The Day You Go Back

You hike to the trailhead. Maybe you are crying. Maybe you don’t know why. You get in the car or bus or van or airplane. Your dust covered or soaking wet gear gets stowed and your dust covered or soaking wet, but certainly smelly body gets into the vehicle. If you are lucky you have your “city hat” to change into. Otherwise it’s big floppy hat or beanie the whole way back.

If it’s a van you roll slowly out on the dirt road until you hit the pavement where you can speed up. Everyone’s body smells filling up the cavity of the vehicle. It can be unpleasant, but you probably don’t care that much, unless you kind of hate the people you were hiking with. I did not. I very much liked them. And when you very much like them on the last day, it was a good, good trip.

Then you drive and drive.

If my trip was really good I lose my appetite. I might be hungry, really hungry, but I still don’t want to eat. Then sometimes I get around food and I start shoving it in my face like an animal. Results will vary depending upon how I ate while on the trip. But there is a time frame where eating just doesn’t seem like the thing to do.

On the canyons trip we had a van and I had a window seat. As we pushed back towards Grand Junction I got to keep staring out at the Canyon Country: Comb Ridge, Comb Wash, the Bears Ears, The La Sals, The Henrys. Places that fill up much of my memory of my NOLS semester. They were huge for me when I was 19. They still are huge for me. I hope someday they can be huge for Xo and I together.

I think about how I don’t want to go. How I want to stay out. Maybe go back, get a house in Blanding, Moab, Vegas? Just a jumping off point. All kinds of life fantasies fill up my brain…