[at-l] Developing mental toughness for LD hiking

[mvhudson at gmail.com (Mark Hudson)]

***

>* > The fire in my belly kinda dies out when I don't have a home
*>* base to go back to for regrouping purposes.  How do you get
*over the need to have a safe place to go to?  Or do you just
re-designate your sleeping bag as your safe place?***

You know, I wish I had a good answer for that, but I'm wired so
completely differently.
Home is where I pitch for the night, home is where the sun comes up in
the morning.
Home is the 30 pound pack on my back. (Anyone remember the old t-shirt
from Campmor, where
the guy is carrying his pack, and the top is transformed into a house?)

You wouldn't think it possible, but when I finished my thru-hike I
became homesick for the trail.
(Not post-trail depression, I had that too and worked through it, I'm
talking genuine homesickness)
Not a specific place, homesick for the trail in it's entirety. How can
you be homesick for a place
that's not a specific place? Beats me... buts that's where I was at,
what can I say....

Sloetoe, re your post... I had a tape in college that was always in
the car deck on the way to the
trailhead... maybe, just maybe, you might recognize CCR's 'Up Around the Bend'?

skeeter