I don't want to write this. Bad sentence. Turning back was scary. I was getting cooked on top of that mountain. No one knew where I was. The Federal government was shut down. I kept thinking that the Federal government was shut down and so, on this Federal Land, a rescue helicopter couldn't arrive or it would cost way too much money if it did. Money, I missed money up there. The pursuit of money and all the stupid things people do huddled in their mankind. Nature is horrific, is why. That's why we have all this asphalt and insulation and electricity. It's because nature is horrific. I don't want to write this. It took me an hour getting back to that big Crystal Geyser bottle. I wanted to save some for the next lost passerby but I also wanted to soak myself in a flood. Dump the water on my head and body. So I did my best at both. And I drank a little bit. I know I shouldn't have. But I was thirsty and desperate and I wanted water because mine was long gone. Yes, I was pretty close to desperate.
I did this all to myself.
Survival became about discerning the proper trail out of the many snaking paths and gigantic obstructing rock formations. I had to surmise the vaguely-recognizable landmarks and attempt to recall how I had arrived above and around each one to get to where I was, stuck, and doing all that deciding took awhile and then in one particularly large collection of rocks, I was dwarfed by the largest rocks and climbing down into a pit within the rocks. There was no way to get through and I swear to God if there were no Mountain Lions living in the dark nooks and crevices of that jumble, I don't think they live at all. I know I keep bringing up the Mountain Lions and capitalizing their letters. Do I do this to heighten the danger? Did I want to do battle with a Mountain Lion? Do road bicyclists on the narrow shoulders of the Pacific Coast Highway secretly want to get hit by cars? Are we a culture primed by a Thanatos urging? Are there simply individual impulses that crave challenging their own unique mortality, especially when everyone around us seems to be wounded or out of control in their own different ways themselves, but wait that goes back to culture so let me try again. Do some of us simply want to die?
I didn't, want to die. Not wearing cargo shorts. Not up there. I wanted to live. That much I knew. Which made navigating that maze all the more alarming.
But I did navigate. A few wrong turns, backtracking, climbing, "could it have been this long's"? and then segment after segment of confusion just to get back to the main trail five miles from what I knew to be my car. I wanted to go sit in my car and cry or take an Instagram detailing my travails or both. Man must have purpose to survive, Instagram and crying momentarily became mine. Then finally, that passed and the terrain was beginning to appear familiar. Yes, I was recognizing species of bush and their frequency of occurrence and yes, a rock to the left, above yet another cliff, and the rock was flat like a bench and I remember seeing it on the way up and it was so smooth and flat but I couldn't sit down. If I sat down, I feared my muscles would cramp and lose power. They were getting tight, my muscles, especially in the sockets of my hip joints. My legs were stiffening. I still, yes, had five miles to go. I should mention, I had a walking stick now and it was helpful (and could be used as a spear) and I grew quite fond of this stick but also my trapeziums were getting tight, so I had to drop my stick but I was there anyway. I was on the proper trail and I was relieved. I knew the path. Thank God I found the path. By the way, did I make a few deals with God to get to this point? I don't quite recall. I believe there was something about living in honesty with my purpose if I could just get the hell out of there.
I had two miles down steep uneven trail. My feet hurt with every step. It wouldn't have been so bad in tennis shoes but these five-toed Vibrams were killing me. But complaining, that's a good sign, it meant I was getting closer to the Western World. Then I saw my first person in five hours. He was practicing karate down faraway on the trail, I could see a sliver of the ocean out by Ventura to my left and down, several phases below on the wide-open familiar trail, was that guy doing karate, wearing a black beanie and backpack. I wanted to ask him for water but he kept hurrying on before my approach. And then, then, at the bottom, a young couple were kind enough to have an extra water bottle in their backpack.
"You look like you're dying."
The young man said to me. I tried to explain my circumstances through parched throat but I think they wanted to continue away from me, like giving to a homeless person. I felt no shame in their charity. I gulped the twelve-oz in two swallows and continued. Brain off. It's what got me up the long, winding, steep trail that I knew awaited the end of my struggles. And I made it up. Saw two more people staring across the valley at my Cathedral mountain peaks and I wanted to tell them that I'd just been up there and seen the other side but I didn't want to get into it and they looked at me funny and when they passed, I crouched down and almost cried but I still had another half-mile or so to get to my car. Which I did manage. The sun almost gone when I arrived, opened the door, and gratefully sat down into the driver seat. And there were no missed calls on my phone.
