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July 16th, Yes Trek Day 6
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so in an
instant you're story bound
a desert, the
underground, on mountains high
a glacier ,
the heat of the day
I wasn't sure how it was I arose so
early, well before the 9:30 am wake-up call. Something compelled me
to be out and about so I went to the van to forage for some laundry
to do. Stepping out of the motel, I beheld the sun, just peering at
me from over a pink mountain. The timing was perfect. No wonder I was
awake -- I'd been summoned by this brilliant heart of the desert
sunrise.
After some moments of musing in the
"wow, here I am" way that you do when discovering yourself in a
non-ordinary reality, I returned reluctantly and blinking to the task
at hand, chasing the image of the sun which had burned itself into my
retinas around the van in search of soiled clothing. I had a small
load to wash and proceeded to the laundry room connected to the motel
store. I found a woman was using both machines, so I set my journal
on the folding table while I went to get a cup of coffee and buy
detergent. The store only sold a jumbo-sized laundry soap and I was
about to purchase some when the already-washing woman, Dottie was her
name, approached the counter. I asked her if she could use some extra
soap. "Nonsense," she said. "You don't need that big box. Use a
little of mine." I guess it only demonstrates that if you approach a
total stranger with consideration, they respond in kind. "Really? You
sure? I pretended to put up a fight, and finally conceded: "Thanks so
much!"
As the washers and dryers whirled, I
observed Dottie in action at the nickel poker machine. She made it
look so easy to throw money away that I decided I ought to get myself
a couple rolls of nickels and try my luck beside her. "Is this better
than watching soap operas?" I asked her. "I won $200 last Thursday,"
she told me. We exchanged stories of our origins and travels and
families while pushing buttons. I spoke of children, mostly, and she
spoke of grandchildren. If you won, the machine would give you
electronic credits, but there was a button you could push that made
your winnings tumble out into the metal tray below with a
dingle-dee-clunk! treedle-eedle-eee. After awhile of delighting in
the sound of dropping nickels, I realized it was probably annoying
Dottie and stopped, just letting the credits accrue on the machine. I
got up to 20 at one point, a whole buck's worth, but gradually it
went away, so I never got the gratification of hitting the payoff
button and hearing a pile of winnings pour out. My only real hope was
to earn enough to do laundry.
Yann came down and laughed to see me
succumbing to the temptation of the lit-up machines which always and
everywhere in Nevada lure each tourist, regardless of the degree one
is experienced with gambling. He took my picture with the new instant
camera he'd just purchased at an exorbitant price (and HE was
laughing at ME!). I convinced him he should sit in my place, gave him
my nickels, introduced him to the machine, and went to write in my
journal.
"The high will be 120-plus in Death
Valley today where we are headed after a sure-to-be-greasy breakfast,
but that's what you want: the heat, the grease. These are what the
day is offering and we are about to have them happen: make it so.
Pokey Chris is still showering and Yann is inhaling his AM fix of
nicotine while feeding nickels to an ever-hungry machine at the
all-purpose mart which gladly doubles as a coin-roll-dispensing
facility and moonlights as a weehours front desk for the no-tell
motel next door."
The three of us dined together at
the town's only restaurant, under the care of an attentive, (possibly
because I was flirting with him) ponytailed waiter who agreed to
deliver jalapeños and green peppers with my eggs-over-greasy.
I left a big tip and while the boys toyed with more slot machines, I
gassed up at the Shell-station-of preposterous-desert-prices and
filled the cooler with extra ice. I then replenished the beverages
with a gallon of water, a couple cold cappuccinos and Chris' favorite
Stawberry-Kiwi Snapple, in anticipation of the evaporation our bodies
would experience in the heat of the moments of the drive ahead. As we
sped away we heard a tickety-clunk-dink-rickety-racket that was the
cassette attached to the wire that plugged into the van's tape
machine in order to play CDs, dancing along outside the van: oops.
Fortunately for our ambience-enhancing music-playing tendencies, the
device still functioned.
We headed for Death Valley, passing
the road to Parump, where the aliens landed in the Tim Burton movie,
Mars Attacks. We ventured forth into California at it's lowest, most
desolate point of entry. The profound heat ahead didn't beckon or
promise, but dared and threatened! We were ready, armed with a loaded
cooler and cameras and high spirits and the whole Yes collection on
CD, air conditioning if necessary. All that remained was a choice in
music and Chris recommended Tales from Topographic Oceans with the
solemnity of a highpriest attending to the creation of proper context
for some sacred enactment of an ancient cultural ritual. It seemed to
us all an aptly esoteric selection for the ferocity of elements
awaiting us ahead, and whatever would be our response to them. We
brazenly left the windows down the while, classic Yesmusic testifying
to the alien air our acceptance and respect for the area's
intensity.
We left the comfort of the van to
hike up to a scenic lookout where the folds of stone shone in warm,
sandy tones touched with grays and greens, rising and falling all
around us, jutting sideways, providing vertical visual drama to
compliment our poses.
chris
chris, yann
yann, chris, merry
In and out the valley we each were
absorbing the experience stoically as the music swelled and hushed,
dallied and rushed with words lending meaning to the vistas unfurling
before us. In an inspired moment, Chris interrupted our
contemplations, scrambling for percussive instruments to pass around
so that we might join Alan White in his "Ritual" drum solo. I was
handed the big tom which I wielded one-handed while steering, nearly
hitting Yann who was frantically spinning the shaman drum, even as
Chris shook the maracas with an impassioned persistent potency. Truly
we were possessed by what seemed an ancient spirit of community,
conquest and celebration. A sacred sweat issued forth from all of our
pores.
Through music,
rhythms, and tempos, each attained a light of their own through their
songs to their stars, so their energy, their souls, their time, their
movements were all accordant to the stars.
-- Jon, in the Olias
story
As the near-to-overheating engine
chugged to climb out of the valley, we listened to Fragile, weaving
through desert ranges decked in Joshua trees toward the towering
beginnings of the snowy Sierra Nevada. We made tracks toward what is
the highest point in California, Mount Whitney, crowning the vast
rock spine of the Sierras which now came out of the sky and stood
there, to our wonderment. We would be driving all beside the same
range for the rest of the day, before crossing over it and descending
to Wendy's. We stopped for a map at a California welcome center where
I admired the way Yann's wet-with-perspiration shorts draped
straightly down his leg, and he allowed me to touch them: joy. I
smiled with pride when he admitted to me that I'd been the first
woman to have touched his rear in a very long while.
I paused to bury my head nosefirst
in a giant sage bush and breath deeply awhile. Inside the facility, a
ranger guy read my Yes-emblazoned tee shirt and said that he'd seen
the Topographic Oceans tour. Another ranger was making change for the
map and book of native wildflowers I purchased and I told him his
associate had impeccable musical taste.
After the welcome center, Chris
drove, allowing me to watch the snowcovered peaks roll by for many
hours. Gladly losing my mind in the warped time-space duration of
gazing, I began to not only see, but *feel* the vast expanses passing
without, while within the very breadth of my self expanded to
accommodate the dimensions taken by earth in this venerable
environment.
sierra nevada
I thrilled to see Giant Sequoia
trees which pirouetted as they passed. Before we knew it a river was
roaring beside us and we stopped to get close to it's edge.
yann, merry, chris
We switched drivers again so that
Chris could sightsee or sleep as I drove over the same magnificent
mountains at Monitor pass, just south of Lake Tahoe and surrounded by
its renouned spectacular scenery. The high, thin air was pleasantly
cool as we spun our course, Jon's Olias of Sunhillow thundering in
accompaniment. As the sun went on its way, in mountains sometimes
lost, the light faded and Yann clicked my camera at my request along
the unlikely projections of earth. (I seem to remember the moments
better than my film did.) The large white moon would suddenly appear
from and disappear behind the lunging bluffs.
turn a
mountain
send them
lost
among the
flowers of the young
rider rider
rider rider
It was apparent that we would not
make it to meet Dawn's flight in Sacramento, but the earthen marvels
along the day's drive were simply too persuasive to be put off.
Somewhat dazed we made a wrong turn, but caught the mistake before
making our way to Reno. We reversed and warned Wendy by phone that
we'd be another 3 hours. While the guys got directions, I ducked into
a Mexican restaurant near the phonebooth and regretted not being able
to sit down to eat (we thought Wendy might have prepared something
for us). I did get salsa, guacamole and chips and -- couldn't resist
-- a chicken taco we fed to one another in the van during the last
leg of the YesTrek.
We descended the Sierra Nevada in
the darkness with all of us expressing our picks for the next Yesset
wishlist. Chris and I saw something we thought was a baby bear, maybe
it's mother, too. I brought the vessel around and around again to
return to the spot. We all laughed, Yann at the two of us, mostly, to
see it was only a burnt log combined with rampant imagination. On we
rolled through Sacramento, the road fairly straight and freeway now,
so we picked up speed. Yann was unusually talkative, which I found
wonderful, and I was also nervous and thrilled with
anticipation.
and we were very
merry to be there
We descended upon Wendy's just
before midnight in a crackling blaze of bottlerocket ascending
emotional exuberant arriving rejoicing giddy glory. Dawn, who'd been
collected earlier by Wendy from the Sacramento airport, managed
somehow to snooze through our raucous arrival and dreamt on as the
cork leapt joyously from where it was wedged in the expectantly big
bottle of champagne that was poised to rejoice in our long-awaited
togetherness. We tossed ourselves randomly around the livingroom amid
the oversized welcoming pillows which provided in splendid excess
splashes of vibrant flowery copious color to resplendently append the
personality our presences were already providing.
I remembered and leapt up to get the
tape for Wendy of her poem, "I Wish," played and sung for her by our
Paulfriend, entrusted to me to be delivered directly by hand, with
heart. She cued it up and I strongly encouraged those who had flash
cameras to capture her reaction, so I could present the photo later
to Paul who wanted so badly to be with us in this moment. Wendy then
began look endlessly, timelessly away while listening and I
mercilessly urged the others to take a picture. But they were
captivated by Wendy's captivation and only Curt could muster the
presence of mind to lift his Polaroid and push the button (he was
apparently more accustomed than we were to seeing his wife recede and
melt into faraway states of solemn ecstasy). The camera noise was
clamorous and distracted an instant from the spell of the welling up
of Wendy's eyes.
...deep within
the secret waters that lie behind my eyes
--W. Vig
We chatted warmly to the
bottom of the bottle of champagne. Wendy and I then conducted Yann to
his room at a nearby Motel 6. On our way back, as friendly Wendy and
I thoughtfully talked, over the windshield wafted, in silent
feathered mysterious splendor, a pure white
Snowy Owl! It's beauty was prominent and distinct beneath a
streetlight, right there in the city, just for us. It widened our
eyes and was surely a sign of the wonder of what it was like to
finally be with Wendy, she with me. At her home we all found places
of repose and joined Dawn in her state of thankful late peaceheavy
sleep.
my
merry tale ****
Day
7