It’s been raining all day and into the night.
I arrived at the Great Smoky Mountains (GSM) this morning around 10 or 11, I had stopped at the Sugarlands visitor center on the western side of the GSM to get some information pamphlets. The place was covered in cars and people. It had given me an awful feeling inside, thinking it was overrun with people, like Yosemite or Starbucks. Ya’ know, maybe I should backtrack some.
Driving south from West Virginia to get here I came across a town called Gatlinburg… Maybe I should start before that, let’s start with how I was born…
A couple days ago I woke in a truck stop called The Tamarack, it was right off the 70 or 62 or 315 – basically it was off a highway that ran through Beckley, WV. I had caught a meeting the night before with someone I knew from social media and she pointed me in the direction of The Tamarack for the night. It had a fueling depot for trucks, maybe cars too, I didn’t need to fill up when I was there. I stayed in the parking lot of the convenience center which held a Subway, Burger King, Starbucks and little store. I woke late taking an over the counter sleeping pill, I haven’t been sleeping lately for whatever reason and I think my anxiety is coming back some too. Anyways, woke late, 7:30, and grabbed a cup of coffee from Starbucks. I had grabbed coffee from them in then hopes that they had their WIFI turned on, they did not. I grabbed a seat in a booth anyways and plotted my route for the day with my phone, I wanted to get close to the Great Smoky Mountains (GSM) but not make it there that day. I was planning on making camping reservations for the following two days at the GSM.
I found a camp spot near Embreeville, Tenn., off the beaten path some but not to far out and not to close to the GSM. On my way to it I found a Starbucks, got a coffee and used there WIFI to make my reservations for the following two days. When I got to my camp spot outside of Embreeville I found it to be beautiful, tall trees, level parking and a creek that ran through the grounds. I arrived there pretty early in the day, normally I would hike or ride or maybe even kayak if there was a lake nearby. But being as I was heading the GSM the following day I wanted to rest up, knowing I was interested in taking some bigger hikes there. I spent that afternoon in the van, in my camp chair with feet kicked up on the blue milk crate I used as a step. I spent the afternoon reading and cleaning and writing and daydreaming. I had very little cell service but enough to watch some choppy videos for a while too.
I made dinner, took a sleeping pill, put in my earplugs being that it had been raining on and off and the ting, ting, ting, has not grown any quieter. I woke the next morning around 7 I would guess, packed up the van and set out. I’m excited about getting there, all the reading I’ve been doing about them paint a picture that would make God himself proud. My drive in took me through a town called Gatlinburg, the northern side of it was nice, it held a feeling like a small town in the mountains and of course my first thought was, ‘I could totally live here.’ A few miles through that sorta rural area it flowed into a typical small-town setting, my feelings were correct. I pulled over at Fancy Foods, their local supermarket. Grabbed my mask and list and made my way inside, not many people were wearing masks. I got all the goodies I needed and some I didn’t, also given a God bless from the cashier when I left, which I was appreciated.
I put away my groceries, pulled up to the gas pumps next to the store and filled up. Got back on the main drag and kept heading in that southernly direction to the park entrance. The further I got from the store and that small town main street feeling the closer I got to what was either Disneyland or Myrtle Beach. It was like out of nowhere this tiny town was overrun by corporate America and a cartoon like atmosphere. I mean literally I was amazed at how ugly the place was, in a 1.7 mile stretch I saw 3 Ripley’s Believe It or Not theme park attractions. One, I know it was 1.7 miles cuz I was sitting at a traffic jam and Siri kept telling me how far till the turnoff to the parks entrance was and two, I am nowhere near exaggerating about the Disneyland, Myrtle Beach, corporate America insanity that sat in the middle of this town. I won’t go into detail about all the different kinds of shops and what not, but I will say the theme was cartoon for real, all the signage, the store fronts, all of them had that zany cartoon lettering and feel.
As I slowly creeped through all that I started to get a bad feeling about going to the GSM, I’m not one to be fond of overrun, people infested nature areas. In the city it’s one thing, you kinda expect that, but to run across toontown butted right up next to a national park, I was scared to think what it was going to be like in the park. The GSM are not huge by any means, there’s a 32-mile rode from northish to southish and there isn’t even a road that goes from eastish to westish. The GSM is shaped kinda like an oblong diagonal coffee stain between the states of Tennessee and North Carolina if that helps you reference my directions. I pulled into the park and that’s when I stopped at the Sugarland visitor center, that’s when I saw all the cars. Thank God there were no cartoon signs at the visitor center, I woulda totally split. I stopped in for a park map, grabbed Delaiah a keychain and I actually bought myself a shirt, first souvenir shirt I bought.
I had about a 23-mile drive to my campsite and couldn’t check in till 1pm so about halfway there I pulled over for a hike, the Alum Cave hike. It had started raining the moment I left the van; I went back in and grabbed my rain jacket, which come to find out is more splash proof than rain proof. At this point I am now used to the wet, I’ve been dealing with it on and off for a couple weeks now. The hike was beautiful, the falling golden leaves, the bright green moss on the rocks and trees, the way the creek made little waterfalls. I wish there was more ways to describe what I saw or what I’ve seen all together. You can’t encapsulate the beauty of nature, you can’t describe the colors, they change with every ray of light. You can’t explain the noise that is made when the wind rushes through the trees or the how the water splashes on the rocks and downed trees. If the sun were out, it would have been a sight to see I’m sure, there is something about the way the sun lights up the fall leaves and the shadows it castes. Now with that being said, if the sun was out, I am sure the trail would have been packed.
I made it to the top of the trail, came up on this immense half cave, like a huge hand had scooped out half a rock and left the other half partially buried and cropping out over a trail. In the distance, opposite the cave you could see some of the mountain ranges, some red, yellow, gold, orange trees dotted in the rich green of the forest. I got a few minutes up there by myself, spinning in circles trying to capture the art God had made on my phone. I’m definitely not ever able to truly capture what I see through pictures either.
As I was hiking back down to the van I stopped and stared at a section of the trail, it had me positioned looking down on the forest. This forest is not thick, there’s plenty of trees but they are thinner than redwoods and sequoias and their branches are those of what you would imagine a tall slender lady’s fingers are, thin and delicate. The leaves sit on the branches as light as tracing paper, floating in the breeze. I try to take some pictures, I look at them, it’s all just leaves. You can only see half of the tree trunks in these pictures, it’s all just leaves. When you are standing there, you can see the entire tree, every bit of it. You can see every leaf individually, every single one on the tree and on the forest floor. As I stood there, watching the leaves hang there motionless in the air, it dawned on me, they are puzzle pieces. They look exactly like puzzle pieces, scattered all over the forest floor and sitting on the branches. It made sense now, it was a beautiful chaos I was trying to capture, and beautiful chaos can’t be captured, it can only be experienced.
I finished out the hike in quickstep fashion, passing a few different groups of people. I like ending a hike or ride strong, not only in action but in spirit, pushing to my limit. I hadn’t hit my limit on that hike and that made me grateful, I had concerns of another episode with being unable to breath. The rain had not stopped much for the entire hike and while I was at the top it became a little heavier and steadier, I could of called that one. I guess it’s just supposed to rain right now is all I thought, I didn’t think maybe tomorrow it won’t or maybe it will let up later, it’s just supposed to rain right now. I finished my drive to Smokemont, where I made reservations for camping, it was empty. Being it’s a Sunday, being it’s supposed to rain for the next 3 days, whatever the case is, the park is pretty empty. Luckily I bought a little rain suit before I left on the trip so it looks like I’ll be putting that to good use. I have reservations to go horseback riding this morning, a two hour long ride up a mountain to a waterfall, but I don’t see that happening. I’ve to be there in an hour and it is still raining. I don’t know a ton about horses, but I do know I don’t really think I want to be riding one in the rain, they move slow on the trail and I’m not trying to get smooshed by it if it slips.
Yesterday after checking in I headed outside the park to catch some cell reception and canceled tonights campsite, no reason to spend another afternoon and evening in the van, in the rain. I’d rather spend the day driving around some, going on another hike and maybe getting a campsite in the late afternoon if I’m still in the park. I’m now at a point where spending the money on getting a hotel room isn’t the worst idea. I could also use a shower, I’m not exactly sure how many days it has been, I stopped counting. I’ve been impressed with myself on how long I’ve been going without a shower. I had been keeping track, like I needed to know so I could tell someone, for what reason I’m not sure. Now I could care less. Maybe I needed to make someone go eww or I needed something to talk about or get some feedback on social media. It gets lonely out here as you could imagine, but the longer I am out here, the less lonely it gets or so it is seeming that way. I wonder if that is acceptance of loneliness or instead of accepting the loneliness, I am not attaching to the feelings of it and letting it come and go as the moments change.
This all got me to thinking about being at home and being lonely. Was I so lonely at home cuz it was how I felt or was it that there were so many people around and just couldn’t connect with anyone and that is what made it sting so much?
Not that I couldn’t connect, but that I still felt lonely with people around. Like now being lonely is understandable, I’m living in a van by myself, but oddly enough I feel it less. Is that because I am in acceptance of not having anyone around or is it that I’ve grown in this area?
My fear of not having anyone around helped hold me back on doing this, the trip I took 5 years back for a month was heart wrenching during the final week. I guess you could say from that view I have grown in acceptance of being alone. But still I wonder, when I make it back, will I fall back into the same feelings, the same sadness? Was it the pandemic that changed how I live and now I am making friends with this new way of life? All this coming from the guy that has forever alone tattooed on his stomach, pretty ironic huh. Just cuz we know realities in life doesn’t make it any easier to deal with at times.
Like we can have an experience and deal with it. Maybe we are great at it or maybe we suck at it, either way we keep having the same experience. It’s not uncommon for us to go through the same lessons in life, continually learning from the experience. Like someone, somewhere is telling us we need to work on this area and they are helping us hone our skills. Just cuz we know this, we see this, our friends and therapists tell us of this, we don’t always handle it properly. We fight it, attach to it, hate it, love it, all the while trying to figure out how to accept it and live with it. I’ve been working towards being ok with being alone my entire life it seems, for whatever reason, it’s been a lifelong lesson. There are the people that go, ‘I’m ok with being alone’ as they sip on their cocktails just enough. The people that go, ‘I don’t need anyone, I’m perfectly content with being by myself’ as they well up during romantic movies. The people that go ‘I don’t need anyone’ as they have 2 dogs and 3 cats in their bed at night. I have been forever searching for that next level of acceptance, using nothing to change the way I feel, almost like a living meditation.
In meditation we are alone, completely and utterly alone, well aside from the monkey mind. But still, we are in the moment, focusing on nothing but the breath. I seek that for my daily life, that acceptance, that simplicity, that equanimity. There’s always the possibility that I will not ever get to where I am headed with all this, that this will forever be my plight and that is ok. I think it pretty amazing that I no longer wish to not feel anything, that I welcome all that comes into my life, I can do this today because I perceive nothing as bad or wrong.
My hope is that this can stay with me, I can expand on these perceptions of life. That acceptance continues to grow in me, that kindness, forgiveness and compassion continue to cultivate in my mind. That I don’t stop smiling and saying hello to all the people I pass on the trail, even if more than half of them do not even lift their eyes to meet mine. I have found such a joy in my life being out here, being right here, right now and it’s transferring into my daily life if that makes sense. Riding and hiking and kayaking, all these actions, it makes it easy to cultivate happiness from within. It’s the times when I am in the van, in the rain, for hours on end and not losing my shit. When I am over reading, over writing, have no cell service, not sleeping it away and I can still have joy in my heart. Where I don’t need anything or anyone or even thoughts of what was or daydreams of what could be to make me smile, this is huge. To even have it for one minute, just one minute, that is huge. And all I need is that minute, because that is the only one that exists.
Comentarios