The little elfin voice that shepherds in the next adventure always opens the curtain with this question: What is it you need, Philly? When was the last time you felt really alive? And it’s pretty much the same answer these days: I need to shed some shackle or other and head out into the wilderness. I am happiest when I’m wandering around outside, looking at stuff, not unlike a dog hanging out the passenger-side window, mouth wide open, joyously drinking in the whole show. In fact, I think I’m just a black lab trapped in the body of a 60-something female and the beauty of all this is that at my age, I can do whatever the fuck I want, which dogs do with ease at any age.
This time, answering the restlessness, I conjured up a three-week solo road trip, to go to places tugging at my heart: the Oregon Coast, Glacier National Park, and the heart of the Salmon River in Idaho. Here’s the thing about voluntarily living out of your car, camping and backpacking your way around amber waves of grain, glaciers, mountains, and wide wild rivers: You have to be prepared with the right gear, attitude and food, and no matter what, sometimes you are going to be uncomfortable, disoriented, and scared. At some point you’ll be rained on and hungry. You’ll get bitten, at least by mosquitoes and at most by any manner of big scary animal. Certainly, you’ll stink and go at least days without a hot shower. The wilderness is not for sissies but holy shit, the things you learn out there.
"And as for comfort, while I set up my tent in a campground outside Glacier National Park, I watched and listened as RVs the size of casinos roared their diesel engines up a country road, so no one had to go one blessed minute without TV, running water, fast food and a fridge. God forbid we should be uncomfortable for a hot second."
From Jesus to Luke Skywalker we have archetypal stories of brave people wandering out into the desert, or space, alone. Joseph Campbell called it the "Hero's Journey," and it’s always solitary and uncomfortable. Yet, Americans DESPISE these two very things: solitude and discomfort. We are the chummiest, softest folks on earth. Who ventures out by themselves, let alone with a car full of camping gear, hiking boots and some socks? Besides me, Jesus, and Luke - not that many and my guess is clean underwear wasn’t a high priority for those guys either. And as for comfort, while I set up my tent in a campground outside Glacier National Park, I watched and listened as RVs the size of casinos roared their diesel engines up a country road, so no one had to go one blessed minute without TV, running water, fast food and a fridge. God forbid we should be uncomfortable for a hot second.
While I camp on beaches and in parks by myself, I won’t do overnight backpacking trips alone. I think it’s just stupid. Dude, these places define remote, so if I sprain an ankle or bump my head it’s curtains for me, and I’m just not ready to die as snack food for a coyote. I’ll join a guided trip with strangers, which is always weird and fun, because if I get hurt they sort of have to help. On part of this trip I did four nights out in the northeast corner of Glacier. There were two high school girls from Jersey (yeah!), a 36-year-old healthcare exec from Australia who was another badass broad, and Scott, a guide who had never led an all-female trip before. Pretty sure the hormone thing made him nervous, but he was a good sport.
Like all my backpacking adventures, Glacier was heaven and hell at one time: the mountains in Montana are breathtaking, pocketed with huge sparkling lakes, eagles flying overhead, and wildflowers surrounding us like a blanket of rainbows. But it rained every day and every night. Rain, rain, rain until the sun came out and brought mosquitoes the size of my head. Shivering in my pup tent on Night Two I thought, “What the fuck am I doing? I’m never doing this again, EVER!” We did ten miles a day with 30-pound packs. Oh, and the grizzlies are no joke in this part of the world so, you have to pay attention to food, poop, and survival. I struggled on the final day, hiking uphill in the rain, back to the van, cursing my stupidity, threatening and swearing that I’m DONE with this backpacking shit.
"At some point you’ll be rained on and hungry. You’ll get bitten, at least by mosquitoes and at most by any manner of big scary animal. Certainly, you’ll stink and go at least days without a hot shower. The wilderness is not for sissies but holy shit, the things you learn out there."
And oh, the people you’ll meet! On one leg of this journey I went on an overnight whitewater rafting trip in Idaho – me and two crusty old dudes and our sunburnt guides, Glen and Jack. When the old guys weren’t quite pulling their weight on Day One (hanging on to the “chicken line” in the middle of the raft rather than paddling like your life depends on it, which it does) I had to have a little conversation with them over dinner that night. On a tiny island in the middle of the Salmon River, me and four guys eating steak cooked over a fire and drinking beer kept cold by the river. We’d met just six hours earlier, and here’s what I said:
“Yo, ladies, tomorrow we’re hitting some Class Four rapids and if you don’t start paddling for real we’re gonna flip,” I took a swig, “And if that happens, I won’t be happy.”
“And if you’re not happy,” a retired Colonel said smiling, “Ain’t nobody happy.”
Bingo. Friends bound tight and quick by the fear of flipping into whitewater, or getting mauled by a grizz, or dying an undignified death from eating bad food miles from nowhere. It’s the instant intimacy of an edgy part of life, like what I often felt working in the ER, as the team shocked someone back to life or we wrestled a little kid from the grip of death. When you share these vivid patches of life, it doesn’t matter who you vote for or where you’re from. You’re instant family, like oats that become a big meal when you just add hot water.
On my last night on the road I did pull into a motel in Boise, Idaho. Dang, that shower felt good. I’d spent about three weeks driving around Colorado, Montana, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon. My Honda and I stunk to high heaven, the earthy aroma of sweat and dirt. I didn’t have my computer with me, most of the time there was no cell service, and I don’t even listen to the car radio. It was a solitary and mostly silent trek, noiseless except for Nature’s perfect ruckus – wind in the pines, tender raindrops and the occasional biblical thunder. Good stuff. That night in Boise I crawled into bed and had this dream:
I’m with my father, who died decades ago. We’d never really connected, me and my Dad; he didn’t know how to love, and hardly knew who I was. His emotional absence burdened my adulthood and triggered lots of suffering but in my dream, we’re dancing. It’s a joyful, wordless celebration unlike anything we shared while he was on earth. I kiss him on the cheek and he smiles, seeing me for real while my heart mends – I could feel it – right then and there, as I slept in a hotel in Boise.
After three-weeks of solo wilderness treks a miracle happens because I unhooked, and ventured into nowhere with no one, to do nothing. Stuff shook loose inside me; this is just what time in nature does. Sure, I’d been wet, hungry, stinky and tired, the tender irritations required of you when you are without technology and all the soft landings we create from house to car, to work and back. Stripped of a bubble-wrapped life, and immersed in solitude, the mind unhinges in a good way and the heart heals in a long-awaited dream of being seen. And that’s the beauty of flying solo.
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