I decided that I’ve been living too carefully and needed to do something out of my comfort zone. Sure I’ve traveled alone, but typically stayed with friends. And to be quite honest, since moving out and living alone, the only kind of travel I can afford now is of the camping variety. So in early October this year I packed up the Tacoma and headed to the Porcupine Mountains in Michigan, because I saw an episode of Joe Pera Talks With You where he went to this place and it looked really pretty, and it was a mere 5 hour drive away. And let me tell you, that drive was beautiful. Sure the leaves hadn’t quite peaked to their full fall color potential most of the drive, but as I made a turn about an hour away from my campsite, among the greens, reds and yellows started popping into my view so vibrantly I actually started clapping and cheering and thanking the trees for being so breathtaking.
As I cruised along, taking mental notes of good signs and such I saw along the way that I would for sure stop to snap a photo of on my way back, I realized how wonderful it is to travel alone on a roadtrip where I could darn well stop whenever I so pleased. And as The Clean’s “Anything Could Happen” was playing on my radio, I noticed in a big sign that said “PUMPKIN FESTIVAL TODAY” in a town called Bessemer and I cranked the wheels toward that small town festival. While I was anxious to get to camp and set up ALONE (the first time setting camp alone is incredibly humbling), I just had to walk through this little main street and delight at the treats, get myself a hot dog, and appreciate humans doing seasonal human things.
Once I made it to camp, I set up, humbly, as I had a new tent that I’d never put up before. My site was just along the Superior and just down a flight of stairs along the bluff, I got to sit at the side of the most beautiful body of water in the Midwest and catch the sun setting along the horizon until the lake swallowed it up like a big orange-yellow egg yolk. The first night I was there was a Friday and the campsite was full. I was once again humbled as I attempted to build my first fire. Now I’ve built a damn fire before MANY times, enough so that when I was at the small town grocery store I scoffed at the fire starters for sale and confidently though to myself “I don’t need that”. Well I did.
I had grabbed lots of small sticks brought plenty of old paper grocery bags but after 45 minutes of trying to get it started, I was feeling very defeated. It would start up then just die. I did everything I could think of, including moving the logs that were HOT around and in my haste burned my finger. Instead of being angry, I laughed at myself. Because rushing and being hasty is somehow ingrained in my very being so much so that no matter how much I remind myself to slow down, it’s sticks like undercooked spaghetti. Now not only do I struggle with rushing, but also asking for help. Maybe it’s pride, maybe it’s trauma related, but it’s damn hard for me. But I went on this trip to do something different, and I swallowed my ego and approached another femme solo camper who was my neighbor on the site. Right away she said “struggling with your fire?” with a smirk, and I’m sure I looked about 2 feet tall when I said “yeah…I am being humbled”. She gave me a log of birch, didn’t over explain or try to start my fire for me but told me how flammable the bark was. It worked a charm. And then next day when I did my first hike 15 mile hike on the Superior trail, I was sure to fill my pockets with any piece of dead and dried birch I could forage. Her name was Erin, thanks to her I was able to have a fire every night for the next 5 days. Thank you Erin. It took going somewhere on my own to realize how much I do need others in my life.
