30 August 2015

I think I've become a hiker

Since June (2015) I have hiked every weekend.
At first it was simply for the added fitness, another sustained cardio exercise in my weight loss journey... Simply THAT... I got out and did it because I thought I NEEDED to... For that..

But something clicked, 3rd or 4th time on the trail. I enjoyed it. Like with weight lifting, I really started to LOVE it. Out on the trail (since I'm a newb) I started seeing new things, wonderful, beautiful things that have been in my backyard for years!!! Critters, I've never seen, except in books, or Google. Plants, wildflowers, rocks and dirt, the variety is incredibly vast right here in Southern Arizona!!

Today I realized how much and WHY I love it. Talking to myself on the trail (when you're alone you have conversations too don't lie) went kind of like this..."why am I up so early?" "Sunrise stupid" What a sunrise it was. Watching out over my entire valley, as the sun peeked from behind the mountains to the east....ACTUALLY watching the sun creep over the mountains!!! THAT is why I'm up so early, THAT IS WHY I'm excited to hike... I wondered how many people am I REALLY watching this sunrise with (elsewhere in my area) FEW I dare say. So there is that, I get to see, I get to experience what few others, know happen, but never SEE happen.

Another thing that came to me was how with hiking, I don't HAVE to depend on anyone but myself... Even if I were to make hike plans with someone, and they were to bail on me (which is pretty regular) IM still on the trail... Their loss. I still get to relish in every bit of beauty that comes with every step I take. No one can take that away from me!!

Hiking allows me to have these conversations with myself in an element that makes me realize some of these "problems" that I think I have are rather small and petty.... For goodness sakes I'm a lone man on the slope of a mountain, with no human in eye or earshot, alone... The "problems" of town aren't anything in the grand scheme of things. The seemingly, never ending drama, of the Internet, and being connected to people that may or may not truly care for me, the behind the back gossip, and hate, are non existent out here THERE IS NO INTERNET! IT IS FANTASTIC!!! It allows me to REALLY reflect on the folks in my life that have been there every step of the way, and those that, well are lacking. I think of the people I've been there for, and some perhaps I should have been, and maybe some that I shouldn't have..All of that is replaced with serene, thriving beauty of nature, raw, right in front of me, new every single time.

I don't know if EVERY hiker feels these feels, but they are mine. I've become a hiker, less than some, more than others but altogether, happy in my pursuit of finding my happy place, so that I MIGHT become a better person.









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