Living forward, learning from the past...

Don't worry... I won't get too deep!!

 2012 came in with lots of fanfare for me... a party with dear friends I don't see nearly enough of.... WAY too many lattes and groceries... The usual...

Except it's not usual at all.

I've written here so many times about how my life has changed and how I intimidating that can be... But I resolved the other night that I wouldn't face 2012 living in the past... Time to head in new directions, time to move forward. However, since 2011 was a pretty crazy year in the life of this girl, I thought I'd be remiss to not do a little remembering/ learning from it. Here goes....

 In 2011 I left a job I loved in a place I felt safe to take a big risk and trust that God had something new for me. I learned I am stronger and more resilient than I thought. I learned that the safest life and the easiest decisions don't come with guarantees and risk is worth it.

In 2011 I took amazing trips to the Dominican Republic and Minnesota and... Indiana! I learned that God is still in the business of using silly, immature, selfish people like me to serve and love. I learned that I have much growing to do and that my heart still breaks for those in need.

 In 2011 I took a really, really, REALLY long walk in the woods. I learned that crazy dreams come true, adventures change lives, climbing the big mountains makes you stronger, and life is meant to be embraced. I learned that some of the best people I know I found in the woods... and allowing them into my life has made my life richer and far more blessed.

In 2011 I also walked through days with old friends and beautiful people. I learned that I have changed and grown and accountability to those girls has helped me hold onto my center when the world has been spinning. I laughed much more than is reasonable this year and learned to see joy in my days. I prayed an awful lot this year and learned that blessings don't always look like I think they should, but God always provides.

Most of all I think this year I learned to love and live well.

As I head into the new year the things that I learned and the people who got me through 2011 will continue to carry me through.  I am blessed.  I have no idea where I will be a year from now, just as I had no idea a year ago I would be where I am today.  However, I won't dwell on what was, the mistakes and missteps that were part of this year.  I won't dwell on the hurt or confusion, the difficult or complicated.  Instead I want to head into 2012 with an open heart and mind, ready to embrace whatever comes, take risks without being afraid, and live a big, big life.

Learn from the past, live forward.  I'm in.

on the 27th

Random fact about me?  Dates stick out in my mind.  Unfortunately that wasn't true in college or I would have done a LOT better in Western Civ, but random dates do stick out in my mind and when they roll around my mind wanders.  Now, validly, my mind wanders a whole lot to start with but go with me here.

Today, Dec. 27th (because I started this before midnight), my day looked pretty normal... morning run, a bit of hanging out with friends, working at Sbux and baking some pumpkin cookies (yep, that's normal these days).  However, over the course of the day I thought about the 27th of other months and the significance of those days and where I was....

3 months ago, September 27th:  One of my favorite days on the trail.  Seriously... hiked 13 miles from Pleasant Pond Lean to to Moxie Bald Mountain Lean to.  Hiked the day with Pat, Mojo, Oatmeal, and Chill, some of my very favorite trail people.  Amazing campfires, beautiful weather, great mountains, and our first view of Katahdin (which was still 150 miles away).  Seriously as close to a perfect day as I can remember on the trail.

6 months ago, June 27th:  My first day back at Sulphur Grove after my sabbatical.  A day that changed everything.  A day that I realized how much I had changed.

8 months ago, April 27th:  I stood on Springer Mountain in Georgia... with NOT A CLUE where I was headed.  I intended to walk the trail for a couple of weeks, maybe a month.  I had NO IDEA I would end up in Maine, meet amazing people, and become a different, better, stronger person.

12 months ago, Dec. 27th, 2010:  I led an amazing team of teens and young adults to Batay #9 in Barahona, Dominican Republic.... where we mixed concrete and dreamed of changing the world.  A year ago tonight I was falling asleep to the sounds of the city on the top floor (open air) of the guest house while the warm ocean breeze blew.

The 27th... who knew it had such significance?  And what a difference a year can make... And as I look forward, I can't begin to imagine what the 27ths of the future hold.  I can dream.  I could tell you the things I hope for in the 27ths and other days to come.  I could tell you what I want and plan for and who I hope is a part of those days, so many things that depend on so many other things, other people and what they want, endless possibility.  I could be overwhelmed by that... but instead I choose to be content knowing everything comes together in its own time.  My dreams, my plans, the future... will happen exactly as they are meant to be.

SO tonight, as the cold wind howls outside and I head to sleep I wish for YOU this... I wish for you many amazing days and memories of your own, I wish for you amazing people to do life with, I wish for you blessings so numerous you can't count them and challenges that cause you to learn and grow.  I wish for you joy.  I wish for you many amazing 27ths of your own.

Bjs!!

time flies....

Home is weird.  Home doesn't always feel like home.  I am weird.

New story.

I left Maine nearly 2 months ago... and Virginia 6 weeks ago.  That's strange.  It has gone so very fast.  A lot of things are left undone... I haven't cleaned my raincoat yet... I hung my pack in the garage after I washed it and haven't brought it in... my trail runners are still caked in mud... I haven't finished my blogging about the trail yet.  

Home is weird.  Home doesn't always feel like home.  I am weird.

Same old story.

I have two jobs now.  I have traded in my hiker stink for the permanent smell of coffee permeating everything I own.  I no longer wear crocs and socks, but have my black Toms permanently attached to these feet.  I don't wear the same shorts and t every single day, but I have barely touched 99% of the clothes in my closet.

Home is weird.  Home doesn't always feel like home.  I am weird.

ARGH!

I still do miss the trail nearly every day.  It is still sometimes odd that I can shower every day and sleep in a bed.  I miss the woods, but as the snow and freezing rain started falling today I was glad to not be out there walking.  I miss my friends and it is comforting to hear from some of them that they struggle with the same things.  I have easily slipped back into some habits like too much internet and busyness.  I haven't been sucked back into everything though.  There are still people I haven't seen and things I haven't done.  I still sometimes feel like I don't really fit into this life, my priorities are different, my perspective has changed.  I don't regret the things I gave up and choices I made that led me back to the trail but I do miss them sometimes.  I miss some of the security that came with my old life... but I love sitting at the edge of the unknown.  Although I am struggling through some things, I am also excited to see what comes next.  

I have come to realize that as much as I love home and my family and friends... I don't want to feel stuck here.  I used to live on the edge of big adventure, always willing to run off and see what came next.  Somewhere along the way I got really really comfortable and stopped seeking adventures.  This summer I rediscovered the beauty of walking to the edge and taking the risk... and I don't want to be stuck again.  As uncertain as things are right now... I love the beauty of endless possibility.

This is my home... but I also know that wherever I am, wherever I am doing life, wherever I am with people I love... that is home too.  I want to live big.

I have been planning for another big adventure in 2012.  I don't talk about it because I feel like it may jinx it... but someday soon... details.

Oh Vermont... these trees live in Vermont... lucky trees!

I've been super stressed lately.

It ain't pretty and I ain't proud.

But it's true.

Stressed.

The job is going ok (although I am still adjusting to getting up at 4 am... baby steps).

I'm planning to start another new job early next week (fingers crossed).

There are things going on in my life that stress me out though.

Things that feel overwhelming and hard.

I'm the most unemotional person I know... 

but I have cried 3 times in the last 2 days.

Seriously.

What's wrong with me?!

Driving home this evening I came to the realization that things are not going to be easy any time soon.  In this season of my life... when I desperately wish I was still living in the woods (except for that whole central heat thing I got goin on in my house!).... this is where I find myself... overwhelmed and exhausted but thankful for each decision and step I took that brought me here.

Truthfully?  The time I spent in the woods this year changed some things about me.  As much as I am very much the same person, I am also very different.  Reality is that I have come to accept that I define happiness and success differently than a lot of people do. I may be struggling, but I am still in the place of saying I am headed for good things and places. One thing that hasn't changed though is my trust that God will provide.  I have always believed that.  I have always lived with the believe that it is all in His hands.  So today I am choosing to embrace that truth.  As December starts and Advent is here (one of my favorite times of year)... I will remember that God will provide, just as He always has.  

Does that mean no more stress or worry?  No.  

Likely it doesn't even mean no more tears!

However... I will make a decision today, and each day, to be thankful for what I have and know that God will provide all that I need. 

Happiness and Joy

OOOOOHHHH.  I probably shouldn't blog after getting up at 4 am.  I probably shouldn't blog after drinking 4 cups of coffee and a cinnamon dolce latte before noon...but I'm going to!  Pretty much because... I'm cool like that!

I have been thinking recently about happiness.  I know, I know... such deep thoughts I have, but hear me out on this.  I have decided (although I would imagine someone else has decided long before me) that happiness is WHAT I am and joyful should be WHO I am.  I've written so much here about finding happiness, being happy, holding onto happy.  Those are all good things.  Happiness matters.  I don't want to face my days with a frown or be a cranky pants.  Some days aren't great.  Today I was training to open at work, which meant being there at 5 am.  That means (since I live 20 minutes away) that I had to get up at 4 am.  Let me just say... not happy about that!  I did it though, because for this season of my life it's what I have to do.  Happiness wasn't in my morning, until I decided to let it be.

I have been stressed about some things lately.  I don't want to be.  I want to pretend that everything is honky dory an I am not stressed... but I am.  I worry.  I fret.  I think about what I need to do and how to pull it all together.  I put a good face out for others.  Yet, I worry.  Stress makes me unhappy.  Worry makes me not sleep.  When I am tired its hard to put a smile on this face... Happiness isn't a part of that path.

Yet as I have thought more about it... happy is WHAT I am.  It's situational.  It depends on outside circumstances and how I react to them.  Happy is important, but I can't always be happy.  Sometimes its hard to get to that place.

However, joyful is WHO I want to be.  I want there to be joy in my life, simply for the living.  I have nothing that should take away that joy.  Things may not be exactly as I want them right now, but I have no reason to not have joy in my life.  Joyfulness is about choosing to be thankful and live that out.  Happiness comes and goes, joyfulness is a long term commitment.

I used to be afraid of commitment.  I'm not so much anymore.

So, I want to live with joy.  I want it to be part of who I am.  I realize that I won't always be happy.  Life is hard and sometimes things are difficult.  I won't always have a smile on my face... but I want joy to shine from my life.  I want to be peaceful, joyful, and real.  In the midst of my stress I want there to be a place of peace and joy.

I recently told someone I was one of the most laid back people they would ever meet.  Is that true?  Not in the past, but more so every day as I attempt to learn to live with a joyful heart... I want to embrace and share joy.  The happiness that comes with knowing exactly who will provide.

... one month later...

“There is more to us than we know. If we can be made to see it, perhaps

for the rest of our lives we will be unwilling to settle for less.”

Kurt Hahn*

I was out and about in Dayton today… went to a job interview, hung out at the GS council with a great friend, bought some cake making stuff, went for a run, harassed my (very lazy) dog… the things that make up my life these days.  It was a beautiful day… and suddenly, mid afternoon I realized that it has been a month since I stood on the top of Katahdin.  A whole month!  How did that happen?  I have been back in Ohio for 2 weeks.  Two weeks!  How did that happen?

One month has passed.  In some ways it feels like a lifetime.  In some ways it was yesterday.  So where do I stand a month later?  One month later… I don’t want to forget how alive I felt on top of Katahdin.  How huge of an accomplishment I felt I had achieved.. One month later I don’t want to forget how beautiful that moment was… and how hard I fought to get there.  I proved a lot of people wrong… I proved myself wrong.  I never quit or cried, I never gave up or gave in.  I met amazing people, I fell in love with life and living again.  I remembered to live in the moments, as hard and ugly or beautiful and wonderful as they were.  I remembered what it means to be passionate about living your life.  I remembered what it means to be peaceful.  I remembered what it means to live your dreams, as ridiculous and unattainable as they seem to others.  I remembered what it is like to do life with people who “get it” when no one else does.

Mostly I remembered what it was like to be happy.  Some days I feel so immature and selfish.  Some days I feel really irresponsible and my bank account says I am getting to be pretty desperate… but man was I happy on the trail.  Not just because I had no responsibilities or tough decisions… not because it was perfect and easy… but because I just WAS happy.  I’m trying hard to hold onto that.

Honestly?  I want nothing more than I want to be back in the woods.  I think about it, plan for it, pray about it and dream.  My life made sense there.  I felt ALIVE every day.  It wasn’t easy or pain-free.  It didn’t always go the way I thought it would.  There were days that were frustrating and hard... but it's a beautiful life being a hiker.  Beautiful.

I am trying hard to keep remembering the lessons I learned on the mountains of the east this summer.  It seems like a dream.   I wish things like that I had taken more pictures or kept a better journal.  I sometimes wish I had turned around on Katahdin and hiked south all the way to Georgia… just to breath in a few more days/weeks/months in the mountains.  When I was hiking people would say “is this the first time you have thru hiked” and I would say “this is the ONLY time I will thru hike” and yet now I think almost every day about if I would do it again… and some days I really think I would.

Maybe I am just nostalgic for the mountains and the simplicity and my friends.  Maybe I just want to be back in that place that made me so happy with people who understood. 

My camera wasn’t always working at the end of the trip (much like everything else electronic in my pack) and I would stand on mountain tops and stare at amazing views and tell myself… this one is just for you Carly, this one is just for the memory… you get to keep this one.  So much of my hike is that way in my head.  I get the memories… I can’t put them into words or show a good picture.  I just get to keep them for me.  I relive them when I am driving or when I am trying to sleep at night.  The memories won’t ever be as amazing as the experience.  Yet I am blessed to have them.

People in Ohio don’t always understand (some do!) or even care much about my big hike.  It doesn’t fit into their lives and the busyness, and I get that.  Sometimes I allow myself to be shocked how very little people care about the last 6 months of my life…. until I realize how selfish it is to even think that.  I had this experience, I lived the dream, I can’t expect everyone to be as amazed by it as I am.

And so, I find myself here, one month after Katahdin… I don’t miss a lot of the nitty gritty parts of the  trail, but I miss some of it more than is probably reasonable.  Sometimes I hope it won’t always be this way, that I won’t ALWAYS think of it on a daily (sometimes hourly) basis.  Mostly though I hope it will ALWAYS be this way.

In Monson, a hiker friend and I were talking after dinner one night.  I had met him in North Carolina and then run into him again near Mt. Washington… then saw him in Monson.  He told me that at Mt. Washington he thought I was a different person, so much happier and more at peace than in North Carolina.  That’s what I want… that’s who I want to be.

My life is a mess of contradictions.  Sometimes I think I am going crazy.

Yet the AT will always be a part of who I am.  I want to be peaceful.  I want to love life.  I want to embrace this time and the opportunities that are in front of me. 

I am blessed.

Last week my friend Patrick sent me a picture of me

(does that sentence make sense to anyone but me?!). 

At the time I told him I hated it because I look like... well, goof troop really.

He says its his favorite.

 My friend Betsie told me it makes me look like a blind person.

This picture makes me laugh though... and I put it here because today, in Ohio, I want to remember days like this... a beautiful day in Vermont with a surprise deli and an unexpected slack pack into Hanover, NH.

A beautiful day on the trail...

enjoying sunshine, friends, laughter, and trail magic beauty.

 Today I thought a lot about wanting to be here...

 or here...

 And I thought a lot about life... and how as much as I miss the trail, I don't want to let the days I have here pass waiting and wishing for something else.  I miss the woods... but they aren't gone forever. 

I'll be back there. 

For now I don't want to forget to embrace these days...

Life is beautiful if challenging and today is a gift.  I've said a lot that I wanted to remember to embrace THESE days, wherever THESE days happen.  SO today, in Ohio... I am thankful.