Chuck McKeever - A Good Place For Maniacs: Dispatches From The Pacific Crest Trail

A Good Place for Maniacs

Dispatches from the Pacific Crest Trail

by

Chuck McKeever

Copyright 2020 by Chuck McKeever

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission.

Front and back cover art by Justin McKeever (2020)

For Ali, my North Star, who always guides me home again.

I remembered how once, in that part of youth that is deeply concerned with death, I wanted to be buried on this peak where without eyes I could see everything I knew and loved, for in those days there was no world beyond the mountains.

Is it possible to love so desperately that life is unbearable? I don't mean unrequited, I mean being in the love. In the midst of it and desperate.

Part 1: Strange Days in Southern California

I.

As the crow flies, it is less than 1,200 miles from the border of Mexico to the border of Canada on Americas west coast. The Pacific Crest Trail, despite being home to untold thousands of crows, cares not for their preferred method of gauging distances, and instead takes 2,650 winding, treacherous miles to touch those same two points on the map.

Crows are among the smartest animals on planet earth, and passing beneath a tree full of them in Southern California, I cant help but wonder what they must think of the pasty, potbellied hiker staggering through the wilderness below. Everything about him must seem ill-suited for the task of a long-distance hike, for outdoor survival, for pushing himself to the limit physically and mentally. His pack is unsustainably heavy, his legs burdened with the weight of years spent living soft and unhurried in the hermetic comfort of a Seattle apartment.

I assign these thoughts to the crows. Its easier this way--to have someone else to try to prove wrong, rather than getting lost in a spiral of self-loathing for failing to prepare myself for this naive and idealistic adventure. I dont hate the crows; on the contrary, I find them fascinating, and their weird squawks oddly comforting. But even though Ive been on the trail for weeks now, I havent lost the crushing self-doubt that I figured would be gone after the first few days. Instead everything I still have left to do and all the miles I still have left to walk lie before me in an endless stretch of days, and I am becoming convinced that I am laughably short of being up to the task.

But Im getting ahead of myself. Before I plunge any further down this trail--for what is a story, if not a bumpy and occasionally beautiful path from one place to another?--I should circle back and answer that most ancient and gnawing of human questions:

How did I get here?

Its April, and my friend Rake is having a bad month. His girlfriend has recently moved from Seattle to the East Coast and dumped him in one fell swoop, and hes overworked and ill-used at his job, where he regularly puts in 60 hours a week without sniffing a pay raise. Its the kind of month that can determine a whole lot, the kind of month that makes some people decide to create radical change in their own lives and makes others sink completely.

Rake chooses the former path.

Im going to hike the Pacific Crest Trail next year, he says by way of greeting one gray day as he steps around the detritus blocking the door to my kitchen.

Alright, I say. Im in.

He hasnt asked, of course, and it hasnt occurred to me to ask him if Id be imposing by coming along. That doesnt matter. In less than two years of knowing each other Rake and I have developed the kind of friendship that doesnt require those kinds of questions.

Oh, I add, I should probably check with Ali.

Ali and I have been living together for less than a year but weve been dating for more than seven. When youre in a relationship for that long, the decision to disappear into the woods for four or five months with a friend isnt the kind you get to make alone.

We have previously spent a calendar year apart, Ali and I, on opposite sides of the world, and so a few months doesnt seem like a big deal in the grand scheme of things. That doesnt stop me from feeling selfish; feeling selfish doesnt stop me from asking anyway.

A room away, she answers my question with one of her own.

Is this...something youve been wanting to do for a while?

I have to admit that it isnt. The thought had never crossed my mind until Rake brought it in the door with him, but those words coming out of his mouth had lit something on fire inside of me. A world of infinite possibility had opened up, one in which I stumbled into the woods a lazy English teacher and emerged on the other side made of iron, heart and soul full of the wonders of nature. I am not a planner; I am a dreamer, and occasionally a dream gets its claws in me so deeply that I feel compelled to see it through to its end no matter the cost. I can already tell, after a few short hours of talking and thinking about the Pacific Crest Trail, that this is one of those dreams.

I do a poor job of explaining this all to Ali. Shes so blunt and straightforward in her own dealings that airy, ill-thought-out ramblings dont stand much chance of moving her. But shes also so keenly attuned to the workings of her own heart and mine that she understands, at my core, that I have this hopeless dreamer within me. That I am by nature restless, a wanderer, unable to sit still for long.

Okay, she says. But I need you to do the research and tell me all about it so I know what it is youre actually getting yourself into.

I make her a deal: I will do that, and if at any point-- any point--she decides shes no longer okay with it all, Ill abandon the whole enterprise. I think part of me knows that she will never make that call, no matter how much it hurts her. Like I said, she knows me too well to think Ill ever stop being restless. And she carries herself so stoically that she will undoubtedly meet the challenge of being alone, alone.

I knew, she tells me later. The second those words were out of his mouth, I knew you would say you were going to do it, too.

Would she have said yes, had she known what the next eighteen months would bring? Would I have even asked in the first place?

A year passes, a year marked by research (not enough), planning (almost enough), and buying (way too much) in preparation for what promises to be the trip of a lifetime. I gain a few pounds, figuring Ill lose them in no time on trail. I get promoted at work, start taking on more responsibility than I ever have before, and part of me knows I am only able to tolerate this because theres an expiration date on the whole thing. Rake and I spend more time at the REI flagship store than any person should. I spend more money in a few short months than Ive ever spent before.

And then somehow the year is gone, and I find myself a week away from this colossal undertaking. Because I am a glutton for doing things under the gun I also decide to squeeze in a cross-country road trip with Ali after a quick flight back east to see my family. My brother has just moved to New York City and is giving us the car he inherited from our dad, so its an opportune moment all around.

I do the first leg of the drive alone. The first two days are a blur, an ugly stretch of industrial sprawl and congested highway spanning from upstate New York to the upper midwest. I tack north, almost dying on Lakeshore Drive as the snow blows down through Chicago. After a quick visit with a friend I keep heading north and west to a hot meal and kind words of encouragement at the house of another friends parents in Milwaukee. On the third day, I pick Ali up in Minneapolis, where shes flown for the express purpose of co-piloting the rest of the trip. At least, thats as much as she knows about her role in this expedition. I havent told her the other half of it.