Loneliness

Well, it's been a few days since Blacksburg and I've been alone for most of that time. Wednesday night I set up camp in a town park in Wytheville Virginia and skedaddled the next morning after swinging by a Walmart. Thursday night I set up camp at a self-serve campsite in the national forest. With no cell phone reception or WiFi, I felt pretty cut off from civilization. The loneliness really started to sink in that night as I tried to start a campfire. I began thinking about how lonely it must be to have ALS. These poor souls cannot talk, hug or otherwise interact with anyone around them apart from smiles or tears. the last two days have made me so hungry for human interaction any chance that I get. and that's just two days. Imagine being unable to interact with anybody ever. The days turn into weeks, the weeks turn into months, and the months turn into years. I think it would be enough to drive a person insane. We were made for community and when that community is muted or taken away from us we become a little less human. Anyway, those have been my thoughts for the last couple of days. Tonight, I'm staying in the small town of Meadowview, VA. The trip has become a lot more fluid in the past few days. I feel like a nomad, scoping out where I want to go the next day and riding without any plan for where to spend the night. The longer I go, the more I realize how little is in my control. All I know for sure is that I'm moving West day by day by day.