A Walk in the Woods

became a memory. The Appalachians alone lost four billion trees, a quarter of its cover, in
a generation.
A great tragedy, of course. But how lucky, when you think about it, that these diseases
are at least species specific. Instead of a chestnut blight or Dutch elm disease or dogwood
anthracnose, what if there was just a tree blight--something indiscriminate and
unstoppable that swept through whole forests? In fact, there is. It's called acid rain.
But let's stop there. I think we've both had enough science for one chapter. But hold
that thought, please, and bear it in mind when I tell you that there wasn't a day in the
Appalachian woods when I didn't give passing thanks for what there was.
So the forest through which Katz and I passed now was nothing like the forest that was
known even to people of my father's generation, but at least it was a forest. It was
splendid in any case to be enveloped once more in our familiar surroundings. It was in
every detectable respect the same forest that we had left in North Carolina--same
violently slanted trees, same narrow brown path, same expansive silence, broken only by
our tiny grunts and labored breaths as we struggled up hills that proved to be as steep, if
not quite as lofty, as those we had left behind. But, curiously, though we had come a
couple of hundred miles north, spring seemed further advanced here. The trees,
predominantly oak, were more fully in bud, and there were occasional clumps of
wildflowers-- bloodroot and trillium and Dutchmen's breeches--rising through the carpet of
last year's leaves. Sunlight filtered through the branches overhead, throwing spotlights on
the path, and there was a certain distinctive, heady spring lightness in the air. We took off
first our jackets and then our sweaters. The world seemed altogether a genial place. say
hello and maybe find out if anyone has heard a weather forecast. But the man ahead
never paused, never varied his pace, never looked back. In the late afternoon he vanished
and I never saw him again.
In the evening, I told Katz about it.
"Jesus," he muttered privately, "now he's hallucinating on me." But the next day Katz
saw him all day--behind him, following, always near but never overtaking. It was very
weird. After that, neither of us saw him again. We didn't see anyone.
In consequence, we had shelters to ourselves each night, which was a big treat. You
know your life has grown pathetic when you're thrilled to have a covered wooden
platform to call your own, but there you are--we were thrilled. The shelters along this
section of trail were mostly new and spanking clean. Several were even provisioned with a
broom--a cozy, domestic touch. Moreover, the brooms were used (we used them, and
whistled while we did it), proving that if you give an AT hiker an appliance of comfort he
will use it responsibly. Each shelter had a nearby privy, a good water source, and a picnic
table, so we could prepare and eat our meals in a more or less normal posture instead of
squatting on damp logs. All of these are great luxuries on the trail. On the fourth night,
just as I was facing the dismal prospect of finishing my only book and thereafter having
nothing to do in the evenings but lie in the half light and listen to Katz snore, I was
delighted, thrilled, sublimely gratified to find that some earlier user had left a Graham
Greene paperback. If there is one thing the AT teaches, it is low-level ecstasy--something
we could all do with more of in our lives.
So I was happy. We were doing fifteen or sixteen miles a day, nothing like the twenty-
five miles we had been promised we would do, but still a perfectly respectable distance by