Carrying Weight

This is all about carrying weight. We carry many things. Some things we have to, some things we want to, and some things we don't want to... but we carry anyways.

We are constantly asking ourselves, "Just how much weight can we afford to carry? Can my legs take the strain, to bear whatever burden, and keep moving?"

We envy those with lighter loads on their backs, and yet, we find a certain satisfaction in the load we carry. Sure, they may move faster but in some way, we feel more complete. We self-stylize ourselves as martyrs, our packs represent our poverty, the cross the we bear.

But our load is heavy, and we fear our own weakness. And so we go through our baggage, and examine the things we carry.

I carry my house on my back. I carry two pots, and inside my pots, I carry my kitchen, which consists of a stove made out of two pop cans, the rough side of a sponge, and a spoon. I carry a wrapped-up piece of fabric about the size of a loaf of bread. It is the roof over my head, perhaps the only thing at all like a home that we carry. My bed is an inflatable pad, my blanket is a bag. Nothing from past houses is eliminated entirely, they are just simplified down to their elemental functionality.

I carry a first aid kit and the worry that I may have to use it. Zipped in a plastic bag, I carry some German bandaids, some gauze, and the responsibility for mine and Rockhop's life. I carry some pain-killers and refusal to use them. I carry a first-aid manual and a stubborn pride that doesn't allow me to rely on it.

Rockhop carries me on his back. I carry Rockhop on my back. We find each other in each others backpacks, blending into each other like two rivers meeting. In this way and others, we support each other, so that the sum of our weight may be less than the sum of its parts.

We carry a water filter. We use it to clean water, dirtied by other humans who walked this trail. And so, we carry the weight of our ancestor's decisions. They deposited the disease, but they also built the trail. And so, carrying the water filter is a way of forgiveness for sins committed. Perhaps we lighten the loads of those we came before us somehow, or make up for them not carrying their own responsibility.

We carry pictures. The pictures carry a purpose, a reflection and a reminder of those far away. They seem extraordinarily heavy, and sometimes feel like dead weight. Why lug this burden all this way, for so long, when it causes so much strain on our chest muscles? And yet, we still carry it, ignoring clearly marked trash receptacles. We look at the pictures while walking and imagine walking with those pictured, not carrying anything.

We carry journals. In them, we seek to carry the present. Not for now obviously, but for the future, when now will be the past. We try to carry future pasts, mental photographs of moments to relive at a later date, when today has grown as tired and dusty as the desert we walk. We carry ever-shortening pencils, lead drained is present precious time drained, an investment.

We carry knowledge. We carry the numbers in our head, the weight of our objects. We carry the idea that we could ditch any particular item and still survive. We also carry the knowledge that every item in our pack is special somehow, and a part of us, or else we wouldn't carry it.

We carry maps. We carry forbearance of the future, and the inability to alter it. And so our load is doubly heavy, we not only carry ourselves up the mountain, we carrying dread of the mountain all the way until then.

We carry our bodies. We carry our flesh and blood, that realm defined by the border where skin meets air. We carry the weight of our injuries and diseases. We carry the fear of being crippled, the fear of dying. We lift and carry our feet for every step of every thousand steps taken. Our strength is the only way to get anywhere, to make it, to survive. And we carry versatile clothes to shield our weak bodies from whatever climate we wander into.

We carry food and water. The food is sent from friends, the water is found out here and purified. Both nourish us, in different ways. They are the heaviest things in our packs. One is from the past, one is from the present, but both flow through us and so propel us toward the future.

We carry a phone. It carries photos and phone numbers and the only link to our former lives. It carries part of our displaced love, but adds weight to it. It carries this blog on its back. This blog carries a promise, to be a fountain in which you may turn the spigot and so feel some of our purified water weight pass through your hands. We ask not much in return, but that you carry us in your thoughts sometimes.

We carry opportunity. We carry the potential of every morning, of every "around the bend" coming up. We carry the possibility to have hiked this trail, everything that that means. We carry the hefty choice to be out here. We carry the weight of being away from those we love, and we always must have this weighing upon our minds: the possibility that we could just go home.

We carry risk and sacrifice, memory and dreams, love and resentment, yesterday, today and tomorrow. We also carry a lot of trash. We carry many other things unlisted, some things surely, that we have not even noticed. We are perpetually carrying this burden, it cannot be set down, we are in motion and it's all right there in the pack on our back. All the baggage we carry is simply that which we cannot leave behind. All that we bring home follows the same standards: we will only carry that which is vital to our being.

It's all about carrying weight.