to test out, so I really want to go even if it means having to go without K.
The only reason that bugs me (I'm perfectly happy with the idea of going solo otherwise) is that I was looking forward to going out on the trail with K as much as I was about going to the Florida Trail. Maybe more.
I'll post later about how this melodrama unfolds.
2 comments:
This hardly seems a melodrama, although I do understand your frustration. I (being a type A) tend to get a little bent out of shape when plans change or fall through.
Huh. That's a predicament. You'll figure it out. You can always come up my way and we can hit the trails.
Courtney shot down my idea of coming to visit this week. You'll have to ask her about that.
And I have nothing to defend myself for.
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