Hoyne and I rented a car at an Enterprise and he fronted the
money. We set out on that bright
morning, giddy with excitement and a little fear because we hadn't mapped out
our route or planned places to sleep or really prepared at all other than Hoyne
bringing his tent from Chicago with a couple marijuana nugs tucked deep in its
compact fabric.
After a
while, snaking through the greater Los Angeles concrete network, we finally hit
the coast and saw that beautiful street sign, which read: "Pacific Coast
Highway." Pepperdine sat at the top
of the overlook and I wondered how wonderful it would have been to be rich
enough to go there.
Hoyne wore
shades and a cut off t-shirt, which showed his tattoos and the sharp angle of
the Pacific sun reddened our arms. We
stared over the immense ocean and let our minds wander, sometimes not uttering
a word for an hour.
The 1
intertwined with the 101 at times, pulling the car off of the coast and through
valleys of vineyards, which stretched for miles over rolling hills and Mexican
workers with straw hats dotted in between the rows and they tossed grapes into
the backs of pickup trucks.
When we
reached San Obispo, the 101 continued to stay straight and the 1 broke off
northwest and trickled to a two-way road tucked and hidden in the enormous
cliffs lining the ocean. I remember
thinking that I was in another world; a celestial world, when I saw those
brilliant, intricate color schemes painted down the sides of those bluffs and
how their ancient crags stuck out as the first defense against the pummeling
ocean, protecting, yet coexisting in a beautiful symbiotic way. Hoyne said that this is how he knew god
existed. And I thought to myself that
this is how I knew he didn’t.
It took us
a few hours, but we winded around those rocky protrusions north until redwoods
popped their bushy heads high toward the sun.
The first step out of the car was stiff, compressed bone and then I took
that first big inhale of air and could smell nothing but fresh fern and the
purest, sweet smell of vegetation just saturated in the air molecules.
We went to
a diner and drank a couple beers and our server let us know that all the
campgrounds were full and the two motels within the Big Sur area were close to
full occupancy and the price was close to six hundred a night. So, we drove a
little further north toward Monterrey and searched for places to pitch the
tent. A lighthouse stood tall far in the
distance, perched on a large boulder in the swelling foam and the land
surrounding the shore was tall with grass and hundreds of cows grazed near the
water way down the valley. I expected to
see Monsanto's cabin and that wandering goat with black lumps of shit in the
white sand, but all that I saw were packs of cows and an endless greying
sky.
We turned
the car around and drove back past the diner, finally finding a wide part of
the shoulder to park. Hoyne really
wanted to use his tent so he fumbled around with the stakes and the canvas, but
could never drive them deep enough to hold, as the Earth was hard and dried,
chipping like brick into crusty rectangular pieces.
That was
about two hours ago and now I sit, reclined as far back as the car seat will
allow writing by moonlight, which illuminates thick fog rolling in from the never-ending
water. Hoyne breathes softly, chest
rising and falling, and he has a Modelo can gripped firmly in his right
hand. The air's gotten cold and my phone
hasn't had service for the last six hours.
Hoyne says there isn't a cell phone tower for one hundred miles. It's kind of nice to be shrouded in fog, but
also kind of scary when we hear random pickup trucks speeding around the bend
in the road. I wonder how in the world
they don't just fly off the cliff into the steaming water below, but maybe
they're used to it and know every dip and turn for the sixty-mile stretch.
I close my
eyes and my brain wanders, far back home to where my mother is curled in bed
probably crying at the thought of me alone.
But, I don’t feel sad and I don’t feel scared. I feel happy.
I hear the animals crying and I can feel that vast ocean churning
beneath us and I think of Kerouac and of Nick Adams and wonder how different I
am than both of them. With one crutch on
the civilization that raised me and the other dangling off of the side of this
bottomless cliff, I feel safe and relaxed, away from the bullshit and alone at
last. Hoyne's lips flutter on the
exhale.
Hoyne woke up hungry and we both wanted to get lost in the
trees so we bought steaming coffee and some nutty muffins and headed toward the
summit of Mt. Manuel. The air was cool
in the valley and hot on the side of the winding trail and we ascended at a
brisk pace, facing the clock which limited our exploration. The issue was that we had to have the car at
San Francisco airport by 6:00 p.m. and we knew it would take a couple hours to
drive there. So, we climbed up high and
fatigued our legs, gazing down the steep brush inclines with jagged rocks and a
waterfall waiting, 3,000 feet below and it was tempting to jump at that white
foamy water and we desperately wanted to take a cool swim, but time allowed
nothing more than the climb, and it was as wonderful as I could have
imagined.
The colors
were so vivid and popped like blooming spring and it all seemed so foreign
compared to the Chicago concrete and the Kentucky limestone that I was
accustomed to. It was a sad moment when
we exited that mysterious and haunting cliffscape, but again excitement
returned when I thought of San Francisco, the final stop of our adventure.
Golden
rolling hills and hazy sky flooded through the window of my personal moving
picture, when the highway signs became larger and more frequent alerting us of
our proximity to the bay. My arms burned
in the sun and I hid them in the shade of the dashboard, massaging my roasting
skin.
We checked
in the car and walked into the airport, which was as clean as a hotel, semi-empty
aside from some Asian ladies waxing the floors.
We left our luggage at the airport in a locker for twenty-four dollars a
night and asked the long dirty finger-nailed concierge where we could find a
cheap motel in the city and he pulled out a map highlighting areas around
Merchant Street, directly off the B.A.R.T. stop and told us where the hipsters
were and where the douche bags were.
Meanwhile, all I could focus on was the thick brown line of muck stuck
deep underneath his uncomfortably long fingernails.
My
shoes and socks were soaked through with sweat and that powdery dirt of the
Sur, which turned to mud and crystallized on my leg hairs and when we stepped
into our lodging, I stripped down, eyes closed under the warm spray of the
shower which washed the dirt down the drain, crusting around the edges of the
linoleum. When I had finished and dried,
the remaining filth caked in long brown stripes on the fresh white towel. After we were clean, we began cracking open
the remaining Modelo cans and worked up an appetite. Hoyne sat tranquil at the table by the
balcony and stared into the dark building across the street, sucking at the
small pipe in his fingers
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