Story Break
On Backpacks.
Hi. Nice to see you back here again. Kind of surprising, really, but welcome. Assuming you even know who I am. If you've read something I've written before, then you have an idea, but maybe not.
I'm a woman and I go backpacking. I'll never be famous, and though it might be fun to try it out for a while, I'll never be rich either. Given the choice I'd rather be rich than famous, but both of them can be rough on a person, though it is easier to be in a position where you can get anything you want, and do anything you want, and be totally anonymous.
Not like it's going to happen to me, but sometimes I daydream.
The absolute best daydreams I have are about real things. That's a strange little statement, I know, because any daydream is not real by definition, but I think you might get my drift. What I mean is, I guess, that I think about things I've done or know something about. I don't daydream about being a princess in a sparkly pink princess dress with princess ruffles all over it. Any more. I did. I used to. Every girl probably does. Most of us grow up.
I grew up, and went backpacking. No more ruffles for me any more, not even in my daydreams. Now I think about hardware.
You can call it that. Let's. We'll call it hardware.
Hardware is all the stuff you need for backpacking, plus everything you buy for backpacking but don't need, plus all those things you buy and sort of run into every time you clean out the closet, but decide over and over that you can't throw away, but that you don't actually use much, if at all.
Hardware is part of it. It isn't all hard. They aren't all wares.
Some of what I think over and carry around in my head is memories, or plans. I think about trips I've made and the people I've made them with, and I think about trips I'd like to make. And who I want to be when I grow up, which kind of gets us back to being a princess again, I guess, but I've never heard of a married princess with children, so no matter what, I'm kind of permanently beyond that, I think. Maybe.
I must be grown up now, too. Am I?
But I like backpacking. I like a lot about it, maybe most of it. Maybe all of it, everything, including the parts that don't seem to be fun at the time, which is generally the larger part. You know, when you're walking along and everything is great, and maybe you're on top of a ridge, in the sun, and you can look down on what seems like all the world, or anyway, all the important parts, and it's all stunning and everything, and you don't really think about it so much?
You get involved in looking but you don't consciously think about how much better you feel than you ever did, let alone yesterday when you were wet and cold. You simply soak in the sun and cruise along the trail and kind of wallow in wonder, but it isn't really at a conscious level. You just feel good without getting carried away. And in a way that makes up for everything else, on some level, but you aren't really keeping score.
But you do notice the other times too, like when you ate your lunch too soon and burned your tongue and you felt that mistake right there on your tongue all the rest of the day. Or especially when you're wet, even if you aren't cold too. Or you have a bit of rock in your shoe, let alone being hungry or pestered by flies.
It always seems kind of strange to admit, that of all the gizmos and doodads and odd little things they make for backpacking and sell to backpackers, I'm kind of stuck on my pack. My pack is my main piece of hardware, the center of my walking universe. It plays a very special role by holding everything together, and for that I'm grateful.
But for me, the ideal pack could also do some things I don't often hear about. Things I don't really ever hear about, come to think of it.
Catching dreams is one thing.
Going backpacking is itself like a dream, sort of an ideal activity. An activity that people sometimes dream of doing. And they dream about it because they don't think they can do it. But they could. It takes only a little organization and then you go. You learn as you go. We all do. Just start with baby steps and after a while you are taking big steps without really noticing the transition. That's a kind of magic, all by itself.
But even while I am actually out backpacking there are other dreams. They come to me from all over.
I think a lot while I'm walking. There is something about walking that does that. I think about this and I think about that. Whole worlds come by for a visit. Entire empires of thought, and if I don't stop and jot down a few of these thoughts, they waft away again. But it's always awkward to stop and scribble. I'd like a backpack that would hold all my good ideas for me and keep them bright and fresh for later.
Whenever a charming thought comes to me, I'd like to just hold out my hand and let the thought land on my finger. Then I'd give it a little flip and it would go over my shoulder and the pack would catch it, and hide it away safe and snug for later.
When I got home I could sit on my bed and gently dump out all my good ideas and daydreams right in the middle of the bed and let them run around and sort themselves out for me. Let them show me what they really are.
This would be so much better than staring at a dirty, dogeared, rumpled pocket notebook full of strange scribbles, few of which I could understand.
I think.
Another thing I'd like to see in a backpack is one I could empty out, and then, when it was lying there on the ground flat and seemingly empty, I could grab one edge and open it up so wide it was big enough to walk into, and then I'd go in, and let it shut behind me, and I would be in a different world.
It could be a safe refuge in a storm, or a cool hideaway in the heat, or it could lead me to a warm sunny beach if the real weather, the weather blowing around outside, was blustery and cold.
With a pack like that I'd always have a place to go and get away from things no matter where I was, even at home. You know what I mean. Think about having one of these on a dull Saturday when you can't get out and don't have anything to do. And the kids are making a mess. Or your husband is. See?
But that isn't all.
A pack, the right pack, can be an inspiration. It has possibilities, it takes care of things for you. True, any backpack is like that, and mostly, to be absolutely honest, it all depends on you.
If you have no dreams to start with then nothing can really inspire you. But I find, when I'm just rambling around the house at odd times, and I happen to see my backpack, I find that I remember once again that there are things I still want to do. There are places I haven't gone yet, and want to go to. There are experiences I haven't had, perhaps with people I haven't met, and I want to go there and see those places and meet those people.
Simply coming face to face with my pack every now and then gives me a little tingle. A little one, but still a tingle. That keeps me primed, keeps me alive. I like that.
What a pack doesn't do for me, what no pack can do for me, is to make it happen.
I'm always in charge though I'm always learning as well. There are things you need to know that you can't get from reading brochures about packs, or from playing with packs, or from sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee and wondering what it would be like to do this thing or to do that thing, or do something else.
You have to want it first, and then you have to actually do it, and only then is it done. And a backpack helps.
If you really are a backpacker, that is.
How about you?