I visited my mom earlier today, ostensibly to do her taxes, but also so I could inform her of my plans to hike the AT. I had decided going in that this was the conversation that was most likely to cause me to abort my plans, but she took it better than I expected (and also raised a number of concerns I had already anticipated). Apparently, this is something my dad would have liked to have done, had he known about it when he was still healthy enough to do this sort of thing. And apparently, one of my cousins had hiked part of the AT at some point, so I potentially have someone else to talk to for pointers.
My mom wants me to hike with someone else. While I'm sure I could find someone to hike with if I looked, I'm not actually really interested in having a hiking parter. That said, I'm sure I'll hike portions of the trail with other people I meet along the way, and given the nature of the AT, at least in the beginning, I'm sure I won't be far from other people. This is a thing I want to do for myself, and, not with someone else I don't already know.
Now, I just need to tell my friends…