hiking up Jirisan: I

at 3:30am on Saturday morning, me and about 150 other hikers spilled blearily out of the KTX into a tiny little town in the southern part of the peninsula. it was a 4 hour train ride from Seoul--my current home. strange that i call it that even now. home.
it felt far away, but that felt ok.

the air tasted different down there somehow. crisper--more clean. bluish? it's hard to describe. given my inability to sleep in moving vehicles, needless to say, i was tired and apprehensive about the journey that we were about to embark upon. we were told it would be a 13 hour hike.

what the fuck was i thinking?? i asked myself repeatedly, as i could already feel my leg muscles cramping up. the taxi screeched around corners up the side of the mountain and i bit on my thumbnail to quell the rising panic. there really wasn't any way out. not for the next 13 hours anyway.

this was my choice.
you're doing this as a challenge. you're doing this to stretch yourself. you can do this. it will be beautiful. fabulous.
you're beautiful and fabulous.

taking a few deep breaths, i curled my fingers tightly around the strap of the sling that carried my trail mix, 2 peaches, my notebook, my Bible, a change of clothes, a blanket, my pack of menthol cigarettes, and my miscellaneous. when we stepped out of the taxi, the cold mountain air whipped around us. the whole group shivered and tightened their hoodies and jackets around them.
what happened to the summer?

i sat on the ground and rummaged around my bag for an energy bar as i stretched my legs and arms.

"c'mon c'mon! let's go!" yelled our guide, and upward we began to trudge into the darkness.

as the velvet enfolded us, i saw them. their unmistakable cold brilliance against the black. i had faintly seen the Little Dipper and the Big Dipper a few weekends before in the middle of the night atop a mountain in the grand city of Seoul, but this was *different*.

i have seen this many stars in the middle of the backwoods of Tennessee; when i have driven all night in different directions across the US--from the Midwest to the East coast to the South; in Maui on a post dusky beach; on a mountain rising out of the South sea. a few times in my life i have paused and beheld that kind of sky.

but after 9 months of yellowed Seoul horizons, the sweeping, forever bright sparks that i knew were there seemed almost fictional. like something i had read in a book or had only seen in photographs.

but there they were, these shards of bright nestled into the clearest black.

you've seen these--sometimes you'll stretch your hand out b/c they look so large, so close, you feel like you can touch them; your fingers catching only the faintest rays.


but tonight. this felt real. this was tangible.
hello stars. hello Real. hello Life.
thank You for the stars.

with this rush of gratitude, came a slight burst of energy. we started on a flat concrete incline, then onto gravel, then onto larger rocks. turning left, there was a set of stairs that stretched upwards into the dark trees beyond my vision.

whew... it begins.