Day One

I locked the door, documented the milage and left, it was 6:30 on a Wednesday evening. I went to see a friend to say goodbye, she said ‘what am I going to do when your gone? Who’s going to help me?’ I help her by redirecting her ADD, the heavy lifting and installing of all her crazy ideas around the house. It’s kinda like herding 3 cats into one action, I love her for it tho. As we were chit chatting with remembered I had forgotten to pack a hoodie, granted it’s going to be as hot as the surface of the sun for this whole trip but a hoodie is like a security blanket for me. After saying goodbye in a manor that wasn’t a “goodbye” but more of a see you later so she didn’t get to busted up. I then jumped in the van, started it up and headed back towards my apartment, stopping for some fast-food (vomit). I went inside and the couch was inviting and the tv beckoned me so I ate and watched and grew sleepy. Now being that it was 8:30 and nearing my bedtime, I decided to sleep and when I woke I would leave.

I do not sleep that good and I knew I would be up well before the sun and able to beat some of the heat. I read last week that this coming weekend America was going to be covered by a “heat dome” not the best weather to drive up Interstate 5 and sleep in a tin can on wheels. I fell asleep on the couch due to the fact there were no sheets on my bed, my nearest and dearest is coming up with her husband and son when I am gone and going to us my place for a weekend or two. The sheets are sitting in the dryer. Sleeping on the couch is like sleeping in a crack with bags of potatoes on each side of you, needless to say I didn’t sleep well. Come to think of it even ina bed I do not sleep well.

I was up at 3:45 and out the door by 4:30, ambling down the stairs to climb into the van and make a cup of pour-over coffee. I re-entered my mileage in my logbook. I’ve a logbook, fancy like too, leather bound soft covers with leather strap to keep it closed. I document all my travels in it, draw crappy pictures and make lists for the next trip. I have this vision of selling the van one day to some deserving soul for a fair price and maybe they will read it and add to it. I’ve something sentimental in me for stuff like this. I think of my grandfather quite often when I’m on the road and what it would have been like had he kept a journal of his time driving cross country from Massachusetts to California for the first time in 30’s. Adventured lived in his heart as it does mine, my father as my grandfather have this affinity for the mountains and my stepfather the same, although my stepfather has a thing for open roads as do I. I’ve been given great role models in my life, at times not even seeing them for this till my 40’s. Throughout the years I’ve been way to self-obsessed to see or remember this.

I went up the 101, cross the 46 and to the 5. By the time I got to the 5, at around 6am, it was already 74 degrees and heading north it was going to get hotter. Up the 5 I went and not much needs to be said about it. The 5 is dry and boring and long and boring and hot and boring, all the way until you get to the other side of Sacramento, I think once you hit YOLO it starts to green up. There’s a slew of rivers that flow around and under the interstate from that point on. Driving over this one section reminds me of the time I took the Greyhound to Florida and passing through Louisiana the 10 freeway it does the same, suspends over water. The grass gets green once you cross that suspended portion of the road at YOLO and then it continues to get even greener from there (well until about Red Bluff). Right after that I pulled over near a field of corn, parked under the shade of a big willow and took a nap.

The rest of the drive wasn’t all that bad, it didn’t start really heating up till Redding and at that point I made a right on the 299 and headed up the canyon towards Burney. I was thinking I should camp at Shasta Lake, being the first day of my trip, a way of christening the journey or so to speak. But I opted out of that idea when I saw the temperature was at 107, no one wants to camp in 107 degree weather, right? Mandy lives in Burney and I was planning on stopping through there anyways so why not go early and stay in some air-conditioned air. I called her, said I was showing up in a few hours, that I was going to find some water to jump in and eat some lunch first. She said there was crick that the 299 followed and there would be a spot of two for me to get wet.

Up the 299 I went, hit a turn out, made a samich and slowly got in the water. You would think it woulda been a little warmer, but it was not, although refreshing it was. Luckily the spot I stopped at was used frequently by locals, the trail, the trash and the graffiti on the rocks leading down the trail told me so. “Brad is a dick” “I love Jenni” “The Hatfield’s were here” - some real good stuff written in magic marker and what seemed to be a white-out pen. I tried to spend time in the turnout, grabbed my computer and got to typing down thoughts. My idea that everything needs to be a certain way always disrupts the flow of my life. Maybe it’s a control thing or that I want things to be as I fantasized them in my head, whatever it is, it always disrupts the natural flow of life. I want this to be like this and that like that, contorting reality to fit my desire instead of accepting it as it is.

I think there’s a fine line between creating a storybook experience and working towards an end result. I don’t know if it’s my lack of patients and fear of running out of time or it’s a fear that my goal might not be met, but at times I push the moment into what it’s not and that just takes away from the true experience. Takes me out of the moment and forces it to be something it is not. And maybe, just maybe, if I slow down a little more, get out of my head and into my heart, I might come to find that it will be perfect in its own right.

So, I sat there in the passenger seat of the van, seat spun towards the driver seat, feet propped up, a hot computer on my lap, a million degrees outside, a million and one inside and there I was, trying to write. Two paragraphs in I found where my arms were resting on my thighs a nice layer of sweat had started to soak into my shorts. It didn’t help that I was wearing Dickies shorts, like who wears shorts so thick they could stand up on their own while they traveled across the surface of the sun. I then remembered that I had forgot my Speedo, yes I have a Speedo and yes I wear it, but only in times of dire need to feel cool. Not look cool, feel cool and not feel cool in the ego way but in the physical way. Speedos are complicated, especially when your anatomy is that of a disfigured Ken doll. I gave in to the heat, packed up my van and ventured on up the 299.

I got so far and the sleepies came on again. I came across a rest stop a few miles outside of Burney, parked under some tall shady trees and prepared to nap. I wanted to be a bright eyed and bushy tailed guest, well that and I like naps. I swear having a bed with you at all times of the day is amazing. I turned on the fans, closed up the curtains and climbed onto my bed. As I laid there slowly drifting off I had the most lovely feelings in me. It had to do with the way the inside of the van glowed a little from the light passing through the plastics of the roof fan and bouncing off the wood paneling walls, the sounds of the semis and cars passing by on the highway, the cool breeze of the fan blowing on me. There was no self-obsession, no questioning the moment, just doing and being as I should. It was simple, it was peaceful and I was beyond grateful.