Trail Names

Back in May, at the shelter where we set up our tents on the first night, we met T-Square.  "You must be an engineer!" I responded upon hearing his name.  "Yes, I am, retired nuclear."  Later, he asked me what kind of engineer I am.  "Unemployed."

On the same hike, after our group reduced in size by half, we met FedEx, who works for the shipping giant and used to hike in a vest with their logo, and Sunnie Falls, who hoped to finish the AT in the summer between the end of her high school career and the start of college in the fall.  When she couldn't find a better pair of replacement shoes, she had bought a pair of Crocs and had thru-hiked about half of the trail in them since then.  I don't know whether it was the same pair for that duration.  We also met Yellow Jacket (wearing a blue jacket), a woman in her... late fifties?... who was on her last day of her last section of the AT when we met her.  She told us that every day at 10 AM, she had a Snickers bar in memory of a friend who had done the same, and died of cancer months after finishing his thru-hike.

In the Shenandoah, I met Handyman and later learned of the random connection between us through his son.  Handyman had been hiking with Cakes ("Like in Johnny Cakes"); Boulderdash informed me that Cakes held the record for longest sustained fart on the Appalachian Trail.  Two days later, Skurks caught up with me, and I finally met Slim, whom I'd heard about from the other guys I'd met in the park.

On my first backpacking trip last year, I introduced myself to a pair of ladies partly to be friendly, but mainly because I wanted to learn about the pack one of them was carrying.  Grieze was clearly alarmed when Timber told me her real name, but if it helps, I've since forgotten it.  That's the thing about trail names: they are not the labels we have grown into, but the labels which define who we've become.  I've always felt that you can't give yourself a nickname, and that the people who do invariably choose something they think will sound more impressive than the rest of us generally believe them to be, but a trail name is different.  Grieze ("Greezy") explained hers by telling me that she just sometimes feels crabby.  Timber falls.  Boulderdash felt like that's what he was doing during a particularly rocky section of the trail.  Handyman has a home improvement business.

I think you can pick your own trail name, but I've also heard that it's best to have yours before you start the AT, or risk getting stuck with something applied to you by other hikers.  Just imagine what Cakes could have been called.  The Girl has said that I am good at naming things, but I have yet to pick a trail name.

On my very first AT hike, Mom called me IronKid because I seemed unstoppable, but I think I might be too old to get away with that one anymore.  I like Treefrog because I carry one (I also have strong legs, climb trees, and make a lot of noise at night).  The Girl's entire family thinks I should be Ryno, because that's what her nephew calls me.  I admit it's pretty good (as is the variant Ryno Dino--I sometimes run like a velociraptor when carrying him piggy-back), but I feel like it would be more fitting to use something my nephew calls me.  The problem is, he calls me Mom.  He also calls his mom and several household objects Mom, and occasionally uses Mom as a verb, command, adjective, or expostulation.  Diagramming his sentences is a nightmare.

After a few days without a shower, I think I smell like a Bad Onion.  The Girl calls me a Master Baker (maybe because I'm known for my Bagels?), usually while laughing inexplicably, but she thinks I should be Snake Bait.  After the Shenandoah hike, when I was invariably the first hiker out of camp each morning, and thus the first to catch my face in every single spiderweb, we both liked Web Walker.  I've considered Off Belay, for one obvious reason, and because when you're off belay, you have reached a point of safety, where you can take care of yourself, and I like to think that's how the trail will treat me.  Back in May, I considered Branch (it was almost my real name, I'm a branch of my family tree, and there are branches on trails, trees, and streams, each of which I'll see plenty of this year), but for some reason I think a trail name should have more than one syllable, and I have no rationale for that whatsoever.

However I label myself, I need to decide soon; my feet hit the trail on March 10.  Any suggestions?