That Was Exciting!

A friend on Facebook put out an offer to her local peeps to join them for hiking once a week. Nothing formal, nothing fancy, just a chance to get out there and go. I don't know if it's the winter chill setting in, or the aforementioned reading of trail blogs, or the creeping knowledge that if I don't get on it I'll soon be at a place where I won't be able to get up and go... whatever it was, her words inspired me.

So I offered the same thing here, locally. We're going to go. We're going to hike. We're going to be out there every week. Come hike with us.

And for a very brief moment, I felt like the nerd at a tailgate party, suggesting we all get together to discuss Star Trek action figure history and development. (Which is funny, because I know nothing about action figure history and development, unless you count Lego Ninjago. I know more about that than I wanted to. But hopefully you get my point. I was certain I'd just lobbed a lead balloon over the social wall and everyone would stare at me like I was lost.)

But it was out there. No taking it back. I gave myself a pep talk ("What are you, twelve? Suck it up. You like this stuff. Someone else might like it, too. Go get more coffee and chill out.") And then I didn't check my email for 24 hours.

You know what happened?

Yeah, you're smart. I'm sure you do.

Scads of people want to go hiking! The response has been so positive, and much larger scale than I was anticipating. I'm so encouraged and excited! This is going to be fun! Maybe a little crazy (that's a lot of people...), and a titch chaotic at first (I don't know what I'm doing, really), and I'm braced for a learning curve (on my part - I'm relatively certain they're not all as uncoordinated as I am)... but FUN!

If it wouldn't be entirely weird, I'd drive to each home and just hug each of them to tell them thank you for being willing to do something new. I might just ambush people at the trailhead and hug 'em then.

Or, you know, not. If you're among those going and have a strict No Hugging By Ambush policy.

Heh.

Still, totally stoked!

I hope you'll let my dorky story serve as a voice of encouragement for any of you who are holding back on putting yourselves out there. Do it. Smile, say hi, say what you want to say. Invite people to share in something that excites you (except MLM sales pitches - nobody really gets excited about people sharing those) to play games, go for walks, learn something new. Even if they decline, you'll have put something good out there. Go for it.

Kiss those babies!
~Dy