You meet under a streetlight at 0100 hours. Details not forthcoming. It’s you and a bunch of other sick fucks who shrugged off every possible excuse to not be here. You take off through the city streets, into the night. You’re moving quick, up and down sidewalks. The moon hangs like a bare bulb in the sky. You’ve done this a thousand times before, now you’re doing it again. In a world that prizes parking spots, impressions, and hacks, you’re seeking a more honest relationship with the universe. It’s not something that can be extracted—it’s an offering. Sweat drips to the pavement.

Tonight the flattened earth regains its shape, its dimension, its texture. This is the way to take in a city: legs and lungs, high-spirited play. Federal Hall, Washington Square, Battery Park, the Brooklyn Bridge in New York. WWII Memorial, Washington Monument, Ulysses S. Grant Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, FDR Memorial, MLK Memorial, Korean War Veterans Memorial, Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Lincoln Memorial in DC. Past the gawkers and hecklers—you chase the sunrise together. The only value it holds is what you give it.

ENDEX: Cold beer around the concrete campfire. Handshakes, and thank-yous. Good Livin’.

Passing thoughts get aired over breakfast in Dumbo with and Lucy. Coffee, protein bowls, smoothies. It’s good to talk, to lay the cards on the table and look at them. To get another perspective—to have perspective. What does success look like? It’s the light in the eyes that illuminate the room.

I cross over the bridge with Lucy and Jason. Somewhere in the future I walk the battlefield one last time. I see ghosts. Buffalo once roamed here, birds of the sky. Now it’s a designated park: restored, refurbished, preserved—fake bricks and tourists. Hey Mike, which post was it? I forget for a moment, it seems abstract, someone else’s life. It was this one. Everyone just looks at it. Jason hands me a Sharpie: Put a bolt on it. The last mark I’ll leave here.

I’m sitting in Lucy and Hayden’s apartment in Brooklyn Heights. I’m surrounded by guitars, books, art on the walls—big windows to let in the light. Elvis’ Sun Records recordings on the turntable.

We walk out into a perfect and clear summer day. Along the promenade—the East River, the strange and broken Manhattan skyline with George Washington and Walt Whitman. We stroll through Cobble Hill: coffee and stationery. Jason meets us back in Brooklyn Heights at Felice for dinner. Bread and olive oil, salmon, salad, and pasta. We sit at a sidewalk table and enjoy the evening conversation. Back along the promenade at dusk.

Jason and I leave the brownstone in Crown Heights after 9:00 PM, buzzing down the avenue. LED lights smooth all motion like a bad TV show. We duck out of the ultra-realism of the avenue into the cinematic low frame rate of the Nostrand Pub. We order Erdinger Hefe Weizens, and then another.

You can’t rewind but you can begin again: 001. To be back out on the streets, under the stars, close to the earth. There’s a thousand reasons not to be here right now, and no one would think any less of you, but there is the mirror. I watch quicksand years fall away. If we do what’s right, we won’t win on paper. Cheers to that.

It’s a bright morning. Toyin makes us breakfast: eggs, bacon, and blueberries from her garden. You can’t make sense of the senseless but you can enjoy small savors. We won’t lament the passing days or what once was. We can only honor the day in front of us and keep manifesting what will be. What are you going to put into your time capsule?

On the Amtrak into New Jersey and through my hometown with Jason. Onto Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and into DC. We walk through Georgetown, meet up with Devin for dinner, then take a nap. At midnight, we walk down to the Potomac. 002.

Buy in: 100 pushups at the Washington Monument. We’ve basked in the radiance of Washington’s servant leadership this entire time—from the evacuation in Brooklyn Heights, to the inauguration at Federal Hall in Manhattan, here, to the capital city. He steps up for his country and then he steps down. The Greatest American.

Through the National Mall, to the Grant Memorial where I landed in June of ‘88: acid drops, sad plants, and boardslides. Stecyk snaps a photo. I’m here again, now: burpees, lunges, and air squats. Jason captures the moment—a continuum.

While the city sleeps, we have Jefferson to ourselves. Rucks off, we linger in the rotunda, silently absorbing the inscriptions. A fox slips along the edge of the tidal basin.

Why are you here?

I have an appointment with myself. To continue to paint my self-portrait outside of cultural mandates and political affiliations. To forgo agency rations and pre-packaged belief systems. Because here is where I see my reflection. Greener grass? No. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Ruck or Die.

Loadout:

GR3 — I never check a bag, and I don’t use roller bags, so I carry the largest possible carry-on Rucksack, the GR3. In it goes my clothes, extra shoes, electronics, books, journal, laptop, and Packable Bullet Ruck.

Rucker 5.0 — The Rucker 5.0 is the purpose-built Rucking Machine for the Hard Miles. I carried the American Tiger Stripe edition on my back in NYC and DC. Instead of trying to travel with a Ruckplate—not recommended, remember, I don’t check bags—I packed a 30LB Achilles Vest and loaded that into the long pocket inside my Rucker

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