Easterly

I didn’t expect to cry that night. But, then, we rarely get to foresee or decide such things. So I found myself on my last nightly walk, under the big tree at Gardner and Willoughby, with tears in my eyes. I guess I should have expected some emotional moments…it had only been one day since I decided I was leaving Los Angeles, and the next morning I would be climbing in my car and heading east. My time there had been full, of excitement and newness and frustration and so much else, but it did not feel complete. I was vaguely aware of the fact that, no matter how much I have learned and experienced, I have nothing tangible to show for my time in California. I hate the feeling that I am returning home empty-handed. And I know it’s not true, but I know other people will think it so the idea stirs up an emotional reaction that might have more to do with my own insecurities than with the act of returning home. So let’s move on…I was also emotional about leaving David and Neil and of course Britton, who has been such a steady presence in my life over the last seven months.

Since I last wrote here, I found out that I won’t be getting into the graduate school in Oregon this year. And since I had only recently learned that most application deadlines for creative writing programs have passed already, it appears as if that option is going on hold for at least another year. So I went back to the bookstore in Pasadena, where I worked for a grand total of three days before learning that I have the opportunity to go back to Florida and try my hand at a magazine internship. It will be unpaid, so I considered staying a few more months to save up money, but I’ve grown tired of the waiting periods, and once it was clear that the magazine internship was my likely next step, I became anxious to get started.

So I packed my car and, with much less warning than my California friends would have liked, placed L.A. in the rearview mirror and headed east. I teared up a little again after circling downtown and seeing the skyline I’ve come to love so much. But it was a beautiful day, and the excitement of a roadtrip and a new stage in life was growing, so I sped up and began to cross the mountains.

I headed northwest toward Las Vegas, through high desert country where everything -- the landscape, the mountains, the buildings -- was some shade of dusty brown. After the great L.A. sprawl finally retreated, the area was remarkably empty. This is why I decided to drive through downtown when leaving…there is nothing like trading one of the busiest city centers in the world for barren, jagged emptiness. And I loved it. Occasionally I passed small settlements of trailer parks and prefab homes around a single gas station, but city life had been definitively left behind for the moment.

The mood changed immediately crossing into Nevada. The state line somehow escaped my notice, but right away the casinos were everywhere. Giant, Disney-esque resorts, then shady establishments of obviously questionable repute, then nothing again. Trailer parks and gas stations, but mostly nothing.

Until Las Vegas. The traffic was pretty thick by the time I crested a hill and saw it sprawled out in front of me. From up there I could see the famous strip, a couple of other areas I wasn’t familiar with, and then miles and miles of neighborhoods off to the side, looking from that distance remarkably like concrete turds. Except for the poop neighborhoods it was all radiant in the desert sun. I drove the strip, recognizing the famous spots that make Las Vegas what it is. But in the daylight it was a little bit sad, so I kept driving.

I had missed the next road I meant to take east, but there was another one coming up that led to the same place. This, I eventually found out, was the highway that led to and crossed over Hoover Dam. By accident I had driven to one of the most celebrated manmade structures in our country. The crowds were incredible, RV’s and cars lining the shoulder miles away from the dam. I was thrilled by the abrupt cliffs and the way the road wound through the mountains, offering stunning glimpses of the lake. The dam passed and I considered stopping, but the crowds bothered me and I was in a driving mood. A mile or so later I stopped on top of the next hill and admired it from a distance.

The ground leveled out for a little bit, though I could see mountains ringing the horizon in both directions. If you ever want to get a feeling for how big our country is, take a drive through the southwestern states. Boulders and hills and cacti extended as far as I could see and seemed as if they would go on forever.

At some point after crossing into Arizona, the ground began to rise. I crossed a succession of hills, each taller than the one before it, until you could eventually start calling them mountains again. These were made of the brilliant red rocks that this region is known for, and they were absolutely radiant in the setting sun. Bizarre rock formations blazed in every direction, and I was having an increasingly hard time watching the road. A few minutes before the sunset I stopped on a bridge that crossed over the highway, then watched it dip out of sight, eventually dragging the colors with it.

As I kept driving and kept rising, I started noticing patches of snow on the side of the road. The landscape was slowly becoming thicker with pine trees, and after a while I noticed that I was in the middle of a pine forest surrounded by an absolutely perfect blanket of snow. This was unexpected…I had forgotten that mid-March is still considered winter in many places.

Snow still stirs up something childlike and hyper in me, so I stopped long enough to touch it and lick it and walk on it and throw it, then I kept driving. I headed toward the Grand Canyon, hoping to find somewhere to sleep in the little town outside the entrance. But while in this town, reading in a little café that smelled inexplicably like mulch, I found out that the main entrance to the park never closes. The lady I spoke with went on to explain that I would find plenty of places to park and sleep for the night, and that the chances of being asked to move were pretty slim.

So with growing excitement I drove into the park a little before 9:00, using the pass Britton and I bought back in Maine. The road wound past empty parking lots, a few lodges, and several shops that were closed for the night. I followed a sign pointing to a lookout point and parked in the abandoned lot by the trailhead.

As soon as I stepped outside I rushed to my trunk to find my jacket and something to cover my head. The elevation had risen another two thousand feet since I had first stopped for snow, and night had thoroughly settled in, so the degree of cold was a bit of a shock.

Successfully bundled, I followed the trail through the woods, lit only by starlight. I should mention how brilliant those stars were, but considering I was in the middle of the desert on the edge of the Grand Canyon, I think that goes without saying.

The trail curved past a couple signs I couldn’t read, past what I found out the next morning was the official viewpoint, with guardrails and everything, then right up to the edge of the canyon. This may have been the most breathtaking moment of my life. In front of me lay a patch of snow about a foot wide, glowing under the stars, and beyond that was the deepest darkness I have ever seen. At one point I thought I saw a campfire at the bottom, but besides that there was no reference point to show how far down I was looking. Something about that darkness, though, spoke of the canyon’s size. And the force of the silence, the way it seemed to swallow everything around it, suggested something extraordinary. Not to mention the random and powerful gusts of wind, which felt eerily like the canyon trying to pull me in.

Eventually I turned and followed the trail back to the car in an awed silence, rested under the stars for a few minutes, then piled all of my extra blankets and jackets in the front of the car and climbed in.

I slept well, waking a couple times to the chilling sounds of wolves or coyotes howling (I’m not sure which…do coyotes howl?). I would sit wide-eyed for a few minutes, then readjust the blankets and fall back into a peaceful sleep.

My alarm went off at 5:30, just as I heard someone else pulling in beside me. I wrestled my way out of the car and greeted the older couple emerging from their van. The night was still at its darkest point, and the thermometer by the trailhead told us it was twenty degrees out. We walked slowly to the official viewpoint, where we could lean against the rails without worrying about the canyon inviting us in for a windy plummet.

By the time the sky began to lighten, there were about a dozen of us on the platform. After whispered greetings and polite smiles, everyone was perfectly silent, huddled by their companions or clinging their arms against themselves under their jackets.

The moon rose a while before the sun, a tiny sliver, and it looked as if it was dragging the color behind it. Blue gave way to purple, to orange, to red, until the entire horizon was painted. At one point a lady beside me leaned over and whispered “Remember: you’re not just hear to watch the sunrise, you’re here to watch the canyon.”

I looked in the other direction and saw exactly what she meant. The color that streaked the east was pouring onto the canyon walls in an orange glow, illuminating the sheer depth of the scene before us. I began to understand why so many people have likened sunrise over the Grand Canyon to Creation. There is a powerful feeling that you are seeing the birth of something entirely new, and as the canyon walls emerge from the darkness it is as if they are being formed for the very first time. The whole crowd of people, almost thirty of us by the time the sun had completely risen, remained perfectly silent for the ceremony. Because that’s what it felt like -- a ceremony, a ritual, something for which people gather in silence and stand together in shared awe.

In the full daylight I wandered the rim trail to different outcrops that offered new views of the canyon. I’ve talked to many people who describe their visit to the Grand Canyon as walking to the edge, nodding and saying “Yep…sure is a big hole,” then walking back to their cars. I cannot understand this at all. The overwhelming magnitude of the scene is enough to capture me for a while, but on top of that it is unspeakably beautiful. The walls are painted different shades of brown and red, layered on top of each other in a way that speaks to the relentless passage of time. From certain angles you can catch glimpses of the Colorado River at the very bottom, silently enjoying this landscape it has worked so long and so hard to create. I decided then that I would return one day to hike to that river and enjoy this more fully.

At one viewpoint, I stood next to a family of five lining the railing like statues. After a few seconds a group of college students broke loudly from the trail, talking in voices much too noisy for a sanctuary like this. The little girl to my right, no more than ten, turned from her family and put her finger to her lips to shush them. “You can’t hear the canyon if you’re talking,” she said. I swear she did. I wanted to hug her.

With the most painful reluctance I walked back to the parking lot, bought a few postcards, and drove out of the park. Arizona wouldn’t let my sadness last too long, though, because the road between the Grand Canyon and Flagstaff is gorgeous and I could not help but smile the whole time.

The road wound through a national forest, rising over hills and between mountains, and again there was a perfect coating of snow as far as I could see. I passed farmhouses covered in snow that were so quaint and American I could have cried. But I didn’t, because there’s been enough of that lately. I drove through the San Francisco Peaks, which are surprisingly big, their peaks a canvas of snow dotted by pine trees and interrupted by the occasional red rock outcropping.

Eventually I found myself in Flagstaff, where I met my friend Grant from UNF for breakfast. He moved here of his own will about a year ago to chase a girl, now his fiancée, and I thought he was crazy. But I have been so terribly pleased to learn that my image of Arizona was entirely misinformed. Flagstaff is a charming city, surrounded by mountains and pine forests, not to mention that most grand of canyons only a couple hours away, and I would love to spend more time here, but I have a whole lot of driving in front of me. I’m hoping to visit with my brother Chris in Texas, then stop for a night in Jacksonville, then be home in time for a family dinner Thursday night. I’ll try to find somewhere with Internet later to post this, and I’ll check in again whenever I next find myself with some writing time.

In the meantime, thanks for reading. Remember love.