The Freedom of Speech

A few weeks ago I got a facebook message from a friend asking if I wanted to go on a hike that weekend, being incredibly unemployed and poor, I was excited to have the opportunity to do something social and fun that cost no money and I'd not been hiking in ages. We were going to Mt. Eisenhower of the presidential range in the White Mountains, right near Mt. Washington. I'd never been to the White Mountains before and was only mildly prepared for the three hour drive. I also started the day on just over 2 hours of sleep. And being poor and with parents on vacation and not buying groceries, I cobbled together a makeshift snack/lunch bag consisting of tortilla chips, frosted mini-wheats, and a piece of cornbread, which I ziplocked and hastily threw into a messenger bag (great bag for hiking right?) and hustled out to Millie (my friend's Yaris).
   We picked up our other two compatriots for hiking, only one of which I'd met before. I was a bit antisocial during the ride up from hunger/fatigue and gathering my energies for the long day ahead. When we began our hike, we cycled through the typical conversations and silences while building momentum for hiking until the natural flow developed. But then, as ascended the rocky slopes across little streams and bridges, we could just speak freely and intermittently without awkward lulls, our topics while nothing profound were still meaningful because they were slightly more than idle chat and uninhibited in a way that only a world without technology and daily distractions can provide. When someone talked, the other(s) would listen because out in the woods it's just you and your fellow travelers, and if you speak it's with more deliberation and purpose, and the silences are more personal either from pensive reflection, or exhaustion after climbing a particularly steep rock-face. It was one of these conversations that inspired me to write this post as a my friend asked "If you were to write a blogpost about this hike, what would you write about it?" And I had to think, because while the views were quite amazing, nothing spectacular happened, no defining memory or nugget to cherish, but I enjoyed just talking to someone, not over the phone (not that people even have phone conversations anymore), or xbox or skype or anything like that, but in person and left entirely to our own devices. I even told a story about a friend I lost (by several definitions, none of them fatal) (Hint hint at an upcoming post). And it is through this mix of naturally flowing conversation mixed perfectly with quiet time that I realized how long it'd been since I'd just talked to people without specific topics in mind.
The top of Eisenhower had some great views, and though sweaty, we decided to get to the top of Mount Franklin one summit over. The guide book accurately claimed Franklin to be disappointing and it proved true as we weren't sure we reached the summit upon arrival, it was a flat path between the other more superior summits despite being a higher elevation than Eisenhower. After relaxing a bit on the sides of the paths that made up this peakless mountain, we began our descent and played another game to pass the time for a while before exhaustion and repetitive letters got the best of us, and we split into pairs between the faster and the not as fast in the final descent.