O difficulty, difficulty!

May 12

This date passed quickly, beautiful and uneventful. It began in early waking and preluding coffee upon the rooster's call and quick bustle to pack pre-departure. Jabez led us through the stretch of hills to town telling us each landmark which may have passed our gaze. Night still sat between the hills, but an orange glow began to show behind the eastern treetops.

I peeled the aluminum foil cap from my coffee mug as we went on, tilting my cup to heed the force of turn and slope. My eyes were peeled to the sky as color streamed into all things. I had the benefit of the windows; unfortunate Justin sat in a chair in the back of the van beside the bicycles and bags.

Jabez gave us a choice of where to be dropped off, telling us which roads would lead us where and we decided on the gas station at the intersection of two highways where we would begin to climb north. Once stopped we laid out our things in a wide pile in the parking lot. Jabez departed and we thanked him for everything, with thoughts for Susan following behind.

Quickly I packed my bike together and went on ahead of Justin to try and find some photographs of the Southern countryside in the early morning light. A few minutes down the road I found the field and watched as the sun peaked over the misty slopes and soon Justin caught up, just having filled his water bottles. The day continued slowly at first with frequent stops as the light crept up. Within a few hours Justin and I had agreed to commence our mornings at six daily. The opportunities afforded were too numerous and broad and the dawn-side temperatures too comfortable to pass.

All the day on was simplicity and clear skies, so we went – passed the Tennessee threshold before noon and going easily on to Cleveland. Immediately upon entering the town we came across the wastes left by the tornadoes, those same tornadoes who'd gifted Jabez and Susan with their rooster friend. The gifts here were less pleasant: buildings torn apart from within, each strung together with caution tape borders and a pink X adorning each side. Weeks have passed and nothing'd been done – lasting monuments for a memory slow to fade, but our way went on.

Searched out, found, and stopped in a two-story campus-side library for afternoon siesta, shoes off, writing, reading, or napping in chairs away from the outside peaking sun and asphalt heat.

Afterward time and distance went on without bother. Night came suddenly with the search for a campsite continuing late. In surrender and weariness we came upon a cemetery rising to a hilltop, a long steep drive winding around its left margin. We stopped and pressed our bicycles up the gravel tracks and in conscientiousness, with a bit of hesitation, and full due respect made shelter behind the graves, a morbid bed perhaps, but welcome (so long as we remained undisturbed!) at the close of the day.

May 13

Waking came with dawn and we gathered our things as planned upon the turn of six. We rose with the clouds and went on our way. The sky remained veiled through the rest of the day and color was lost from the dawn. When days are gray it's easy to expect less pleasant things. We went on without much event through the daytime, climbing to the top of a plateau in the mountains as rain began to fall.

Near the end of the day with the sky still a dim gray I rode up a hill and stopped during a small gap in the rain, awaiting Justin behind me. I saw his white helmet appear and noticed he was walking, hauling bicycle alongside. He slowly approached and then he told me he'd almost fallen but had caught himself, planting his right leg into the ground with the result of a jammed-up knee. He could walk with the pain, but pedaling wasn't as simple. The joint shot him with pain if moved it to either side so we sat and rested a while, wondering and weary and unsure of what may follow.

Light began fading away and the sky's shade of gray deepened. There was nothing to do but make camp, so we set off, and with one footstep to my pedal my chain popped a strained link, dragging fallen along the asphalt. The fix was quick, but the insult too obvious to miss. The day pressed me hard, but I didn't know whether to cry out to it, “O difficulty, difficulty!” in laughter or tears.

Two hills later we readied to make quick camp in the woods. A parked car sat in a shoulder-side pull-off from which descended a rugged path down to lower ground running parallel to the road. A short way along the path we found an empty space on even ground next to a shallow trickling stream. Here was where we laid our tents and sat in repose. We filled our lungs with nature air, exhaling temporal worries into a flowing and flowering wilderness night.

May 14

Turning in discomfort through night, my eyes were closed though seeing only occasional brief and fleeting dreamless sleep. The earth's rotation went on slowly and unevenly. I awoke in cycles every time initiated by pitter-patter on the tent top, single raindrops growing and collecting to a reverberant shush until sleep caught me again. The stream behind the tents swelled, its pulse and pace quickening as it fed.

I became sick to my stomach as night faded into day and the uneasiness continued. My alarm sounded at six, but I did not feel like doing anything, now having gained what felt like fever. Justin remained also in his tent, got up a couple times, but we both slept on past afternoon without much change. I had told my parents I would call them the night before, but had had no signal to do so. Justin went searching for one on the road, but acquired nothing. Returning he told me that the car at the base of the path's driver-side window was shattered out and asked me if I'd heard anything in the night. Neither of us remembered it being that way before.

Not until later did we discuss what we might do about the day. My body ached and was heavy and cumbersome having remained in my tent such a period and the air outside was yet colder and uninviting. The rain had been dropping in, on and off throughout the morning, but by late afternoon had been absent a while so with difficulty I got up and walked about. Justin's leg had not improved and I still felt queasy, shivering on my surface while hot inside and retaining a fogginess of mind. Days like this test how much you want what you think you want and make you sick for home and a bed; days like this test fortitude and teach will.

We walked down the road to where my chain had broke and were able to make our calls to the comfortable houses in heat and dry so far away. The sun was setting beyond the trees. Vehicles sped occasionally by as we walked back on the side of the road, and I watched as the waxing gibbous moon grew brighter against a sky shrinking away. We turned back into the forest to find our tents still draped with a cold moisture in the dark.