I’m sitting at a favorite trailhead, listening to the quiet of these predawn moments, and waiting for daybreak to illuminate the trail enough to walk without a flashlight. It’s the last day of the year.
An occasional car passes as I wait for the sun.
This nature park is only open from dawn to dusk, but there’s also parking near the gate. I wait to hear the quiet “clang!” of the gate opening, which reliably occurs just at daybreak. There are a couple other “regulars” who turn up to walk or take pictures as early as I often do, but this morning it’s just me. I’m okay with that; I’m not here to make conversation. None of the early morning people are. lol
2023 is over. What a year. So many lives lost to conflict or genocide. Humanity can be so terribly disappointing. The amount of violence and trauma left behind by 2023 would be shocking if we weren’t all so numb. I sit quietly, in solemn reflection and acknowledgement; we’ve got to do better if we’re going to survive ourselves at all.
2024 is just about here… I think about the year behind me. The challenges. The successes. The failures. The unrecognized opportunities. The missteps and course corrections. Work. Life. Love. Change. I consider how fortunate I am to enjoy the relationship I have with my Traveling Partner. I reflect on my current job and how much I enjoy it… And how little my enjoyment of my work ultimately actually matters, inasmuch as it has very little correlation with my longevity in a given role, at all. I think about the books I’ve read this year and the books I hope to read in the year ahead. I think about how wretched and poisonous corporate greed is, and the way it taints just every-fucking-thing. I think about hearth and home, and how much difference love makes, day-to-day. I reflect on how fortunate I am to have this life and another year to live it.
One more walk in 2023.
It’s daybreak and I can see the trail. I take a moment to move the car past the gate into the parking lot.
I sigh. Finish my coffee and lace up my hiking boots. It’s time to begin again.
It’s early. Pre-dawn. I’m waiting for daybreak at a favorite nearby trailhead on a drizzly chilly-but-not-cold Winter morning, on a Saturday morning, a day before this year ends. I enjoy walking as a metaphor for forward progress, for momentum, and for pursuing a path. Good morning for it. It’s even seeming very likely that the rain may hold off long enough to get a proper walk in without returning home quite sodden and chilled, which is a nice bonus this morning. I’d be here, now, even if conditions were colder and wetter, but I am glad the weather is relatively mild.
I rub my eyes and sip the iced coffee I picked up as I headed up the road to this place. Good morning for that too; I’d hoped to sleep quite a bit later, and I am tired. So tired. I suppose I could nap in the car until the sun peaks over the horizon… but… I’d miss watching the sunrise. lol I do enjoy a sunrise. Another beautiful living metaphor, a sunrise speaks to me of change and renewal and new beginnings, and I enjoy each one I am so fortunate to see.
… Fuck… I could be sleeping right now, though… only I’m not. Nothing much to be done about that, however , so I make the best use I can of these precious minutes of mortal lifetime to do something nice for/with myself. That’s how I find myself here on this trailhead so many mornings, waiting for the sun. I’m okay with it. I’ve waited on the sunrise for far worse reasons in this life.
This iced coffee is very good. The barista did a great job pulling the shots for it. “Shaken espresso”, but without anything to flavor or sweeten it, and no milk or cream, just coffee and ice. On a colder morning this wouldn’t be an ideal choice, because I’d want to be able to warm my hands with the cup. lol This morning it’s 48°F, and an iced coffee seems fine. I sip it contentedly, as the waning moon overhead perks through the clouds and a gentle rain spatters the moon roof of the car intermittently.
It’s a good time for meditation and quiet contemplation of the year that is almost over. It’s a good time to reflect on what has worked and what hasn’t worked so well. It’s a good time to look ahead and wonder, question, dream, and plan. Later, the sun will rise, and it will be a good time to begin again.
I’m relaxing. Enjoying the evening. I’ll probably be up rather late; I collapsed into a foggy, dreamy, lush nap shortly after I got home from work (and after making a short trip to a favorite local pie spot to pick up a pie – why not? I like pie…). I woke refreshed, and found my Traveling Partner had slept through the time I was napping, himself, relaxing on the couch. We must have needed the sleep. Dinner was simple, nothing fancy.
…There’s nothing about this that is significant, important, or, probably, even interesting. It’s just a quiet evening with nothing much going on. It’s pleasant, and that’s enough.
I’m in a lot of pain tonight. It’s not “new pain”. Just my arthritis. Chronic. Predictable. But not new. I mean, shit, I first started feeling the twinges of what would become my “constant companion” in… 1988? 1989? Something like that. About 35 years ago. At first I thought there was “something seriously wrong” with my spinal fusion – no one explicitly warned me about the likelihood that osteoarthritis might set in, in the adjacent vertebrae, or gave me any idea what to expect when it did… until after it was part of my experience. Not much of a fucking “warning”, but what could have been done? It’s not like a warning about arthritis would have caused me to decline the surgery that lets me walk, stand, and get around as well (and go as far) as I do. So… I hurt. I mostly don’t mention it out loud to other people. I probably minimize it more often than I should when I’m talking to my Traveling Partner. I don’t like him to worry, or stress over it, and for fucks sake, what could he even do about it? Basically nothing. So… why bitch? I just deal with it and try to move on. Take medication when I need it. Keep myself moving (because being too still too much of the time definitely makes things worse over time – a lesson learned decades ago). Sometimes it’s hard. Life, too. So… yeah. So what?
I distract myself with entertaining videos. I write. I listen to music. Play video games. Read books. I enjoy life. It’s already likely to seem far too short. 🙂
No one likes to hurt. Pain sucks. I remind myself how common it is that we do. For sure there are people who have it much worse, more of the time, than I do. Perspective; it is so much more profound to experience contentment and joy, because I definitely do know what it feels like to be mired in pain and misery. Maybe it’s enough.
…Be kind to people. It’s not always obvious how much pain someone is in, and how it defines their experience. We’re all just people. Pain is part of being human.
When the rain began to fall, so close to the forecasted time it may as well have been a plan, rather than a weather forecast, I was long gone. Already home. Already showered. Already astonished to feel the bone-deep fatigue that had set in once I got home. My Traveling Partner seems glad to see me. We both get something out of these opportunities to miss each other.
Site 146, C Loop
I had originally planned to be camping Wednesday through Sunday, home on Sunday afternoon. Instead, I got started a day later (bills to pay, frankly, and needed the work hours), and then called it “done” a day early, when the weather forecast became pretty insistent on the chance of rain going from “possible” to “probable” to “count on it”. I am decently well-equipped, even for camping in the rain, but… I didn’t bring the extra overhead cover I’d need to make cooking outdoors comfortable in a downpour, and didn’t look forward to breaking down my camp in a rainstorm, either. I woke this morning having already coordinated with my Traveling Partner, who seemed more eager to see me than inconvenienced by my early return. The sky threatened rain before day break, but the forecast stayed true; no rain fell. I had coffee and a bite of breakfast, tidied up, and got started packing up.
Looking like rain.
I got in some good walks. Got some good pictures. Got some solo time thinking my own thoughts and being master of my time, my intentions, and my effort from the moment I woke each day until sleep took me down each night. I meditated. I watched the fire grow cold on a chilly evening alone with the woman in the mirror. I picked up my sketchbook to sketch or paint, and put it down without doing anything with it at all. I picked up a book to read, and put that down, too. Turns out, this trip was me, with my thoughts, and little more than that. I cooked. I tended the fire. I listened to my inner voice, and reflected on my experience.
…It was an amazing time to spend with myself…
“hearing myself think”
I don’t want to mischaracterize my camping trip; I was in a colossal managed state park that has some 400+ individual sites, arranged in loops A through H. This place is huge – and popular. Jessie M. Honeyman Memorial State Park is on the Oregon Dunes. It’s an amazing place, with several activities available, including ATVs on the dunes, kayaking or paddle boating on either of two lakes, fishing, swimming, hiking, biking, or joining the merry oldsters in the Welcome Center to work on the latest jigsaw puzzle. Popular + activities = crowded. I wasn’t surprised that most of the sites seemed full, even on a Thursday. This fucking place looks like an outdoor gear convention. It was hard to “be alone” surrounded by people – I got most of what I needed fireside in the evening, or out on the trail during the day. It’s a friendly place. And noisy. So noisy. I can’t even go hard enough on this point; it’s fucking noisy. ATV’s. Packs of shrieking kids. Wailing babies. Adults who should know better yelling to each other across multiple sites worth of distance. Loud trucks and loud talkers. It’s fucking noisy. It’s not a great choice for camping if quiet is what you’re looking for, is what I’m saying. I was regularly approached in camp by strangers asking questions about my solar panels, or the fridge, or some other piece of gear or something else that caught their eye. Like I said; a friendly place.
…I’m not really “approachably friendly” with strangers, though, so this tested my ability to be polite and gracious, which are skills worth cultivating…
I’m glad to be home. I slept poorly. There were too many “feral children” running about loose without supervision in small packs of “new best friends”. There were too many dogs on leashes (and a few that weren’t, which was worse) and many of them barked. Like, a lot. People camping in family groups taking several sites were common… and loud. Very loud. “Rambunctious” seems like a good word for it. In spite of all of that, I had a good time, and got a lot of what I needed out of the time spent more or less alone. Worth it.
…The drive was lovely, both directions, and felt very much as if I were the only car on the road at all. It was quite wonderful.
Anyway. I’m home. There’s more to say about it, more to process. Pictures to look over. Anecdotes to share when the context and timing are right. I sit here listening to the rain fall (on a video, as rain falls outside), happy to be home. Happy to be.
A frown crosses my thoughts briefly…some bad news shared by a friend taking the form of a facial expression as I recall it. I breathe, exhale, and let that go for the moment. I’ll come back to it, later.
It’s a metaphor.
I sit here with my feet up, feeling grateful, contented, and loved. It’s enough. More than enough. It’s a firm foundation for all the many new beginnings to come. 🙂
I’m sitting in the waiting area of a local tire place. No coffee. I mean, I could, but… it’s late in the day, and the coffee here is probably quite dreadful, so… no.
Generic tire place.
The smell is “shop” and tires. It’s a bit noisy, but the sunshine streaming through the big windows feels nice. Tomorrow I leave for my camping trip… Tonight, apparently, I need to get a tire repaired. Shit. Well, at least I already got the grocery shopping done and the car is packed. Really nothing left but the morning… grab my camera bag and go, if my Traveling Partner is sleeping when I get up. Have coffee together before I leave if he’s already up.
….Easy…
It already seems rather silly that I stressed about this tire.
I’m pretty excited about this camping trip. Enough to overlook the pain I’m in. Headache. Arthritis. Fuck pain. I’m going camping anyway. I really need a couple days alone with my thoughts, my camera, and some trails I’ve never walked. Maybe I’ll write. Maybe I won’t. I know I will listen to the wind through the trees and the squawking of the jays.
This damned tire though.
…The mechanic turns up to tell me it’s fixed. A bit of paint on the rim prevented a good seal on the tire. Easily fixed. I head home.
Evening Light 