Two years ago, my marriage evaporated without warning.
In the wake of this, words began flowing from pen to paper, thumbs to notes app, pencil to restaurant napkin. Every spare moment I had, I wrote.
At first, I wrote to purge swirling thoughts from my head, to pour my hurt, confusion, and a bewildering sense of relief into something outside of me. I have always been a writer, but in the months following my divorce, I wrote as if my life depended on it. In many ways, it did.
After my divorce was finalized, I set out on the adventure of a lifetime: a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail. At nearly 2200 miles, it’s the longest hiking-only footpath in the world.
What makes someone start to pen a memoir at the ripe old age of not-quite-thirty?
When you realize that you wished you’d read it when you were even younger than not-quite-thirty.
When the story wakes you up in the middle of the night, demanding to be told.
I’m writing this for my younger self, but I’m also, hopefully, writing it for you.
This is the story of my long walk.
Not just from Georgia to Maine. But also along the meandering path I took away from my deepest knowing, into a marriage that required us both to hide our truest selves.
It is the story of how that path spiraled inwards, backwards, and eventually led me home. Right back to where I’d started.
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