If May 25th has a personality, it's restless. Across more than two decades, this date keeps showing up with something unresolved, something about to happen, or something that absolutely did not go according to plan.
It started simply enough back in 2002 with a quick note about heading to New York, the kind of post you fire off before disappearing for a few days. By 2007 things got more complicated. There was a frantic search for housing, parents arriving after five years apart, and a genuine appeal to anyone who might know a cheap rental in Missoula, because Jellystone Park cabins were apparently the backup plan. Meanwhile, that same year brought a quieter kind of anticipation, packing the car for Pocatello and revisiting a big Mission Mountains adventure from the year before.
Then came the scone era. A blueberry scone, a fresh cup of coffee, and a whole lot of AT data to stare at while missing the Tour of Bitterroot from City Brew. The training logs kept rolling in, including a genuinely brutal day with 85 miles and nearly 19,000 feet of climbing on the Rattler, followed by an honest reckoning about tortilla chips, sore throats, and a fitness crack appearing in the armor, all captured in the wonderfully titled Out Of It.
The 24-hour race years have their own gravity on this date. The 2011 pre-race post is something else entirely, equal parts sleep-deprived confession and pure stubborn resolve. The 2012 departure post is leaner, just directions to the race site and a promise to tweet updates.
Later years softened a little. A rainy day detour to Memorial Falls instead of the planned backcountry camp, because sometimes you just do the tourist thing. Company arriving with no particular agenda and defaulting to Palisade Falls up in Hyalite Canyon, which is apparently the universal answer when no one can decide. A quiet moment in 2021, then a bored but game ride on whatever was available in 2022. And then, somehow, a cocaine-stealing bear on a cliff in 2023, which is a perfectly reasonable place for a May 25th to land.
Some dates just refuse to be ordinary. This one never managed it, and that seems about right.