into it all we go.

day eight. 40.1 miles. kirkwood ca, to minden nv

dead birds on the roadside. flat on their backs, permanent sleep within. one in california, the other nevada. 30 feet apart. across the line. a post with a blue sign atop, explaining the history of the states. young cattle collapsing under their own weight, on their shaky-calf-legs. bony knees. perhaps the birds were in flight. the last rising and falling of wings, as they meet in a certain tree. the racing of love. sometimes, faraway love grows stronger by the minute, infinitely helped by technology these days. a man in a tractor spins circles beneath the road, beneath the tree, beneath the shining sky. the mountains that surround us. always. always, there are mountains. an older woman leans her elbows on a rusted, white, truck, a scar above her left eye. her hair, gray and thin. she too, has a sunburn. cigarrette lines. another woman, hair dyed red, all jumped up on caffeine, sells an oatmeal cookie to a filthy man on a bike in her tiny little store in the eastern sierras. the big semis tow someone's bright yellow house off to a new world. the closing of one chapter and the opening of another can bring so many things. such elation and joy. pain too. the driver wears a red cap. beavers scamper under piles of rocks by the water. children fish with their fathers. the motorcycles go by, the woman on the back clutching at the man. her chest pressed hard against him. envy. i see my own longing. midnight scooter rides in canada. rabbits in the field, brown like the earth, break left and right, darting in their cocaine way. i see the dust on the sides of my legs, which matches the barns. some of them. others are red.

clandestine and quiet, we are the seekers of a place to sleep. the sleep-seekers. truth-eaters. afternoon tea in nevada, which we make in a field by the highway. the spirits rise with the changing of states, the descending of hills. nevada. the beginnings of the high desert. vacant fields, the near antithesis of the sierras. we are flanked on all sides by mountains in the distance. the geography, is frankly staggering. i spin in my head, trying to soak it all in, to my heart. my brain. my blood.

a stop at the oldest bar in nevada in a town called genoa. we meet ed and donna and mike. we talk about travel and the big mountains. ed and donna offer a front yard to sleep in, and a shower in the morning. mike offers a ride out to their house in his enormous truck. the bed, reached my sternum. i am amazed by their trust and willingness to share. the size of their hearts and generosity. we arrive and play with 'precious' the pot belly pig. i walk through the fields before bed, quieting my restless mind. how is it, that the brain can sometimes impact the heart so quickly and strongly? sleep comes fast, but broken. i toss and turn and toss and turn, and begin to ponder strapping a full size, down pillow, on the back of my bike. we wake in the morning and ed invites us in. we do laundry and shower. he offers breakfast. he tells stories about riding with the hells angels, and getting stuck in calgary with some woman who was not his wife. his wife did not like this. he talks of his children and their worlds away from his. we play with the two bulldogs, one of which weighed ninety pounds and looked quite a bit like a seal. {see mike's journal} it was fucking amazing. when i told him i wanted a photo, he went inside and put water on his hair. combed it back. there is a great soft place in this man's heart. he wishes us well, and we are off. there is a sadness in the departure. i feel such an amazing amount of gratitude. it is painfully beautiful this gift he gives. and nevada moves out before us. flat. hot. another day.

day nine. 48.7 miles. minden nv to somewhere in the middle of the desert, past carson city quite a ways.

carson city is awful. deserted buildings, and strip malls. casinos. we make several stops for several things. mike acquires a new cell phone battery as his old one died. we have lunch and write a bit. we stop at a giant, i mean enormous, monlithic grocery store called smith's and buy food for the night, as there is nothing for miles. we carry gallons of water. heavy gallons of water. we stand in that parking lot of the store, charging our electronic devices {what a brilliant idea to bring the power-strip...and by the way, if you ever need to charge anything, most grocery stores have outlets mounted on the exterior wall. yes!!!} and applying "highly reflective tape" all over our bikes. all over. yes mom, i thought of you when i did this. we take tylenol as we both have bad headaches. mild fevers. and off. the sun high above the ridges to the left, throwing light, dropping it really onto the brown hills. the further we ride from minden, the more the hills seem to drop off. slowly disappearing. melting like ice. the cars begin to diminish, as the man outside the grocery store said. "goddamn, there aint nothin' out there fer days. you fuckers are crazy." we ride and ride, {is that redundant yet?} heads thumping. just after 8, as the sun has dropped behind the hills we pull off highway 50 and push our bikes 30 yards or so through the sand. set up the tents. how terribly strange it feels to be camping in a field of dirt and sand, the trees living elsewhere. not here. the wind shakes its tongue. we cook. rice and beans and cheese and chips and salsa. tortillas. just as we're finishing up dinner, the spotlight hits the open land and blinds our eyes. shit. we aim our headlamps downward, and walk to the cop, making certain to leave our hands visible. we can see nothing, save but the light. he approaches and asks simply, "what are you doing?" i reply, "camping. we're riding our bikes to maine." the expression on his face was priceless. confusion, and the complete opposite of suppport. we can see immediately, that he thinks this is a terrible idea. i begin to justify our potential illegality, when he cuts me off and says, "no it's fine, but there are a lot of wacko's out here. tons of 'em. weirdos. i wouldn't camp out here. no way." of course, we have no other option. until that moment, i felt calm and safe, having settled into the trip. a night without fear. alas, how quickly our minds can bring it back. he asks if we have cell phones. we say yes. he says, "well don't be afraid to call us. i mean that. there's tons of weirdos out here." goddammit. we stumble back to our tents, half laughing and half scared to death, for it is not the animals, but the existence of weirdos that scare me most. we leave our dirty dishes, lumber into our tents, and shut off the lights. i lie there just before drifting off, regretting the timing of deciding to make my bike ever so visible. wonderful, now all of the cars will see it perfectly as they go by. all of the weirdos.

but we are fine.

the heat rises fast in the morning. we eat, drink tea, and pack up. i shit in the open field as the cars shoot by. this is a new thing. we hit the road. the desert spins out before us, unchanging. it is an ocean of dirt. the "bike lane" which is really not a bike lane, is corrupted with the bumps that keep people from falling asleep. it leaves us about 4 inches of riding space. the winds push us. trucks lean out. the occassional wave. a thumb up. only one middle finger thus far today. we stop at a small lake/reservoir to swim {read: bathe} and due some laundry if one can call it that. we ride on through the sun {91 degrees the sign says} which feels good after the cold mountain air. though i will confess to an unnatural amount of dry and mildly bloody boogers. why? the desert seems to cause an increase in this problem.

we currently sit in a cafe in fallon, where we will soon leave. stock up on food, as this is it for 60 miles or so. nothing but nothing out there. and the trip grows. i find a deeper place in it, and find more patience in my heart. i find grace. love. it is always there jefferson, just listen. it does not ever go away. nor does it drift or change or diminish. it grows stronger constantly. it is bigger than the desert. bigger than everything. into it all we go.

Posted by jeff pitcher at June 13, 2004 02:53 PM

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