From Heights to Depths
Mount Katahdin is the highest mountain in Maine, but is also the final destination for those hiking North Bound on the Appalachian Trail. It is somewhat ironic because many people, after experience such heights, literally, on the trail, begin to experience the depths of life once leaving. This does not hit every person, but the post-depression of the AT is a very real aspect of hiking it. The months that the Appalachian Trail needs in order to be hiked requires a ton of processing. This processing, when left untouched or incomplete, can be dangerous to one's emotional state, leading to depression. People don't realize it at the immediate moment, but once they leave the Appalachian Trail, there is a part of them that cannot fit back into their old life back "home". Jefe went over his post-trail depression a little bit in class when he was guest speaking. It is a very real phenomenon that simply cannot be understood by those who have no experienced the trail, including myself. A person is going from the trail where he or she really did not need anything except a few pairs of clothes along with food and water for a few days. Then that person returns home to a bed, television/entertainment, most likely a job, fashion, etc. A person enters back into society that has cliques, hierarchies, and written law, where on the trail none of that was concrete. There were rules, but they were more understood rather than written. There was entertainment, but that would be more stories by the fire than a comedy on Netflix. There was a bed, but it was the ground in a tent with maybe (more likely than not) a few nights here and there with a bed, but for the most part there was none. All of these aspects of life that are different play into this post-trail depression. And dealing with this takes time, being intentional with processing everything, and discussing and working through the differences in life and the depression one is facing.
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