On that Midnight Train to Georgia
My Appalachian Trail adventure starts on Easter Sunday, April 9th, 2023 with a 630-mile train ride departing at 6:30 pm from Union Station in Washington DC and arriving at 7:30 am the next morning in Gainsville, Georgia. It’s the midnight train to Georgia … literally!
Union Station, Washington, D.C.
My last day at home was a frenetic whirlwind of last minute to-dos interlaced with a throng of well-wishes from an army of supporters. It’s a happy and finite kind of stress - the kind that is savored like a chocolate confection on a hot summer day.
And it’s the kind of stress that inspired a dance party of one - whirling around my Reston, Virginia townhouse, ticking off to-dos with a dramatic flare, to the Spotify mix of all two-million-ish renditions of Midnight Train to Georgia.
Sing it, Gladys!!
She's leaving (leaving)
On that midnight train to Georgia (leaving on a midnight train)
Hmm, yeah
Said she's going back (going back to find)
To a simpler place and time
Suddenly it hit me. I stopped. And a cool chill came over my body.
My life is about to change. Profoundly. In 6 months, I know I will be a different person. I just don’t know who I will become.
Excitement. Heart beat. A tingling sensation. A knot in my stomach. And finally the tears. Good tears. I’m-immensely-proud-of-myself tears. I’m-scared-as-shit tears. And I-can’t-wait-to-get-out-there tears.
Here we goooooooo!!!!
——
Look at my Amtrack roommette!
Like a 5 year old kid, I couldn’t stop myself from playing with all the fancy buttons in my Amtrak roommette.
Playing with everything in the fancy roommette.
If you click on this button, a sink pops out. If you click on that button, my personal trash receptacle appears. If you pull this knob, the ceiling comes down and turns into a bunk bed.
Duuuuude!! That is just so cooooool!
——
The gentle lull of the clatticky clack finally brought me back to my mature 52 year old self.
If you had asked me even three months ago if I would resign from my stable executive job to camp out in the woods, I would have laughed out loud. “Not a snowball’s chance in hell!”
I have zero experience camping.
Okay. Maybe not zero - technically. Over thirty years ago, between college and graduate school, I waited tables in the restaurants of Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Canyon. Open to new adventures, I hiked with my aluminum external frame backpack for a total of three times. However, I quickly decided that a warm cozy bed wins out over a cold lumpy RidgeRest any day.
So now? Suddenly? I want to sleep outside for 6 months? ALONE?????!!!!!!
Have I lost my god forsaken mind??!!!
Welllll - I won’t exactly say that I’ve lost my mind.
But I will say that I’ve lost my soul. And it’s time to find her again.
Five years ago, a torn multifidus and torn achilles tendon tore me away from IRONMAN - a sport that allowed me to play with my friends outside in the sunshine all day. Even exhausted from grueling hours on the bike, in the pool, and on the running path - I couldn’t wait to get out for more. It was my heartbeat, my identity, my solace. Death number one.
Three years ago, the world as we knew it suddenly and inexplicably changed. Neighbors became enemies. Public spaces became battlegrounds. Breathing became life-threatening. We were forced to connect with the world through a tiny little black box, approximately three inches by four inches. Death number two.
One year ago, the 300-person department that I had built from scratch reached maturity. I thrive in uncertainty. Give me the toughest corporate challenge you’ve got. I will be happily obsessed. Simply solving the challenge is ho-hum. Opening up the world of possibilities, resulting in an industry revolution is more my style. Once it’s built, it’s time to hand it over. Other people are much better at maintaining. Maintenance is death of my entrepreneurial spirit. Death number three.
Five months ago, I was diagnosed with melanoma. The hours of playing in the sun combined with my red hair and freckles caught up with me. My day of reckoning was here. Not just one spot. Five. F-I-V-E spots - toe, calf, thumb, back and arm. Five of the freckles that inspired aw-you’re-so-cute comments suddenly inspired surgical and pharmaceutical interventions. My skin: once a friend, is now my foe. Death number four.
Death. So much death.
With all the death, I was turning to a fictitious cloak of safety found in a little black box and a bank account number and a sociopolitical opinion and internet purchases and and and.
What am I doing?? What choices am I making??
It’s time to feel alive!
It’s time to get back to the basics - to remember that happiness lies in the simplest form. I need to go outside and play. I need to connect with people on an intimate level. I need to feel intimidated by a seemingly impossible challenge. And I need to feel safe in my own skin.
I’m going on this journey to find my soul again.
As the song says, she's going back to find a simpler place and time.
Going back to find a simpler place and time.
