undone

When Samson lost his hair, his strength left him. When I lost my zipper, my desire to continue my walk left me. 

I was at the 17-kilometer mark—most of the way to Hanam City—when it happened: I had moved over to a shadowy part of the trail to take a piss when I discovered, to my horror, that I couldn't find the little handle that you tug on to get the zipper closed. I assumed the handle had fallen off into the darkness, so the question was what to do next. I was already feeling kind of tired and had been thinking of just stopping in Hanam City for the night, and I think my mind wanted to latch onto any excuse to cut the walk short. It occurred to me that I wouldn't be able to sit and enjoy my much-anticipated tangsuyuk with my fly hanging open, and that settled it: I decided I'd turn back around and either grab a cab or walk all the way back home. 

I ended up walking all the way back. The trip wasn't as bad as all that thanks to the cold, which kept me from sweating, but my feet were achy after 34 kilometers of walking. It took about 3.5 hours to walk 17K toward Hanam, and about 4 hours for the return trip because, as normally happens, I was slower for the latter half of the walk. 

As I walked, I kept looking for a place to break off the trail and grab a cab, but the road going parallel to the Han River task was a freeway, so there was no chance of flagging a cab down unless I went the extra distance and walked to a smaller street. I also kept thinking about being home in a nice, warm bed. The thought was both motivating and torturing. 

But eventually, I made it home just fine, and once I got my pants off and examined the zipper, I saw that the zipper's tiny handle was still attached, but the zipper itself was broken, which is why the handle no longer grasped both sides of the zipper. So I'm going to have to take my pants in for repairs after the holiday. Meanwhile, I'll be stuck wearing my old jeans for a couple days. First-world problems, right?

Don't cry for me, Argentina. It's only pants.