The Windmill Posts

From a dark room, my original intent was being alone in my car driving down a desolate coast with no other people around. It’s been me alone but with one or more imaginary companions at a time, talking to strangers and driving through a million small towns. I’m good with that. I feel like raw me, the essence of me. No masks or filters or roles or characters in someone elses play.

Tomorrow I’m off to San Francisco, which brings this section of nature to a close. I’ll be back to the wilds soon enough, but a couple days in San Francisco and a couple days in Monterey feel like I’m back in a proper city again, and it’s just a different vibe. I’m sure I’ll write more about these, but my relationship with both cities has to do with my college-like experience with the Marines. So I’m excited to be revisiting old haunts and new attractions.

More Trees

Happily for you, this is nearing the end of the redwood experience for maybe a week. But it’s not going to stop me from waxing poetic about today.

I stopped along the avenue of the ancients and went for a hike down the provided trail. Nothing special, just walking with the redwoods. A few things occurred to me. The first was the smell. Sweet. If petrichor had a cousin who worked at Yankee Candle, that might be close. Also, pine. Deep pine. Other times during the day I would be driving down the highway, windows and everything closed, and I would get a strong smell of Christmas.

The second realization was figuring out why being among the redwoods feels so holy to nature, so spiritual. Because of the silence. Other than some wind in the upper reaches, and the occasional drip of water from the rain leftovers, it’s utterly silent. The ferns and the trees soak up the sound, and it’s just dampened quiet. And ageless silence that reminds you once again that these ancient giants have been here so long, and have been listening to this quiet the whole time.

The reason there are no birds or creatures in the underbrush to make noise is that most of them are up top. Flying squirrels going from tree to tree. Birds nesting and spending their time aloft. Many of these creatures in the canopy live their whole lives there and never even touch the ground.

Being inside the trees was both thrilling and intimate. That was an awful lot of tree above me, and while I know it’s not coming down on my any time soon, it’s still a bit like standing in front of a parked train. You just know what it could do. It was intimate being inside these monoliths, standing where the hundreds and hundreds of rings should be. In some cases I could be there because of a trauma to the tree, others because some of these spaces grew that way. Regardless, I felt privileged. It also reminded me strongly of Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card. The central figures in the novel have a unique relationship with trees and their ancestors and how everything is part of the same organism.

Food

I have had a difficult past with food. It’s not a great relationship. I was given a diagnosis of Disordered Eating, but not an Eating Disorder. I’ve always been a little put out by having to eat, in fact a couple decades ago I wrote something called “The Food Rant” outlining all the reasons eating is a hassle. During my depressive episodes I tend to stop eating, only eating when someone else urges me or I’m in a restaurant with friends, where not eating would be awkward. But I’ve been known to go days without eating, and one of the elements of this trip is trying to improve that. I’m giving myself a liquid breakfast of Latte and Orange Juice, but determined to have a proper lunch and a proper dinner. I’m eating out on this trip, obviously, and after about three days I got burned out on hamburgers. But BLTs are a great lunchtime thing for me, and they tick a lot of the food group checkboxes.

It’s dinner that’s a challenge. I’m actually very comfortable going out and eating on my own. I bring a book sometimes or do things on my phone, like organize today’s blog thoughts. But finding a restaurant is still a challenge. I don’t drink, and pub food tends to be greasy anyway. But I get on google maps and do my research and find something that works.

Tonight it was a restaurant called Flow in Mendocino. Moderately diverse menu. But so many of the options were too much food. Restaurants do that anyway, and it kills me to order something and only eat a third. It’s not like I’m doing leftovers here. And so I found the Prawns and Chips and chose that. It was pretty good, and I knew prawns aren’t cheap, so I wasn’t going to get too many. Fish and chips you occasionally get some fries and nine whole fish. Frustrating.

The reason I went off on food is just that it’s something I’m working on, and it helps me organize my thoughts to write about it. Thank you for your patience.

Deets

• License Plates: None new, again!
• States: CA
• Departed: 8:50 am PDT, 61 degrees – Had another psychiatrist appointment early
• Original ETA 1:04pm PDT
• Arrival: 3:07 pm PDT
• Weather: Rainy, giving way to occasional not raining, 55-60 degrees
• Roads: Some interstate level of sophistication, also the most intense twisties I’ve ever seen in my life. They will be joyfully seared in my memory forever.
• Budget: Food above (not worth it), Hotel at budget
• Food: Taco Bell, Flow restaurant in Mendocino, Prawns and Chips
• Music: Lamb – Lamb, Portishead – Dummy, Girl Talk – Feed the Animals, Bis – Return to Central

Observations

• Eel creek does not have eels in it, thank goodness. No, it’s thick with lamprey (google it) that they thought were eels. EEK!
• Went to Taco Bell, it was easy and I was a bit peopled out. Older couple trying to navigate the electronic ordering menu when I got there. Ordered, waited, got my order, left. They were still trying to order. They are likely still there. They did not seem like they gave up easily.
• 101 in California at this point is “Veteran’s Memorial Highway” thank you very much. I know I’m not memorial, but still.
• The lost coast highway makes my stomach not want to be where it is. In a good way.
• From the deck of my bungalow (#humblebrag) I can’t see the ocean, but I can hear it roaring so loudly. Driving to dinner I thought about that and the fact that the lifeboatmen would row out to ships in distress in this inky black darkness, with giant rollers coming at them unseen. I cannot fathom that level of optimism or bravery. (Come to think of it, I may have a view of the ocean, but the fog will have none of that today.)
• I booked a bungalow (same price) at this mo/hotel and it’s really sweet. Pictures below.
• I had a better conversation with myself than the dour lesbians at the table by the window had with each other. Also, they monopolized the waiter.
• I drove through a tree. Yes, I paid tourism for the joy of it. My Mini Cooper barely squeaked through the thing, I have no idea how the SUV’s are doing it. The lady said they work very hard at it.
• Avenue of the Ancients is an old stagecoach trail, thus the small towns every six miles. For the horses. It’s current purpose is to allow you to drive through groves and groves of redwoods, with stops for trails along the way. The trees are so close to the road they’ve installed reflectors on posts in front of them. Seriously right at the edge of the lane. The speed limit is 55 but I was going 40 and that felt way too fast.

Pictures