Safety Tips
The distance traveled and destinations visited can be thought of in terms of - two rock chips to a windshield, gas that is $2 cheaper per gallon, hours required to reach the next Starbucks (4 hrs), and chapters in the audio version of Franzen’s “The Corrections.”
Boise, then Moab, then Cortez, Durango, and finally Santa Fe. The map shows a line, but will never capture the stories, experiences, and anecdotes. The cheerful man with two cancers who weaves in a joke while putting voice to a doctor’s cold bedside manner. Dinner with a colleague where we exchange stories of past, present, and future without any clear punctuation, floating through time.
Solitude in national parks giving me time to walk without a hurry - quietly and softly - a pace only suited for the off-season. No crowds, no performance of awe. Off-season means I connect with the people who live in the off-hours. Retirees in big RVs with names like, “Freedom” or “Odyssey” printed in fonts meant to imply motion even when parked.
At the end of the trail: Cyan and Anthony. A healing tattoo for him, done carefully, deliberately, as if permanence could be gentle if handled correctly. Ink against skin against red rock. The kind of moment that feels private even though it happens outside and would later be shared via video on TikTok.
On the road again. Sage for miles. Wind doing administrative work across the mesa and so much time for thoughts to loosen. Time to think about how TikTok Shop is just QVC for Gen-Z, influencers on Instagram are just doing the same “how to” this and that once reserved for Cosmo and Esquire. The desires and tone unchanged, only the technology is different.
Mesa Verde arrives by way of windy roads that demand attention. The truck rolls slightly side-to-side when I grow impatient with 25 MPH. Cave dwellings cut into stone like an argument. People lived here. This is not a concept. This is architecture as refusal to disappear.
Mexican food three days in a row, which stops being indulgence and starts being strategy. One reliable option in towns that have too many restaurants that serve ‘everything’. Red chile, green chile, the question asked like a test you eventually learn how to pass. Heat as grounding mechanism.
Gas station pit stop in Colorado. No bathroom available, unless I am a plumber. A big laugh reveals tobacco stained teeth, mouth of dip, and a glock on the hip. I walk across the street where I can use a bathroom, get a deli sandwich, buy feed, engine oil, and get groceries. The inventory says Walmart, the people say, “you’re not from around here.”
Hotel for a night between stops. Hotel safety tips read like a ten-episode season of CSI: do not open the door, do not trust the person at the door is an employee, use all available locks, and do not invite anyone to your room. I make several trips to my rig.
Durango after the snowstorm. Quiet streets. Businesses closed because employees are out sick with ski fever, which is the most honest illness I’ve heard of in years. Weather as permission. Absence as choice.
