I made it to Cold Springs Saddle (3401')from near Milpas St & 101 in Santa Barbara with what could be enough food for three weeks.
I wish I had written my grandma before I left town.
There is a post I finished at ~7:45PM 3/30 (Monday) that won't be published until this evening. . . I used the delayed publishing/post-dating feature.
So the main thing is: this may be the last heard from me until 4/21. More likely though I'll check in from a mountaintop or leave the forest by 4/14 or even earlier.
The last attempt to carry two weeks of food was a fiasco. . .
This time I mis-measured and may have brought twice as many legumes as I would eat in two weeks (almost 2 cups dry/day).
I'm somewhat greedy for expanses of time free from structure and free from carland and from the calorie/food addiction/preoccupation that often distracts me when I am in communities or urban areas.
After a week of this how will I feel?
A lot will be considered/ thought about out here besides food. . . (or the mind may quickly run out and be still/silent. And then? Read? Climb mountain to check/send email?)
I'll finish Tom Brown's _Grandfather_. Maybe _Infinite Jest_.
I'll enjoy sleeping outside without worrying about cops or about car or people noise or bright lights.
I'll drink good water. Collect good greens. Get lots of rest.
I'll be at Forbush Camp tonight. Then I think I'll head to Little Caliente Hot Springs. After that I could go eastish toward Ojai, or westish to Cachuma Saddle. I may move slowly at first due to pack being heavy.
I'll let the "Los Padres Walkers" community idea sit (groups.google.com/group/lpws). If it is still with me after a while, I may make a better list of where to announce it.
I won't take as many pictures--the old ones give the basic idea.
Enjoy the next three weeks!
Oh, Leslie M and I and others possibly are still planning that three-week mindfulness sangha Sierras walk in about August.
If I want alternatives to paying the $381 ticket, I should go to Vista/Escondido by 5/11.
[Partly, the Los Padres Walkers idea comes from my reaction to the various communities I visited, to not wanting to stay in those communities. Partly it comes from that monk (Zoima?) in _The Brothers Karamazov_'s injunction to take responsibility for everyone and everything. I don't want to be escapist. I want to help the others, who, like me, were stuck in buldings, behind computers, in carland, in private property land, in "highest and best use" land, in excessive calories land. In the land where people try to attract and retain mates and reproduce, reproduce, attract, copy.]
[I'm sorry to have once again defined myself in opposition to aspects of existence which are a part of me and which I need. I'd better present my exploration as seeking greater diversity and as seeking the appropriate degree of life's elements for my own situation.
Another thought, maybe not related, follows.
Haiko left me with a pointer: what I experience, the divine/spirit does also. We are its eyes and ears (and hands and mind).]
[Let me also add, while I'm going on and on, I still have no clue what to make of Quail Springs. No clue. I let it fade from my mind. I take no initiative in planning to return (I wait until you want to walk there with me). Though anything I can say about it is positive. The story I have developed: they live (interpersonally) as if they had already attained the permaculture ideal of abundance. Tears came attempting to explain this--"What did I do to deserve this? --it's like your mother" (how the ideal of mother loves). So often they express welcoming and appreciation. And there must be some mistake; they must have changed their minds by now--
But aside from my not comprehending or relaxing into their way, my unease may come more from not fully aligning/resonating with their (or anyone's?) building, planting, staying put, eating, working, and car-using projects.
So I'll paste in here some writing I attempted during the 2.5 weeks I was there:
--begin paste--
Asunto: no longr write
Why I can no longer write. But I said, "I wish every one could know what I know here." Could I write, a few more would.
Amazing clichés. Amazing people. Royalty [of character, soul, aspiration]. Melodramatization. Expression. Criticism. Self-satire. Inspire solidity, confidence.
Madness. Madness. How can this exist. How can such fine people be here with me? Be serving me? Cooking for me? Gourmets. Teaching me. Charging others not me. Why am I community, guest, appreciated, served, taught, and learned from by some, accepted as part of the worthy diversity, even as I feel. . .
Need I write more. . . ?
I will not stay? I will hobble on? Back to an old way "I" can comprehend more? More suited to. . . confidence, solidity.
--end paste--]
[It costs a quarter to post this, regardless of length.]
[Ben and Raffi just left. Ben, the informal, undercover mayor of I.V. (Isla Vista). Run the parks, they say. Lots of good stories. Driving out to Pendola where there's a hot tub they say. I could have gone. Said a bunch of 'Nam vets migrate on horse down here from Yosemite for the winter (others drive/ride). He'll meet them at Pendola. I see a Pendola Debris Dam on the Bryan Conant's map, but no hot springs. Do they mean Little Caliente? Ben gave me tips on how to get fed and how not to get caught by the cops camping in IV (if it looks good to you. . . ). I wanted to ask about the UCSB police too, but he answered something different. Isla Vista's a good place. So many places I could hang out.]
A breath and a smile,
No comments:
Post a Comment