After lots of consideration and numbers crunching I have decided to postpone my thru. In order to do it I would basically have to sell everything, pick up a part-time job in addition to my full time job and live really poor until June.
I'm not afraid of sacrifice but I have begun to realize that all of that will keep me from hiking much at all between now and my June start date. Preparing for the trail is keeping me off the trail and that doesn't make sense. I have decided to instead hike weekends and my two weeks worth of vacation on the AT until I can comfortably take off and thru.
I just think that it would be rather depressing to come home from a thru, hopefully one of the best experiences of my life, just to dive back into a struggle to start my life over from scratch.
Am I selling out or does this make sense? I still want to thru, I'm going to tenatively plan for 2008. I just think that if I do it the right way I'll have better memories and an easier transition back into the real world.
I'll still frequent Whiteblaze to learn from y'all and I'm going to the SORUCK. Looking forward to making new friends and joining in weekend hikes and events. Good luck to all 2007 thruhikers with their prep and hikes.
Amazonwoman