Day 1 mile 0

My green pack occupied the rear window seat next to me, stuffed to the brim with things I would need and things I would not, leaning like the tower of Piza as my aunt navigated the foothills separating San Diego and Campo CA.  Despite her goofy, laid back demeanor, she drove as if she was a racecar driver in a past life, just casually pounding the accelerator and brakes according to the curves of the road.  In the front seat, my uncle’s head swayed like a tall tree on a windy day.  After a few missed turns and a potty break, we finally found ourselves on the dirt road leading to the trailhead.  

At the trailhead stood a gray concrete monument marking the start of the long journey north. I stood beside it and looked south, dumbstruck. Growing up in the Midwest, I always assumed “the wall” between the U.S. and Mexico was more metaphor than reality.  But there it was, a brutal row of vertical metal slats rising two stories high, offering no privacy, just presence. A structure without emotion, unapologetically dividing.         

Another vehicle arrived and through the back seat window I saw a large shit-eating grin that’s never up to any good; the face of my hiking partner Melo.  A trail volunteer who had hiked the trail last year greeted and directed us to the back of his minivan, asked to see our permits, hand us sign the registry.  After snapping a few obligatory pictures atop the monument, bidding our escorts farewell and set off.  I walked with the sensation of having hot hand warming packets in my shoes for 15.4 miles before making camp along a small stream.  While digesting dinner, the sputter of a scratchy small engine started buzzing in the distance.  Some crazed old bastard came bombing into view on an abused red moped and pulled up to our site.  “Hello”! hollered a grizzled man with a stumpy nose and a thick gray beard, straight out of a western saloon movie scene, the kind of guy you'd find chain-smoking and sipping whiskey in the background.  In a high raspy voice, he introduced himself as Charley.  Skipping the bullshit and getting right to business, “Well! What do you think?!  I’ll do Forty bucks for a half-ounce of home grown”.  He whipped out a weathered zip lock bag.   “Do you want to smoke it before you buy it!?" He blurted out.  We smoked and exchanged goods as another helicopter buzzed overhead. “those fuckers never stop”! He cried out as if he’d been saving that frustration for days and promptly scuttled back to his little machine.  He fired it up like a proud toddler and as he rode away looked back and waved to us with a child leaving a candy store grin across his face.  

Day 2 mile 24

We stopped for lunch under the shade of a bridge and cooled off in the creek running beneath it.  A hiker appeared and, in a thick Australian accent introduced himself as Croc.  He rolled up the sleeve of his button-down and revealed a roadmap of scars running amok along his forearm, evidence of a childhood encounter with a crocodile that nearly took it off.

We decided to begin the afternoon hike with a tab of LSD.  I had taken LSD once and Melo and Croc were virgins, three infants stepping into a strange new world.  The heat returned the moment we left the bridge, and I was instantly reminded of how much my feet, legs, and shoulders ached from the day before.  I was carrying over 40 pounds of food, water and gear, all shoved into the bottomless pit of my backpack and each step felt as if it were getting heavier.  The shoes I felt no need to break in were rubbing my toes raw and the sun sauteed my salty skin like a fat ribeye.  As my body struggled under the weight of trail life, I began to trip; physically on the rocks and roots littering the trail and visually on the sagebrush that began breathing.  My stomach began to teeter like a small boat in a big ocean and my head heaved in and out from hallucination and heat.  The straps of my trekking poles felt slick with grainy engine oil, and when I looked down, they wriggled like worms.  My coordination deteriorated and my senses exploded.  I could hear the blood thumping through my ears like a drumline synced to my pulse and my temples felt like they were bulging out of the side of my head.  I kept thinking we were lost, as if the trail was leading us astray, despite the fact the sage brush was so thick and high i felt like a cow being corralled down a cattle chute.  

After nearly 2 hours of getting blasted with the panic and anxiety from thinking we were lost, we finally arrived at Kitchen Creek, the small watery oasis of the evening.  I unloaded the monster on my back, limped into the water and sat beneath a mini waterfall.  The cold fell over me and I nearly started crying with relief, it was as if the water wiped my thoughts clean, bringing my awareness back to safety.   

After rinsing my socks and laying them to dry, I dragged myself out of the creek and started setting up my tent, swatting at the swarming bugs bouncing off my face. I was more than ready for the LSD to fade, but it lingered in my chest like a stubborn cough.  I climbed up on a huge boulder to join Croc and melo for dinner.  Jimi Hendrix played from Croc’s phone and the whine of his guitar felt like a cool silk ribbon being dragged along my skin.  The sound hit me differently, hearing Jimi play was like hearing music for the first time ever.  I was over taken with a deep understanding that whatever this was—was it.   A sense of peace i had yet to know, everything was just right, perfect in fact.    

Sitting on that boulder, watching the shade creep up the other side of the valley, i focused my eyes on a single bush. It churned like clothes in a washing machine. Anything I focused on seemed to breathe—expanding, contracting, wriggling like it was alive. I couldn’t help but wonder: what else in this world has been hiding in plain sight?