This post is slightly delayed. By the time you read it, I will be on the CDT.

It has been an emotional roller coaster of a departure. There have been a lot of good-byes, many of them hard. I have had bursts of excitement and moments of abject terror, often overlapping. I cried at Kroger (why the gravity of this trip decided to hit me at Kroger and not in the 4,000 opportunities it had prior to that, I do not know) and it all came out when I hugged the dog.

Our brains are hard wired to resist change. This is the same roller coaster I’ve ridden during most of the transitional points of my life, the what are you doing are you insane? that is the brain resisting any divergence from the status quo. It comes, usually just before I make the leap. I have given in to that panic before. I’m not giving in this time. I am here. I am going.

A 6am flight from Columbus to Dallas, which got delayed because the plane needed de-iced. A nice morning run inside Dallas/Fort Worth, because the de-icing turned a 45 minute layover into a 15 minute layover and DFW is not small. But I made it, the views from the window were top notch, and my pack made it too.

My phone started refusing to make or receive calls, so I ended up taking a Lyft to a Verizon near the bus station after all my troubleshooting efforts failed. It was a nationwide outage and my phone is fine. The ride and the diversion gave me a chance to see more of Tucson, to get my first taste of the desert. This area of Tucson is full of life. They have so many street trees, succulents the size of cars (sorry, no pic, we drove by too fast), and so many cactuses. So many things survive here, in spite of their average of 1 day of rain total between the months of April and June.

I met two other thru-hikers at the Greyhound station, and they are lovely. This is a big year for northbounders, and I am excited to meet them. Tucson made me excited for the desert; I love seeing the life that thrives in spite of conditions that most things can’t grow in.

We aren’t gonna get a lot of sleep tonight, all of us leave on shuttles for the border in the wee hours of the morning. I am mostly excited now, and much less afraid.

Let it begin.

Miles walked	0
Bears seen	0
Moose seen	0
Mountain goats seen	0
Rattlesnakes seen	0
Lbs of peanut butter eaten	0
Tbsps of chia seeds eaten	0
Pairs of boots worn out	0
Toenails lost	0
Rain storms	0
Zero days taken	0