Choose Your Hard

Can I go back to bed and wake up June 1st please? I want my summer back. It's not that June, July, and August are my favorites, in fact, I love fall best. But that means winter is just around the corner, and I am not ready for that. And for some reason I feel cold will be here quicker than usual. With that said, there are still plenty of wonderful days left before I go into black bear semi-hibernation mode.

Labor Day weekend was filled with wonderful adventures and fantastic early fall weather. We hiked a lot. Our escapades started in Acadia National Park - check my Instagram reel of the backed-up traffic - then the next day we headed north to Baxter State Park where we snagged two nights at Trout Brook Farm Campground on the north side. We explored new-to-us trails for three days.

The previous posts detailed our previous hikes, but since this a not a book, and we hiked several trails, and I value your time, I will not go into depths about each of the trails we explored. This will be one of those life adventures rather a physical adventure story. For your esthetic enjoyment though, I have added a hodge-podge of photos below from the weekend.

Acadia

Baxter

Sunday morning we woke naturally, exhausted from the week and our Acadia trip. We didn't even make it to church. Sometimes tiredness does overcome us even though we want to hike. We leisurely shook the morning mental and physical haze from our brains and bodies, then proceeded to plan the rest of the weekend. Bruce decided to call Baxter to see if the reservations department was open. Here is written proof that I can be wrong. I insisted there was no way they would be open on the weekends, especially a Sunday. Bruce dialed the park's number and a friendly voice greeted him. He asked the million-dollar question, "Are there any vacancies for anywhere in the park?" To our surprise and excitement the answer was "Yes."

Off to Baxter we went after grabbing more food and clothes. A couple hours later we found ourselves at the Mattagamon Gate for the northern entrance of Baxter State Park. We drove another two and a half miles to the campground, scoped out our site, then drove to a trailhead a tad further.

On the way up we mulled over the map choosing a trail for a late afternoon hike. The Five Lakes Trail seemed perfect for what time we had. At 3:15pm we signed the trail register and into the woods we hiked. It was a wonderful trail; that is, if you like backcountry low trafficked, less groomed paths to trod on. We do. Deep into the forest we went. The smells of soil, ferns, evergreens, and crisp air mixed with the sights of dense tree cover and scattered ponds had our senses on overloaded. What was lacking in contrast from Acadia were people. We saw no one.

We were having a grand time, until we weren't. Those of you who have been following my journey since the begining know I went through a season of depression. As 2024 blossomed so did I. I emerged into the old - yet new and improved Emily I knew was inside. I feel the best mentally than I have in years and in some ways, better than ever. It's like my down time made me stronger. But on our Sunday hike I had a momentary set back that dampened, more liked drowned the second half of our hike.

For reasons that don't matter for this post - an incident occured that sent my emotional state flailing back to when I was in the throws of my 2017 Appalachian Trail thru-hike and the dealth of my dad. I errupted in uncontrollable anger. I knew I was being a turd but couldn't shake it. The only thing I could do was to keep my mouth shut and hike. I hiked hard and fast, but the faster I hiked the more mad I became. I cried silently despising these past pains and hurts I was letting affect me. It was hard.

While I fought the emotions, not wanting to go back to that dark place, I remembered a quote I had seen on Instagram several days prior. It was a poem about choosing your hard. I did not want to feel what I was feeling. I wanted to enjoy the hike. I didn't want to upset Bruce. But it was hard to beat down the anger whelming up inside. I kept remembering the lines from the poem.

Marriage is hard.

Divorce is hard.

Choose your hard.

Obesity is hard.

Being fit is hard.

Choose your hard.

Being in debt is hard

Being Financially disciplined is hard.

Choose your hard.

Communication is hard.

Not Communicating is hard.

Choose your hard.

Fostering relationships is hard.

Being lonely is hard.

Choose your hard.

Staying positive is hard.

Depression is hard.

Choose your hard.

Life generally will never be easy.

It will always be hard.

But we can choose our hard.

Choose wisely.

(The lines in blue I added)

It's so true, life is hard. It's seldom an easy hike from one vista to the next. So, if we know it is difficult, we can make it easier by choosing which difficulty we want to venture through. And so, I chose to be positive. It wasn't like turning on a switch. I still gave myself a time out to decompress. But instead of staying in that angry state with the potential danger of plummeting me back into deep depression, I choose the hard task of saying I was sorry. I wanted to be positive and that state of mind is not always easy to maintain but it was the hard I chose because being depressed is even harder.

Bruce gave me the space I needed even though I am sure I upset him too. He understands my pain. But he doesn't let me use that as an excuse to be mean, nor should he. Depression, PTSD, and any other form of mental illness can make people act like a jacka==. But that doesn't mean the people around us should let us hurt them while we are hurting. The saying, "hurt people hurt others" is ture. But that's not a pass for a free-for-all mean-streak. It's okay to point out our less than desirable ways. Just do so at an appropriate time and in an appropriate way. If you aren't sure how to do that, then a professional can help - not me or my simple blog of how I handle things.

So, in between you bouts of calm when things are getting tough, remember it's all tough, just choose your hard.

Happy Hiking,

Emily