We Did It!!

On August 20, 2016 (my birthday! "CT by 43" having been my mantra), Curry, Milo, Zephyr, Emmet, and I reached the trailhead at Junction Creek in Durango, having hiked the nearly 500-mile Colorado trail over the previous 42 days. We did it! I always knew we could, but still...we did it!!!

There was no ribbon to run through or finish line to cross, and at first we weren't entirely sure we were at the actual trailhead (last time there was some confusion), but my parents were there, to take pictures and to bring us our car, and when we all went out to lunch, it felt like it might just be another resupply stop.

"It still hasn't hit me that we're done hiking," Emmet said at the lunch table. Exactly. It still hasn't hit me, two weeks later, back in Maine.

We spent a couple of days at Mesa Verde National Park, with my parents and one of my sisters. It was exactly what we needed, some time in a quiet place with not much to do...but something to do so our new muscles wouldn't atrophy...before being catapulted back into regular life.

We got home early Sunday morning and school started Monday for the twins, yesterday for the teen. I've spent the week jitneying kids to friends' houses and sports practices and running around town belatedly buying school supplies and clothes and groceries to fill our bare cupboards. And trying to remember how to function in the world (I forgot to take my purse into the health food store; fortunately they're small and understanding). And trying to lie low because people completely overwhelm me. 

Also, I'm working on the book. I have to; E and Z keep me honest. Every day after school they ask me, "How's your book coming?" "Did you work on your book today?" I'm on page 17, averaging about four a day, and still only halfway through Day 2 (this will either be a very long book, or I'm going to have to learn how to be selective). Also trying to figure out how to organize my days without the outside organizing principle of work (and honestly, how did I ever even have time to go to a job? The days fly by and there is so much to do and I barely scratch the surface).

So that's where I am. I don't know how much I'll write about the hike here, since that energy and those stories need to go into the book. I hope to share some pictures, but before I can do that, I have to address the perennial problem of having too little storage space on my computer. I didn't come home to any grants or publication deals, so a new computer is, sadly, not the answer right now.

And how about you? I hope you had a wonderful summer and are settling into the school year with a little more organization and grace than I have so far managed.