Open Ends

People of the South Wind (Section 1 and 2)

1
One day Sun found a new canyon.
It hid for miles and ran far away,
then it went under a mountain. Now Sun
goes over but knows it is there. And that
is why Sun shines—it is always looking.
Be like the sun.

2
Your breath has a little shape—
you can see it cold days. Well,
every day it is like that, even in summer.
Well, your breath goes, a whole
army of little shapes. They are living
in the woods now and are your friends.
When you die—well, you go with
your last breath and find the others.
And in open places in the woods
all of you are together and happy.

- William Stafford

*

My 3-day Greyhound adventure with Rebecca turned out to be a slow and moderately enjoyable stretch of time and country. We played cards (I lost horribly) and ate PB & J and watched Freaks and Geeks and, the next thing I knew, we parted ways all the way "back east" in Cleveland, Ohio—farewell eastern Oregon, Salt Lake City, Denver, Omaha, and Chicago! Upon arrival, I ate lots of treats and slept for about 12 hours before beginning the just-as-strenuous adventure of sorting through all of my boxes of books (some of which received some water damage just 2 weeks before my return! poor cookbooks...) and helping my parents to clean and revamp sections of their crumbly house. It's nice to feel useful after so much indulgent time doing my own thing, drifting connectionless 'cross the continent. Plus, in a week or two, I should have earned enough moolah to cover my first month's rent! So (I'm telling myself), things seem to be looking up, or at least horizontal, for the time being. A normal pace and some everyday concerns will be good for me in the weeks and months to come. Living is living—sounds good to me!

Long Roads

Yes.
Here we are.
The road ended, literally.
The sun set, then rose a little while later.
Music, quiet, water, and trees.
Staying the same place for more than 24 hours--strange?

I really wanted to make another post sometime before we reached our final destination... or, for all practical purposes, our ALMOST final destination. Amidst the mountains and the bike repairs and the final push, that obviously didn't happen.

I wanted to try to describe more fully all the wild and caring characters we met throughout the eastern half of North Dakota, the vast expanse of Montana, the Idaho panhandle, and, finally, Washington. I wanted to try to describe all of the scenery and landscape and environment we experienced, the varieties of trees and mountains and dirt, each conglomeration slightly different than the last. And, mostly, I wanted to try to hint at the connection between people and landscape that seemed so obvious while pedaling longitudinally, one mile at a time. There were the Spirit Lake, Fort Peck, and Blackfeet nations, the sudden change from dry plain to lush mountain valley, or the subtler changes that occur when you cross a seemingly arbitrary state border. There were the watershed moments, when the water literally flowed out from under our feet in opposite directions, toward the Pacific Ocean and the Hudson Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, all at the same time. Slugs littered the roadside west of the Northern Cascades. Tourists littered the roadsides (figuratively and literally) outside of Glacier National Park on America's Independence Day. Radically different forms of living dotted the highways and backroads we followed, even though what we mostly saw were the nests of one species, human beings (and only a rather homogenuous, unbelievably monochrome sample of that population!).

After approximately 7 weeks on the road, or nearby it, I have a much bigger picture of this land in which I and many other folks are attempting to dwell. We didn't get to cross any national walls into Canada, as we decided not to bring our passports, and there's an almost overwhelming mass of country that remains in this country, beyond just our narrow "Northern Tier" strip along Highway 2, Highway 20, and the Empire Builder railroad--let alone the rest of this continent, and the rest of this planet (we met one guy who is planning to cover most of this world on his bicycle over the course of the next 5 to 6 years). But since graduting from college back in May, I feel even more fully educated (and rested and resolved and piqued and restless) after being briefly immersed a little more fully in this land and its people. It was splendid, reassuring, and appalling, sometimes simultaneously. I felt more sure of my self, my body, and my identity than ever before, while at the same time I felt myself dissolving into the places, the histories, and the dreams of all that we passed over on our two spinning, threadbare tires. Needless to say, I still have a lot to process.

*

The sun sets for a long time here in Anacortes. It passes slowly behind the mountainous islands across Guemes Channel, and the whole sky is a wash of pink, blue, orange, green, and grey for hours, until nearly 11:00pm or so. We're staying with a bunch of other campers here for the music festival, scattered throughout the large and winding yard of some new friends. They are renting a sort of luxurious beach house built in 1970, with wood paneling and funky tile and some groovy porches looking out over all of downtown Anacortes to Cap Sante Overlook, and then across Fidalgo Bay to the snow-capped Mount Baker and, somewhere off in the distance, the Canadian border. With all the festival attendees gathered in the living room, snacking, exchanging stories, and what not, we feel a bit like the Brady Bunch on spring break. Other than that, we've been trying to see some of the scenic parts of town and nature without spending money. And, we've been trying to relax and read books and take care of practical things (laundry, etc.) without spending money. And, we're trying to find food without spending money. It's been fun. Last night, we saw 5 bands play in an old port warehouse right along the water. You could see the water rising and falling and sloshing through the gaps in the floorboards underneath our feet. Mirah played some beautiful songs, and then Phil Elverum led some friends througha boisterous and profound set of Mount Eerie songs (mostly new ones that I'd never heard before). This guy has an interesting relationship to his community and surroundings here in Anacortes, whether it be the birds or the rocks or the water or his friends. I've been thinking a lot lately about how his insights fit into what I want to write about in the future.

We've got the festival left today and tomorrow, and then, assuming we won't be able to hitch a ride down to Seattle (not everyone has pick-up trucks here, like they do in North Dakota!), we've decided to bicycle 55 miles down Whidbey Island (which means we get to see some scenic destinations, such as Deception Pass) and then take the ferry across to somewhere near Seattle, where Nate's friend will pick us up in her vehicle. Then, it will be on to Oregon and some dear people there. I'm excited to continue this wonderful time of quiet and excitement now that we're done bicycling... as long as the money keeps stretching or I find some way to earn a little cash.

I hope to use this digital space for some further contemplation in weeks and destinations ahead, now that we've quit our full-time job of bicycling and I'm, according to the money-lenders of this world, OFFICIALLY UNEMPLOYED.

On the Road Again

Okay, okay, I guess that last post was kind of jumping the gun. It was the panicked preemption. But, the genius mechanic over at Val's Cyclery combined some old parts and found a way to fix up Nate's bike! And, they hardly charged him a thing, in spite of the rush job. Very nice.

Plus, we just met some folks at the Pangea House Community Collective, and they fed us grilled potatoes and corn on the cob and are letting us stay in their community center/music venue tonight. I just finished up playing some old favorites on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) they have here and I toasted some bread. Ah, toasters... what a luxury.

In a strange way, since we managed to hitch our way more than 150 mi. in less than 24 hours (thankfully, nearly 2/3 of the population of North Dakota drives a truck of some sort) and got the bike fixed in less then a few hours, we are actually a day ahead of schedule now. Praise the Lord. We leave Minot tomorrow morning, and then we should cross over into Montana in a couple of days. It seems that the landscape will only continue to flatten out and dry out up until we get to the Rockies in about 700 mi. We'll have to keep our canteens filled to the brim...

We are here, in Minot, ND.


View Larger Map

A few days ago we passed our 1000-mile point, and now (with a little hitchiking), we are about halfway across the country. Yes, hitchiking... Nate's crank fell out of his bottom bracket about 150 miles back. We are currently waiting for the bike shop to get back to us about the fate of Nate's ride. Needless, to say, we're a bit nervous!

I guess to kill the time, here are a few more random photos (I'll try to get the rest up later) from my time in Minneapolis with Tory and Joke and up at the beautiful north shore of Lake Superior:

The Twin Cities and Tettegouche State Park

(At Silver Bay, we witnessed a world record attempt for the longest ATV parade, but Tory has those pictures.)

Okay, so images:

The majority of the photos are cycling through in the little box to the right of this post. If you put your mouse over the box, you can scroll back or forward through the pictures. If you click on one of them, it will take you to Flickr where you can see bigger versions and perhaps a caption or description.

I guess the only problem is that not all of my photos are up there yet, and I can't get them to upload to Facebook. Blah blah blah. Technology wins again. Maybe I'll figure out how to make these things work better somewhere along the way.



more houseboats!



on the way down into Saint Paul



a building in the background

Week 1: Joliet/Chicago to Minneapolis

Okay, so it was technically almost two weeks. But we could've done it just one. I swear.

The first few days were mostly spent learning the ropes, how to carry our stuff, pack and unpack, find camping spots, and interact with the people we'd meet. We started with enough food to last two weeks, but then realized that we were cycling past several grocery stores a day. We also were worried about where and how and when to camp each night, but that has turned out to be about the easiest part of the trip: so far (in the Midwest, at least), we've just been able to roll into about any town, meet some folks at the diner or pub or grocer, and then, if nothing else turns up, just set up our tent in the city park or on the outskirts. And once we started tracking up through the bluff and wetlands along the Mississippi, especially, we've had some lovely spots for camping. However, we have yet to deal with any significant precipitation. So far, whenever it's rained, we pull into a coffee shop or call it quits and hang out for the rest of the day in whatever little town we happen to find ourselves.

Oh, and getting into shape, too. That's been a big one. My legs strangely feel a bit muscular, and the wind and sun are gradually having effects on our skin and hair. For the first week or so, before turning north in Iowa, we'd get tan on only one side of our body (the left side, which faced the sun as we biked west). After our big haul last night, I'm starting to think we might be ready for trek westward. I guess the trip up to Minneapolis was a kind of trial run for this next leg of the journey. The same thing as we've been doing, only about 3.5 times as far and with a few mountain ranges thrown in. It's very exciting, but still a little bit terrifying to think about. Nate and I are going to put our heads together and figure out a lot of the the concrete details and practical stuff. We think we'll be able to lighten our load and plan our timeline a little bit better than stage one of the trip, since now we have some idea of how these things will all work out.

Anyways, Day 1 in Minneapolis was really nice. I slept in, did some laundry, then hung out with Joke and Tory for the rest of the day. I drank coffee and ate lots of food while catching up with Joke. Then we met up with Tory and sat on the beach of Lake Calhoun (I think?) for the rest of the evening. Oh, and then Tory and I made eggplant parmigiana and ate some mango sorbet from Trader Joe's. Yeah, lots of food. I guess that's not much different from when we're on the road, which usually involves either cycling while thinking about food and sleep or eating and sleeping while thinking about cycling. If I have any time the over the next couple of days, I'll try to post more details or describe some highlights from the first, introductory part of our expedition. Oh, and pictures from my new digital camera, too!

Until next time...

Breaking Away?

So I'm headed away from both of my homes, at least for a little while. Bye-bye for now, Mansfield and Grand Rapids!

If I have time next week (after finals) or in Chicago, I might try to make a post that officially inaugurates Nate and my bike trip westward, provides some details, etc. For now, though, I'm setting things up to potentially update this blog via mobile phone while on the road. Maybe some pictures, too? Technology is crazy, and it sure has changed a lot even since a year or two ago, when I last paid attention to it.

Stay tuned!