Lovers: SDTCT Day 6
I wake up in the transcendent cocoon of Carrot’s van at three AM. we are curled into one another, hands just slightly touching. Carrot is breathing softly.
In the din of the van under the moon, I feel a small wave of peace wash over me. It’s a big feeling but not an intense one and those are the feelings I like best these days - the ones that are quiet and real. Peace is not something I can ever seem to grasp for very long and so I do not try. Instead I lay with the feeling and I trust that it won't stay long but will probably come again. No need to cling; I let it wash over.
At six AM we wake for real and I’ve slept so well I almost can’t believe it. Nine solid hours of rest and I couldn’t have needed it more.
Carrot drives Raine, Liza and I to pick up Hadley and Kelly from the Julian Lodge and we drive to meet the rest at a trailhead in a fancy neighborhood just before our day of bushwhacking and trespassing begins. Together, the 12 of us discuss water and miles and logistics and pace. We have a lot to cover and we’re getting a late start. I can’t decide if I am worried about the rising temperature or delighted at the laughing and the jokes and Carrot's prancing dogs. I know from experience that the trespassing will make me feel ill, that I hate risk in this really categorical way that never seems to go away, no matter how many risks I take.
Eventually, we hike - but not before Carrot offers to slack pack us, which means she will carry our sleeping bags and pads and extra food and shelters to the trailhead we are to camp at, that instead of leaving she will see us at the end of the night. FUCK YES, what a nice thing that is. I am happy, and like the peace, I try not to cling.
We meander through a humid red dirt path that winds down then up, down then up. We crawl over and under a gate and like the peace and like the happy, the anxiety washes over me too. I commit to walking, forward motion even if it makes me feel scared. Dogs bark and growl as we pass, then people aren't going as fast as I want them to, then I am mad at myself for wanting people to move more quickly. I recognize that like all of my frustration and irritation in this life, the frustration totally comes from fear. I am afraid we'll get caught. I am afraid we'll be in trouble. I am afraid of the Don't Tread On Me flags waving ominously from every direction. I am afraid and it's turning my brain into a shit soup.
But still I go, there's nowhere else to move but forward. I play a game in my head, I call the game This Is Me Being Casual. I play another game in my head, and this one I call Don't Pay Attention To Me, I'm Just Somebody's Wife. These games are my spell, my invisibility shield, my cloak. I feel almost sure they are going to work....and then they don't.
1/3 of a mile from the trailhead I see a blond lady silently watching. She’s my age, I think but is constitutionally on a different plane of existence, one where this is her land and we are on it. She has Questions and the main question is "Are Y’all Lost?"
I have one role now and that role is A) to use my privilege as a cis white person to talk to this woman for the group and 2) to play totally and completely dumb.
Yes we are SO lost
I hear myself say.
Yes can you please please point us in the Right Direction.
She points us in the wrong direction, down the hill. She says she won’t shoot us but her neighbors sure will. She says we better watch out for the reservation nearby, they’ll shoot us too. They'll Shoot Ya, They'll Shoot Ya, They'll Shoot Ya, she says. This woman is racist and boring and terrifying in equal measure, probably the worst combination of things to be.
We turn around, and we are somber. We cut across another private road, this one keeping us on the private land for longer, but steering us away from the woman and her murderous neighbors. The resounding feeling is the deep desire to get the fuck out of here pand I feel it vibrating off of all of us. We try to walk fast. This part actually isn’t fun, not even type 2 fun, and I feel like I want to do this route every single year but I sure don’t want to do the trespass again.
The private property boundary ends and the mood noticeably lifts. The road winds red and thick before us and we are presented with the Bushwhack. I tell the others that the bushwhack is bad. I tell the others that the bushwhack is 1.5 miles long and that it will take us three hours. I tell the others that the manzanita is face high, that the yucca is low and hidden and as sharp as a knife. I tell the others that there are four false summits.
The others do not believe me, but of course all of it is true.
The effort of this sucks the life out of me, leaves me a grumpy sullen teen. Liza is just ahead of me and says WE'RE ALMOST THERE MUFFY, WE'RE DOING GREAT, LOOK AT YOU GO and in this moment I am so grateful for incredible Liza and her magical enthusiasm. I want to sit down and cry but instead I clamp my mouth shut and I follow Liza's voice. We're going and we're going and we're going, and eventually-- we make it to the top.
At the summit I take off my pants. It is 1000 degrees and the pants kept my legs scratch free but I am melting. I lay on my foam pad and eat chip after chip after chip, eyes glazed over. My head stays down, I let people pass, and eventually I put on my shorts and I start to go down.
The road is eroded and rolling. I listen to music. I listen to Where Should We Begin, the Esther Perel podcast about relationships, and I open mouthed sob. I think about the concept of a lover. I think about the concept of various lovers. I wonder what I should do. The sun starts to set, and there are Carrot and the dogs again, which means I cannot think anymore, I can only smile.
Finally, we hit the parking lot and there we find Girl Scout, the San Diego Trans County Trail's most beloved trail angel. Girl Scout has juice and enough burritos for all of us to have two, and suddenly relationships don't matter quite so much.
For now, there is only food.
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This section of the SDTCT is on unceded Kumeyaay, Cocopah and Cahuilla land. My writing is a part of a fundraiser for Border Angels, a humanitarian aid group based out of these beautiful borderlands.