Day 68 - 8/14/16 Casper to Hiland, WY

If there's a competition for most desolate state, Wyoming is the frontrunner so far.  At least with the corn fields in Iowa, there's evidence of human presence.  But with Wyoming, the barren fields of grassland are just that: barren.  I was aiming for Powder River today but, when I got there, I didn't see any businesses that weren't boarded up to fill up my water.  

So I kept riding.  The only reason I moved on is because Jon, the guy I stayed with in Casper, told me about Hiland just 20 miles past Powder River.  I had no idea it was there, the name doesn't even show up on Google Maps.  But sure enough, it's real.  At the top of a hill I could see a small cluster of campers, old cars and a couple ranch-style homes in no particular arrangement to suggest a town.  At the bottom of the hill I saw the sign: Hiland Pop 10.  10 people live here.  Jon told me there's a bar here where I could get water, so I kept riding until I saw it.  The Bright Spot, I guess in this town it is.  

Cow skulls hang on the patio posts, picnic tables and mismatched chairs rest in the ahade with no one in them.  It smells like cigarettes inside, each table in the lounge/pool hall/convenience store is ornamented with an ashtray for a center piece.  Through a small door behind the counter is the bar looking like something I could only imagine in a movie about the underbelly of American life.  

One wall is covered in photos of hunters holding up the bodies of dead animals, rhinos to grizzly bears and a whole slew of antlered creatures; another wall littered with business cards and stickers with fun sayings like, "Meat is not murder!  It's a tasty way to enjoy a dead animal"..."Drill Earth first, we'll drill the other planets later"..."If Obama's the answer, how stupid was the question?" and "Welcome to Wyoming, frankly I don't give a fuck how you did it back home."  And every empty space is filled with dollar bills; some with just a name and a date, others with handwritten sayings like, "Trump 2016" or "Fuck it".  

The TV in the corner is playing The Patriot and the bikers that wandered in are providing their own commentary in between reading aloud the offensive stickers that strike them as funny.  In the lounge/pool hall/convenience store, a French family is hanging around, children and all, probably taking this all in as a genuine impression of America that they'll go home and tell their friends about.  

They even wrote on a dollar and stapled it to the ceiling – there's probably more money on the walls than this place is worth.  I pinned up my own dollar as well when asked by the bartender if I wanted to.  What the Hell, you know?  Everyone is gone now, no more bikers or French folk, even the bartender is barely present and The Patriot just started from the beginning on TV.  How would I describe America after seeing all these small, desolate towns in these middle states I've never seen before?  

Is ecclectic an appropriate answer or is that too broad? Where else has hat French family been?  They were all wearing cowboy boots and straw hats.  Is The Bright Spot what they were looking for?  What they expected to find?  This country is truly so big and the big cities are such a small percentage of what makes up this massive land.  I'm at a loss trying to put my finger on what this country is all about.  

Maybe I'm just distracted by The Patriot on TV or maybe I just keep finding better and better stickers on the wall.  Here's one that says, "Dip me in honey and throw me to the lesbians!" right above a confederate flag sticker.

The Unthinkable

          Not long ago I walked by a cemetery and saw an old woman standing in front of a grave.  She wasn't crying or saying anything outloud, just standing quietly, looking down at whoever was buried there.  It could've been anyone, her lover, her son, her own mother.  Death doesn't discriminate; you don't have to be old to die.  I wonder what she was silently saying to this person in the ground.  It might've been nothing, maybe she was just staring into the unknown, wondering.

          Death is a mystery.  Life is a mystery, too, although at times we think we've got it figured out and then death happens and life gets flipped upside-down.  I like to think it's all an illusion, smoke and mirrors, some combination of misinformation and misperception that makes us forget death is part of life, and out of death comes new life.  The metaphors are all around us: the birth and death of the day, the changing seasons, the brief and beautiful cycle of plants blooming each Spring.  For some reason, a lot of people have trouble seeing this cycle in terms of human life.  To many, death seems like an abrupt apathetic end to a beautiful performance that only happens once.

          Yesterday I was walking in the woods with a friend.  It was one of the windiest days I had seen in a while.  We were walking towards the edge of a lake when we came across this man and his dog standing next to a fallen tree in the middle of the path.  His dog was was picking up smaller branches and running around all excited.  The man was pretty excited, too.  He said the tree had fallen less than two minutes before we showed up.  He heard a tremendous crack in the midst of a strong gust of wind.  He looked up to see where the noise came from and was lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the falling tree just in time for him and his dog to move out of the way.  When my friend and I arrived the smell of fresh pine hung in the air.  The tree looked like it had exploded, there were pine needles and splinters all over the path.  My friend and I could've stumbled upon this man crushed underneath the massive tree amongst all the debris but, today was not his day to die (or his dog's).  Tragedy was avoided and the man's near-death experience became a funny story for all of us and his dog was quite happy to play with all the broken branches from the fallen tree.

 

      

          Plenty of people are worried about me going on this trip – very excited but, also worried.  For my mom, it's almost like I'm going off to war.  She had me get a set of dog tags with my identity and emergency contact information on them. She even suggested I write up something so my money and possessions can be divvied up if the unthinkable happens; for lack of a better term, my last will and testament.  I joked with her and said I'd leave it all to our dog just like that Jimmy Buffet song but, she didn't laugh as hard as me.  I'm not poking fun at you, mom (I know you're reading this), it's just funny to think of walking across America as going into war.  Really, anything can happen at anytime, though.  You can get crushed by a tree on a windy day or you could slip on a banana peel and break your neck.  These shouldn't be reasons to be afraid, they should be reasons to embrace each day in this lifetime.

          I suppose I'm putting myself in a vulnerable situation, attempting to walk 3,300 miles with 35 pounds on my back like some slow-moving turtle.  But, there's a fine line between being excessively foolish and overly cautious and I think going for a walk is literally walking this line.  The adventure is worth the risk to me.  If America turns out to be a warzone and I end up getting killed in action then so it goes.  I sure hope I don't die out there but, that's something that's just out of my control.  If I die, I will die trying to live.