commune -ique

simply. communication is a funny thing.

not funny 'haha' (though i can be), but still 'funny' in some way. not quite sure where i'm going with this, but we'll see...

at the heart of communication is communing. right? the coming together of two or more people. (can you communicate with yourself. keep an open dialogue, find better perspective through it. huh. i don't know. not what i'm getting at.) communication is not the trading or passing of information, like i think that our society/culture would have us believe. words, whether written or spoken. actions, too. indirect and directly affecting actions.

the information age, yes? age of mass communication, yes? but are we finding the root. are we actually communing, though.

when i think of the word communing, i gather a mental image (always silent) of two people sitting close. flesh, energy, and other unknowable things pass between them, in this dream. like hands (not hands) moving back and forth between. give and take. equality.

we talk talk talk so much. but what do we actually convey. we do do do (mostly inward focused), but do we allow ourselves to truly connect or be connected to.

in previous days, (long previous days...), when you wanted to communicate, you had to walk up to a person and speak to them. give or leave them a gift. write thoughts and feelings and words on pages and give/send them.

i now find myself changing. focusing less inward and more outward. towards a specific someone, albeit. a daily renewed desire to commune heavily weighs on me. it is not a burden, but rather a calling.

i desire to commune with her. daily. hourly. in more and less words.

i fancy myself a wordsmith sometimes (and a thoughtsmith at times as well...). but i'm finding that with this renewed desire to deeply commune, i'm having to re-examine what true communication is all about. in some senses, i'm having to re-invent my own usage of words and thoughts. i must emply new tactics, for this new desire.

thankfully i will not labor forever. i have a hope in a time after this life, where true communion will be found. where all may share intimately in HIM and in one another.

but for now, for me and for her, i will continue in my strivings...

and end & a beginning...

friends.

i did not know if i would bleed this blog into my 'normal' life after returning from the edge and the road. it seems as though the adventure has not ended. i prescribed a set period of time to experience adventure, and i have been blown away and over-abundantly blessed in it's continuance.

i suppose i was narrow-scoped and foolish to limit my view on adventure to a 'nether-time'. to say that it could only be had, on the road, or on the edge. truth be told, it's not about having it, it's about finding it.

looking in every crevice and around every corner. 'experience the rich ache of daily life', i once wrote. 'normal life' or 'normalcy' is only one's (my) inability to properly see. accepting normalcy is essentially a self-blinding. overlooking all the the Father and the fates have to offer.

so, i left you all. and i was full of hope...

things have not changed and i have not fallen off that covered wagon. i remain hopeful and so much more. i am returning/returned to SB and am starting/re-starting my life. ending this chapter. perhaps beginning a mini-chapter. perhaps just preparing for the next chapter that I have glimpsed and is upon me.

if i have seen/spoken to you at all, you know that things are different now. my world now includes a woman, and how wonderful it is to pour time into her and us. she is my world. plain and simply. how quickly love changes us/me.

so for the next 9 months i plan on soaking it all up. the sun, the sailing, the weather, the friends, the church, the time.

come along with me. on this page, or standing next to me.

adventure awaits...

from whence i have come...

out of the forest (quite literally) and back onto the grid.

today is my father's birthday.

today i am a mere three days shy of being 'on the road' for two long months. i think i had an inkling that these months were going to be long. as the days passed, the time away from anything i've called home seemed to strech on like the midwest horizon. i found small pieces, little places of 'home' along my way. Seattle. Plymouth. Nashville. Ft Collins. that was good.

today i drove from southern oregon straight to my parent's house, in lovely-golden-brown-hilled NorCal. by the by, it's really hot up in northern northern california right now. as i crested the last hills before i dropped down into the valleys that comprise the 'north bay area', i felt the cool coastal air nip softly at my arm as it hung out the window. the air was a sure sign that i had returned to the land of my fathers. but with it, i know comes so much more. that the life i know outside of traveling along america's roads on the roving winds, that state of living that I guess i would call my life, would once again be mine to inhabit and partake in.

but things are different. irevocablly different. any substantial time alone; traveling great distances; traveling at all; partaking in something outside of yourself; seeing life outside of yourself; meeting someone special; these things change you. they have all happened to me in the last two months. i have changed.

i have fed my wanderlust. i have floated on the winds up the coast, seen the Big Sky, and traversed the wide plains. i have sat quietly beside a beautiful woman. i have grown weary of the road, and have chased the sun westward as far as i can.

another year lays just ahead. i cannot get there by car. i cannot and will not walk there alone.

i am full of hope...

road poetry a.k.a. 'roadetry'

set out across the high desert of eastern oregon. thought i was going to dread each bleak and far stretching mile. but not the case today. no, today was cool air, desolate beauty, thoughts of a lady elsewhere, and great music. iron & wine. doug martsch.

over 200 miles passed as quick as i can write it. it might have helped that i pounded three red bulls at 8:30am. but who's to know these things. the landscape and the quiet begged me to write. so i grabbed the little notebook and steered with my knee.

it was fruitful. i shall part with those words. but first, i'm going to be going off the grid again. this time i'll be camping with my family in southern oregon. it's been close to eight years since we've done this. i'll try to jack in at some point in the week, but who's to know these hings. i'll be back in Novato before the month is over.

as i draw nearer to the end of this road trip, i'm filled more and more with mixed feelings. peace and calm, like i've done what i've set out to do. excitement, for the next chapter in my life. saddness, ostensibly, as this time of unbridled freedom comes to a close.

i have begun age 26 with a bang, an adventure, and a new little lady. i could not ask for anything more.

i'll see you all soon...

----------------

'heading west'

a tiny speck under an open sky
floating along on this black swath.
the air rushes
in the window to flood my nostrils.

i am a dust man,
formed of that same earth
i so silently pass over.

the sun and powerlines
give me direction.
the clouds
-chaotic in majesty-
gently urge me on.
the mountains
simply ignore me,
my time with them is but a breath.

i speed to
and crest each horizon
full of wind-teary-eyed anticipation.

yet i only find
more hills and peaks
bekoning me to come
and see what lays beyond
their heights.

so, i breathe
and press forward,
cutting my own furrow,
forging across this open land.

i think on a love
and other meadowed valleys
i've left behind
-but not forgotten.

i head west
to chase the sun
and a future that lies ahead
and unknown.

fortune on the high desert

so we left our hero sitting in his car on the edge of the unknown. with no clear prospects of camping, he pushes on. darkness pervading, eyes getting heavier with each black and lonely mile.

it’s nigh on midnight now. i pass a dirt road in the darkness and then another. damn, it’s dark. my headlights are losing the battle. the peterbilts are barreling and will not allow me to slow at all. i’m falling asleep, and no amount of loud music is helping.

i let the semi pass and for a moment i am alone under the dark wyoming sky. i vow to take the next dirt road, no matter where it leads, and look for a place to bed down. a slight screech of tires as i almost miss the tiny brown path that deviates from the blacktop. the ‘dirt’ road is more rocks than dirt and my car is begging me to go slow. it curves from left to right until i no long no which way is which. up and over a small hill, tells me it’s time to stop. i can no longer see the string of red and white lights that pepper the night highway.

rabbits and prairie dogs dart across the road from one sagebrush to another. as if one side is better. a slice of prairie grass along the road looks flat. here i will make my home.

first the tarp, then the pad, finally the sleeping bag. lantern and knife within arms length. i ‘mark’ my territory for good measure. the ground is surprisingly comfortable, either that or i am really tired. with no lights, civilization, or anything around, it’s just me and the stars. i don’t even think the moon was there for company. whispering a silent prayer of thanks for my spot, i drift off.

morning comes quick. i wake before the sun has peaked above the hills. i stand barely clad, and look around at the bleak beauty and sunrising colors that stretch before me. i love my life.

drove across all of idaho. honestly not much to see. just stayed the night across the oregon border, in ontario. 9 hours of driving lay ahead of me. oh yeah, and my trunk broke this morn. "it's okay, we didn't need that part anyway, she'll fly without it."

i'll be back in that old familiar Pacific time zone again before i know it. unfortunately that puts me two hours from my girl, and many miles from Montana, the promised land.

oh, california, how i love and hate thee.

but, before i get ahead of myself...three cheers for Oregon...

good will in the mountains

i am in green river, wyoming right now. my computer is busted and i can't lift the screen more than 3 inches. typing with my hands on the keys and the screen on top of my hands. absolutly stupid. but as a reciever of many free things, (cars, computers) i must not complain too much.

i'm sitting behind a ghetto liquor store in the darkness of my car and the shadows, stealing internet and drinking a cool but not cold beer. my plans to 'just camp somewhere in southwestern wyoming' have blown up in my face. no campgrounds, and no national forest. no trees anywhere actually, just rocks and shrubery. so as i write this, i don't quite yet know what i'm going to do, but, ah well, this is what it's all about right?

yesterday i was outside colorado springs with an uncle and aunt. i had some friends that i knew lived in northern CO, but i never called them in the planning phases of this trip. i cold called them from a pay phone in the mountains (this is after i asked a stranger to borrow his cell so that i could make another call...didn't have the heart to make two). i tell them i'm coming through and would love to stop for a few minutes and say hello. long story short, their hospitality abounded and i stayed till today.

twice yesterday i banked on the good will of my fellow man, and it paid off richly. Let us also say this: Ft Collins, CO is my new favorite place. instant friends, micro brewed beers to the hilt, sweet church this morn, and mountain high beauty. i can ask for little more.

i am becoming road weary. i miss my girl terribly. the time is drawing nearer to hang up the keys and the wanderlust for a while. i need to be a home body for a bit.

alright, with any luck, i won't have to sleep by the side of the road. next stop, OREGON...

chasing the sun...

so i'm heading west now. i will not spend a great deal of time lamenting that I have not written. in my defense, i will say that it is because i have been living in a fantasy world, enraptured by a woman. and i wouldn't trade a minute of it...

yes, there is a girl...

i drove across missiouri and kansas yesterday and the day before. it is a wasteland of nothingness out there. i had very little to keep me going, save for the promise of the cool crisp air of the mountain country and the northern states.

i came to an epiphany yesterday while driving. i am feeling the road tripping bug slowly being worked out of my system. alone on the road is losing its romanticism. i don't think that i'll back out alone. alone on the road of life is losing its romanticism as well.

i know. we'd never thought we'd see the day, but this 'confirmed bechelor' is tiring of his rambling ways.

i will be spending the next few days treking to southern oregon to meet up with the family for a week of camping. so freakin excited. after that, will return to the california north to work and road-detox.

the road, it would seem, has beaten me up a bit more than i thought it would.

perhaps i'm just feeling lost without her by my side...

back from the wild...

so i'm back on the map (though still not quite on the grid).

hello my friends, i've missed you all.

I am stealing internet from some business south of Chicago on my way to michigan. got up real early after camping in southeast iowa last night and got back on the road. please FORGIVE me for neglecting to write, as i have been back in civilization since monday. there was this overwhelming feeling like i need to write epicly about my time. each day that past, it became more difficult to write. alas.

i need to write more and speak of my times and adventures on the Indian Reservation as well of my short stay in middle-of-nowhere, Nebraska.

I think that over the next few posts, i shall write "flashback-postludes" and relate my recent adventures in that manner.

my head is swirling with the events of the past few weeks.

God grant me the serenity to spins these yarns...

big sky and spirits high...

well, that was a nightmare. long story short, they patched up my horse. my wallet’s a little lighter now. and by little, I mean a lot.

got back on the road. much relieved. little bummed about the money spent, but glad to be freewheelin again.

the Montana mountain heights brought me right back. feeling good in the saddle. as if with each turn or peak, I left the days previous fiasco further and father behind.

spent the night at my Uncle Phil’s. old-school ramblin man. we understand each other. he’s seen it all and been through the shit. I think he’s one of my main reasons I’m obsessed with Montana, beloved state. he recently came back to Christ after years and years. my heart and so many others, prayed for this and now rejoice with our Father in heaven.

bit of time for some bacon and eggs. black coffee. bit of time to swap a few stories. then is back to the road. last stretch before the Rez. pickin up a red feather friend in billings. I can only wonder what lies ahead for me in these next two weeks. pray that I may be a good witness.

and as always, think fondly of me in my absence…

houston, we have a problem...

okay. so i guess i'm not quite ready to go radio silent. yesterday, after leaving seattle, i didn't quite make it across the state before things went sour. and boy, the acidity is running high.

for all of you map people out there, i got as far as Lind, WA on the i-90. poor little blue car, was kickin and feeling like she wasn't even going to make it the 20miles to the next town, ritzville. i pulled off under much duress at the crossroads of highway 21 and the i-90. i found a little spot to park and check it out. she never started back up. shit. i'm in the middle of nowhere. wheatfields and crazy-strong high winds. rolling hills as far as i could see. no civilization. shit.

walked a bit. found some roadside workers. asked them for oil (which i thought might be the problem). they barely acknowledged me. flagged down the next car i saw. nice lady. felt sorry for me. she took me to podunk washington, also known as Lind, WA. told be that lind was famous for the 'combine demolition derby' which happens to be on friday. told me i should go see it, since i was broken down. i declined politly. then she told be all about the plight of the western washington farmer and the wheat fields. actually very interesting.

arrived in lind. went to the only mom & pop market (to which she called ahead to make sure they had motor oil). went to buy, but they only take cash. went in search of atm. got lost. the nice lady, Denise, drives around looking for me. finds me. i get cash, i get motor oil. we drive back to my car. long story short, the oil is not the problem or the solution. shit.

she stays with me. we call one of the nearest towns that i can get towed to and fixed up. it's 45miles in the wrong direction: west. at this point, my heart is sinking lower and lower into my chest until i think it fell out by the side of the road. if i get this car running again, i need to go back and find it.

$180 dollars later, i'm being towed back to Moses Lake, WA to a toyota dealer. i say goodbye to denise, my 'middle of nowhere angel'.

the towtruck driver tells me about some of the motels near the dealership. they all cost a million dollars to rent a room, and all i can think about is how much money i'm going to have to spend to even get back on the road. if i even can. i decide to stay up all night. bad idea. i decide to not eat at a resturaunt cause it's expensive. bad idea.

i'm slinging my satchel of justice and wearing my communist hat. i'm set. i'm kickin about, looking like a destitue vagabond (cause i am one). young guy with giant truck sees me and asks me if i need a ride somewhere. he and his buddy take me to town. we have a cig. go to safeway and buy can of soup and 24oz beer. hitch a ride back to the freeway where there's some 24hr diners. found a truckers lounge in the back of some gas station. heat and eat my soup, drink my beer in little back room. truckers come in and out. i say nothing. i fall in and out of sleep. it's midnight.

i decide to get out of there and find some bushes or some shadows to lie down in. i find an abandoned building. i bed down for a couple hours on the concrete next to the building. wishing i had some newspaper to put over me. feeling a bit like Kerouac, but not getting much sleep. give up the ground at about 3ish. head to 'shari's diner' to finish out the night.

nice waitress. i ask her to tuck me back in some back corner. she gives me coffee and let's me sleep. it's 5 when i wake. she gives me more coffee and her bleary night shift eyes pity me. she rustles me up some corned beef hash and eggs at my request. i thank her. she tells me the coffee is on her. it's already a bit light out by 5 though there's no sun yet. i eat a real roadhouse meal and read about Wild Bill Cody. i love the old west.

at 6, i trudge the mile back to my car at the dealership to sleep some more and wait for them to open at 7:30. they're looking at blue car right now, unknowingly deciding the fate of my road trip. best case, i'm back on the road, minus 3 to 4 hundred dollars. ouch. worst case, i have to leave the car. hitch it to montana maybe. maybe just cry in a ditch for a bit. i don't know.

i gotta say, you just can't make up stories like this. and truth be told, road trips wouldn't be the same without some issues along the way. i'm just hoping it ain't over before it's begun.

i'll drop a last note before i hit the Rez...