Stranded Road Trip

Cosmic Sky Sending Messages

Bright crescent moon with huge clouds in a tangerine and indigo sky at dusk

Help. Stranded at a hotel not far from you, he said. Could I come pick him up?

Quack, quack, my phone had just rang, a rare instance of when the sound is not turned off. A mind already bursting with input and tangents finds it a nuisance to hear further intrusions; the duck ringtone does convey. Damn, I thought to myself. I want to help him, can I dig deep?

It was evening, I was tired. On a Tuesday, poor thing of a day. Possibly no one’s favorite, right next to Thursday. Yet, I took the call when I saw my cousin’s name light up and knew it was important (me and my preferred people don’t casually talk on the phone these years, not when a text will suffice; millennial problems).

He’s a decade and change older than me, dear to me, sensitive like I am. We share some interesting and curious traits. A bit different you could say. What was he doing out here in suburbia? His truck broke down a few stops up the highway from me. He doesn’t live very close. I calculated in my head…four hours on the road to take him back home, middle of nowhere Michigan. He’s outside of the burb-scape, the hustle and bustle of corporate-signage, noise, and rush hour traffic. I would technically be home early in the AM, after midnight.

“Yes, of course,” I told him after a brief pause, “give me the address, I’ll come get you shortly.” One of the few blood relatives I speak with. I hadn’t seen him in years I realized, the two of us exchanging pleasantries via text for birthdays and holidays and such. Really unique dreams, we share those occasionally. The love is there regardless of the amount of time that passes between visits. We carry an understanding of where we as people have been, so that we may come together whenever the time is right.

Prior to his call, I had just walked in the door at home, most of my days scheduled within an inch of my life. So I had to make my dinner whatever I could stuff in my mouth before filling a water bottle, grabbing a bag of chips, and heading back out. Nearly dusk, I needed to pull into the gas station around the corner if I was to make this trip without delay. My mental state? Weary, my stress too high these months. Yet I was finding out that the scattered and mundane can shift in an unexpected instant.

I pulled up at the corner. As I stepped out of my car to fill the tank, the image in the sky above became clear, like the heavens opening, giggling, laughing in delight…

A double rainbow filled the entire view. Mouth agape, I joined the handful of people there to pause and stare. Held in a timeless sense of awe that this message brings, everything seemed to stop. This is a wondrous feeling in itself. The remembrance that beauty is innate to the world. That miracles are real. That hope is worth holding on to; don’t give up, the earth seems to say, the journey is mesmerizing. This beautiful vision to recharge the spirit. Embraced, for these several minutes and what I could retain in my back pocket like loose change. Happy. Like Santa might visit this Christmas after all. With a deep sense of renewal, I was ready in my mission. Four hours, tedious years, Tuesday. It all fell away. Forward and onward. Curiosity restored.

I drove down the road and onto the highway for a few miles before finding the exit and the roadside hotel he had pulled into. His white truck was in the lot, yet defunct; A steed we would have to abandon. Getting out of my car in the parking lot, I saw a woman standing nearby, wearing business casual attire and conveying a sort of gentle, idle energy. Like an NPC in an RPG. What information did she have? She was a bit more middle-aged than myself, me having only just gotten to the middle. (FWIW, I like it here.) She had been enjoying the same view in the sky, less visible now in time and distance. “It’s like when I lived in Hawaii,” she said without missing a beat, as if we had been sharing this moment together, always. “You would see these beautiful rainbows constantly. Like being told that everything is all right.” She smiled at me knowingly and I smiled back, glad to be the one to catch her sentiments.

I walked swiftly now into the deserted hotel lobby, brightly lit, sterile, both too quiet and too loud, a tv on nearby. A younger woman with a tight ponytail greeted me from the front desk, eyes I could feel watching as I made my way down the long parallel first floor hallway. Surely, she had heard his story upon arrival and had been waiting to see who would come to his rescue. I wondered if I fit the part properly. I always assume I’m just a bit off from what is expected, because whoever knows what to expect anyway?

I knock at the room number door he had given. In a hotel, you best have to wonder if the right door will open. He does appear, thankfully, and as I remember him from over three years back: tall, slim, kind eyes, with dark hair worn longer now like Jesus. He’s dressed in medical scrubs for work. And a small smile that is relieved, exasperated, over it. Anxiety people understand one another innately: don’t worry; let’s gtfo! He grabs bottled water, his bag, and we jet. Getting in my station wagon, his comments recounting the day are peppered with nervous laughter. He wonders how to come back and claim his ride. One problem at a time, we determine, and agree it will be a pricey one. He’s grateful for my showing up, and I hope to convey my genuine honor for being the one that can do it, the one that gets his call. When you’re of the few, what could be more precious?

The light of day is fading fast as we ride. As ugly as the freeway is, sometimes the big open sky reveals much more. If I usually notice litter, billboards, congestion, and sprawl in the light, the last seconds of dusk are like glimpsing the dream before going under. I turn quiet in our conversation as I realize what is painted all around me. As far as the eye can see, a glorious orange and indigo sky, the brightest that night can be. A tangerine dream if I ever lived one. Sparse and massive inkblot clouds perfectly framed a razor sharp crescent moon, captured in sheer neon. Whatever he was saying, whatever was playing on the stereo faded in contrast. Lucky. I am seeing this in front of me. I am a lucky one. We are the ones that get to witness a display, nature showing off what she can do, what she simply is. And this is just one night. How many looked like this, and were even noticed by much of anyone? How many left in life to fully drink in? Fucking majesty. Dancing over the drowsy drivers, watching the clock, listening to the same words cast a spell of sleep. And I do this too, yes I do. Comfort over contemplation. Over connection. But now, awarded the chance to see with eyes anew. Plentiful is natures splendor. We do or do not cultivate our abilities continually.

He and I drove in rhythms of both quiet and conversation for the two hours into town. I had never seen this part of the state to my recollection, he having moved out here some years ago. Riding endlessly through the dark, with gaudy punctuations of yellow, red, and green. Scarcely awake at the end of the day, just to go home, to go home again. Relief was palpable as we neared his apartment off the main stretch of the small downtown. A city where time could stand still, if such was possible. Slowed down anyway. He thanked me again and I let him know it was my pleasure to see him, to chat, reconnect and get out a bit, and this was true. It was nice to paint a picture in my mind of his life here and know where he was settled.

Yawning at the hour I would normally be sleeping, I gave myself a quick pep talk for the next two hours back. I was going to play my same music again, but with…gusto! Decided intention. Intensity. Sing it louder. Hear it…better? My sheer will would pierce through the haze. Yes, that. Darker out still, but discernible, I retraced my steps with the help of the maps feature on my phone. Repetitive and dull landscapes these roads. I seldom passed another vehicle given the hour, mostly semi trucks on their long solitary journeys. Although I had driven all freeway to get to there, the app changed my route about 30 minutes in going back.

I obliged and took the exit onto a one-lane dirt road. Kind of odd? Ok, I guess so. Rural and residential. Spread out. Lots of fields. Few markers. Quaint. Comfortable in a familiar way. Road-tripping had been most of the vacations that my family could afford growing up. I liked to think it was preference. And it was at some later point. A long drive to a cabin or to set a tent in the woods; that was the thing to do. So any one of these lonesome roads was actually an old friend calling me back again. I sped up, seeing how fast I could go with limited sight distance in the pitch black before I became uncomfortable. I’m a respectful driver these days. But the combination of darkness, open road, distance from home, and a loud song will make you find a new limit. And that’s when the moment reached me one last time.

A final stroke of inspiration wrung out, I suddenly stop my car. The crunch heard under the tire as it comes to a halt. No other sound. Eerie quiet that is startlingly full. Same dirt road, nothing around as far as I could see. Not that I could make out much of anything in the pitch black. And yet… I turn off the engine, open, then step out the door, the abrupt sound of it shutting. And look straight up…

For a warm August night, chills go down my spine. Piercing. Piercing my eyes and soul. The stars above. A half breath was all I could manage. Air held in like sitting for a still photograph, the first one ever captured. The first person to ever see this. It will always be the first time, I realize. Who could take this all in? The gleaming, shimmering array. Endless luminescence. I am but a crumb at the banquet. One glorious morsel. To be profoundly alive as the nothingness below the blanket. Comfort. Home, here, here anywhere, on the ground. God, are you there? The question doesn’t come up under the eternal now. The true, vivid night.

Photo by Aimee Zaugg on Unsplash

-VLS