Wanderlost 2

by Simon Williams

  I needn’t have gone to the trouble. Dolores is not on duty this morning. The polite and competent border agent that replaces her waves me thorough in less time than it takes to stamp a passport and feign a passing interest in my life.

  ‘That is all there is?’ I ask, wanting to make sure that Dolores won't suddenly leap up from behind the counter. ‘Surprise! Got you sucka! Go wait for the northbound bus insignificant human. I am Dolores Brown, queen of playing with people’s lives as if they are mere puppets.’

  ‘Yes. That is all.’ He gleefully responds, snapping me back to reality. ‘You have a New Zealand passport. You are on our visa waiver program. All you need to cross the border is your passport and a sunny, cheerful disposition.’ Off I walk, shaking my head in disbelief. Bloody oath.

  Bob's your uncle

  People will rarely speak honestly of how bad a trip was. Everything is always 'the best.' Nothing that goes awry will ever be brought up. Long before there was such a thing as fake news we had Aunt Phyllis's glowing report of her vacation to Greece. How could something not go horribly wrong in Greece? The survivors of the Titanic, Hindenburg, and Lusitania only ever spoke in glowing tones about how good the food service was. Why is that? I find the crappy stuff on trips to be way more interesting.

  A highlight of the time I spend residing in San Antonio is the time I spend getting away from San Antonio. The options are rather limited as there is only open scrub and sagebrush in all four directions of the compass. However, if you are audacious enough, it is possible to consider the long arse drive to Big Bend National Park in the isolated western part of Texas. Nothing else exists in this corner of the world except for this National Park. Nada. Zip. Zilch. Tourism wise the area could certainly benefit from the addition of an Alamo or two. Maybe a shuttle launch site. Perhaps even a gigantic theme park called DesertWorld, where visitors can take photos standing beside a giant cactus.

  Myself and my girlfriend at the time, an American lass named Mandi, spend a long evening driving westward toward the setting sun. The extended horizon of Texas spreads out before us. The country side is devoid of greenery. Bland, and uninviting. If this is God's country, then the man upstairs has little in the way of imagination. The fading day gives way to a perfectly dark sky peppered with pulsating stars that appear several light years closer than I have ever seen them before. Countryside looks a damn sight better when I can't see it. Despite hours of driving we come up short of reaching the entrance to the park. We make it as far as the town of Alpine, 60 miles from our destination. At least I think it is Alpine it could have been a ghost town. This municipality makes an uncleaned toilet block at a highway rest station feel like Constantinople during its heyday as world's most important city. We pull into a Motel, ask for a room, and I make small talk with the receptionist.

  ‘So how long will it take us to get to Big Bend?’ I ask.

  ‘To where?’ The receptionist replies.

  ‘The National Park,’ I state.

  ‘National Park? And where is that?’

  Seldom am I floored by the ignorance of people however this is one of those times. No other sane reason exists for anyone to pass by the town of Alpine unless they are heading to or coming from Big Bend National Park. Yet somehow, in her 18 years of life, this young woman has completely evaded becoming aware of the only purpose for civilization to exist where she lives. Her obliviousness strikes me like a straight left to my stomach. Snot bursts from my nose and I must quickly wipe it away with the back of my hand. Beating my head against a brick wall would give me less of a headache than discussing world events with this woman. Is she allowed to vote? Maybe in far flung voting precincts like this the voting authorities just collect the ballot boxes and burn them. Like they do in Afghanistan. She is empowered thinking she exercised her civil duty while democracy just keeps on trucking. I guess this is how seven-year-old Duke the Dog won the election to be the mayor of Cormorant, Minnesota in August 2014. The world is this stupid sometimes. I no longer wish to proceed with conversation after the return of my credit card and retire to my room.

  The next day, Mandi and I arrive at the barren rock expanse of Big Bend. It is mid-morning. Already the sun is scorching whatever life may have survived from the cold overnight temperatures. Boiling hot during the day and freezing at night, deserts are the unwanted, bipolar step children of the topographical world. They serve no worthwhile purpose while taking up a great deal of space. With the possible exceptions of acting as backdrops to Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns, allowing the activities at Burning Man to be done far out of my sight, and conserving water that is better distributed to lush tropical islands. Unless you are a scorpion, a rattlesnake, or David Attenborough, then there exists no sane reason to be wandering around in a desert.

  Mandi and I struggle for an hour to erect our tent at the Maverick Ranch RV Park. The ground is solid rock. I would have been more successful hammering my tent pegs into the middle lane of the George Washington Bridge. However, humans less intelligent than me have survived living in these conditions before. The entire population of Alpine for instance. Tent pegs are a luxury anyway. One good lightning strike, flash flood, or starving mountain lion, and the least of my concerns will be if my ground sheet is properly affixed to the soil. After securing our tent to the ground by using large boulders placed in every corner, I go for a drive to survey the lay of the land. Barren rock greets me at every we turn. It is like being on Mars. Except Mars might be more habitable.

  This is the largest area of Chihuahuan Desert topography in the USA. With an elevation change within the park of over 6,000 feet. It doesn't rain down low and it doesn't rain up high. The southern park border is delineated by the Rio Grande River over a 240-mile stretch. At three places along its course in the park the river cuts into an elevated plateau forming spectacular sheer walled canyons. It was the sight of one of these canyons in a travel magazine that drew me to want to come here. Slick advertising. Perhaps the bikini-clad woman standing on a raft holding a slab of beer in the photo helped. Beer can sell anything. I would sign up for a brush with death on a wild untamed river in a heartbeat if it came with beer. Mandi and I are booked to white water raft down the Santa Elena Canyon section the next day.

  Bob's your uncle - part 2

  Next morning, we are up before the sun. We must be at the pickup spot early for a pre-raft briefing. Despite being desert, this is still America and as such there are a hundred disclaimers to be filled out before we are handed a paddle. Our guide drives us to the river access point. Here the Rio Grande is unhurried, wide, and shallow enough to the point it can be easily traversed from Mexico on an inflatable lilo. Per our guide, it is crossed often by the Mexican population of the village on the other side. To crack down on illegal immigration into the USA surely the Department of Homeland Security has the means to track inflatable lilo sales in the cross-border region on Texas.

  Our guide makes the trip for me. He is a wiry old coot, originally from Baltimore and roughly in his late forties. Although his scraggly beard may have hidden a few more years on his face. That information on him though is dull, in truth it is his paranoia that makes things interesting. His fears of an over reaching American government coming to take away his guns is what forced him to move way out here. Only in the farthest reaches of the Texas desert is he able to maintain his liberty. He and his guns settled down in a cozy two-bedroom cottage and hope to raise a family of pistols one day. I imagine that most of the living space in his house is taken up by stacks of emergency canned goods. Rows and rows of tinned baked beans quietly aging waiting for judgement day.

  This man lives his life in a constant state of DEFON 5. Anytime he mentions the word, ‘government,’ his top lip goes taught and his eyes sharpen. Out here amongst the sage brush and cactus he only spoke in whispers. The Feds are still able to listen in on us apparently. Americans make some surprisingly dumb choices to maintain their rights. If he is afraid of his guns being taken why didn’t he choose any number
of weapon friendly locations in the USA that are more hospitable to live than the Chihuahuan Desert? NRA headquarters, the entire state of New Hampshire, or a tent pitched on Charlton Heston's Beverly Hills estate.

  Thirteen miles into the paddle we enter Santa Elena Canyon. For the next seven miles of sheer walled solitude there is only the three of us, our raft, and the government listening in. The vertical walls of rock rise directly out of the water and soar to over 1,500 feet on either side. In this uncompromisingly harsh environment I realize that someone would need to be a little bit nuts to want to come and live here. I am therefore pleased with the expertise our guide has in being cuckoo. Twenty years later, I wonder if he still takes raft tours and warns travelers about the ever-expanding government. I heard something the other day that President Obama wanted to take away people’s guns. Maybe the river guide was right, only 20 wasted years too early.

  The water flow in the canyon is flat and passive. This is not your thrill a minute mountain whitewater ride pummeling down the slopes of the western Sierras. This is the lazy river ride at Universal Studios Orlando, albeit without an easily accessible funnel cake stall. I allow myself to slide out of the raft into the Rio Grande's cool refreshment. The width from wall to wall is only 30 meters so I swim and touch the Mexico side. Then I pretend to flee a reprisal from the Sinaloa drug cartel back to the safety of the American side. There I turn and flee from the tyrannical US government back to the raft. Illegal immigration is a piece of cake even without a lilo.

  A few miles in, we beach the raft on a rocky outcrop to survey the rapids of a stretch of water known as The Rock Slide. Now, I have some white-water rafting experience. The Tully River in North Queensland, Australia is a solid Class IV river and I have done it twice. This doesn't mean I proclaim to possess the technical skill to navigate the dangling gates on an Olympic kayak course, but I know what danger on a river looks like. When we get to the location that overlooks the rapids I am considerably disappointed. The whitewater is a single, un-deceptively tame half foot drop. After the anticipated exhilaration drummed up by our guide I realize that the only thing big in Texas is the hyperbole. My river guide, acutely sensitive that any criticism from me is a sign I am in on a wider government conspiracy, surveys the water as if taking up his position as the second shooter on the grassy knoll.

  ‘The water may look easy but the rapid is extremely technical,’ he ruminates.

  ‘It is just a tiny drop, mate. It will be easy.’ I tell him.

  ‘That is what they said about Vietnam.’

  ‘Really, I am sure we will be fine,’ is my answer.

  ‘One tiny mistake and you won’t be thinking that. I need to know what I am up against.’ This man's ability to spin bullshit is on another level. He would not be out of place advising Hillary Clinton on her 2016 political campaign. ‘This river can be a hidden beast.’

  They say the true measure of character is what a person does when they are alone. Nope. It is what a person does on a far-flung river in Texas when facing an idiot who is trying to oversell danger. What a bunch of fuckinbullshit this is.

  ‘Can we just get back in the boat?’ I urge him. 'This river is slower than an asthmatic redneck the day after Daytona weekend. Point us in the right direction and Bob's your uncle.'

  The guide glances sideways at me and firmly shakes his head, ‘I need a few more minutes to survey the eddies.’

  Christ mate, if people wanted to be oversaturated with hype we would just watch an entire Super Bowl pre-game show. This cretin is a class A wanker, but I can sort of understand where he is coming from. Some people just suck at life. But I can't do anything as he has the steering oar. We finally re-board our craft and cast off. As in the rest of his life, our river guide fashions an immense deal out of nothing. At the last second, he unnecessarily completes a 180 degree turn before the raft gently slides backwards over the small drop. The moment rates in the technical realm of guiding a wheelchair over the edge of a sidewalk. He wipes the sweat from his brow. I didn't know heroics required so much perspiration. Good job my brother. In his mind he may not save Mandi and I from the government’s overbearing reach, but he nevertheless protected us from the perils of The Rock Slide. Well thank you linesman, thank you ball boys.

  Next day, after the leisurely raft trip that masqueraded as a drop over Niagara Falls in a barrel, we drive up a twisting road into the Chisos Mountains. This is the geographical center of the park. The elevation change is 6000 feet from the bed of the Rio Grande River to the peaks of the range. To my surprise the stark dry desert is replaced by lush green foliage bathed in cool temperate winds. The clear skies and cool mountain air are reinvigorating. The blanket of night is thrown over us once more while the startling brightness of the stars astonishes me yet again. There is nothing about life in a city that prepares someone for a vibrant night sky far from the background glow of a metropolis. This celestial spectacle almost makes up for the waterfall of terror on the rafting trip.

  Forgoing a tent pitched on solid rock for a third consecutive night, I book a motel room to sleep in a soft bed. Just my luck there happens to be a motel built up in the mountains. Americans can stick a hotel anywhere. Mandi subsequently almost sets the room ablaze lighting the portable gas grill indoors. If she had set the motel alight it would have spoiled the star gazing for everyone. The motel loses a towel in lieu of losing the second floor. Combine the two minutes of thrills battling the fire along with all the time spent having dangerous excitement during the white-water rafting excursion, and Big Bend National Park gave me 122 seconds of drama. More than most tourists get from a visit to North Korea, glass blowing in Venice, or Lenin's tomb.

  Hit the frog and toad

  The world is smaller than we can possibly envision. Everything we ever do is connected as well as the people that we meet. Coincidence is simply the result of discovering that no two unrelated events are as far removed from each other as man would imagine.

  There are cities in this world more populous than entire countries; Osaka; Mexico City; Beijing. Greater Los Angeles is a vast city as well. As of the 2016 census it is roughly four times as large as Slovakia. Ever had a chance run in with someone you knew in Slovakia? No, you haven't, no one ever has. So that makes the chances of it occurring in L.A. four times more exceedingly remote.

  As immense as the infinite lights of this metropolis are, they are not as endless as they appear. Prior to moving there to live I reside in San Antonio, Texas. For the last half year of my time there I have a roommate. When I leave town I purposely lose contact as I am pissed at him. He is engaged to his childhood sweetheart from his home town back in Illinois but dates a stripper in San Antonio while living with me. That doesn't bother me. Tiger Woods dated a stripper. He isn't shunned from society. Strippers are regular humans just like you and me, only more expensive to hang around with.

  It is after he breaks the news to his stripper friend that he has a fiancée that she shows up drunk at 4am and tears my front screen door off its hinges in a rage. His infidelity now cost me money out of my pocket. Not cool. How can I file a claim for that with my home insurance provider? Cause of property damage - a highly agitated stripper. Case denied.

  The display of power by such a tiny girl is frightening. Both ends of the screen were twisted at 90 degrees. Holding herself up on that pole all day had given her unworldly strength. If one day the world erupts in post-apocalyptic chaos, I am not so much worried about escaping hordes of flesh eating zombies as I am with avoiding car loads of pissed off table dancers. I couldn't very well be mad at the poor stripper as she had her heart crushed, so I am furious at the roommate over the screen door. I had been mulling pulling up stumps to move to Los Angeles to fulfill a dream to appear as an extra in a movie. Time to kick that senseless idea into first gear. San Antonio has become too dangerous with its vigilante stripper problem. The roommate is told to find a new place to live, one that his adulteresses can destroy at her leisure. I never speak to him again once I leave
the state.

  My first few extra acting gigs in L.A. are tiny. A member of the crowd in a hotel scene on Melrose Place, a member of the crowd in a street scene for the Brady Bunch Two movie, and a member of the crowd during a stadium scene in the Robert De Niro film, The Fan. If Hollywood directors are known for picking someone out of a crowd to give them their big break into stardom, then I think it wise for me to stick to crowd scenes. The pay as an extra is an earth shattering $40 for an eight-hour day. I am doing this for the love of my craft, not for the money. I must. There is no money in it.

  Somehow word of my being on Melrose Place filters back to Australia and several mates say they scour the show to see if they can see me. The episode is titled, Run Billy Run, from the dramatic 4th season of the show. It is the episode where Jane sabotages Richard's fashion show by using a tiki torch to set off the fire sprinkler system in the showroom. This is also the same episode where Kimberly starts suffering migraines, then Amanda turns to Peter for comfort after the bribery allegations against Bobby become public. All super relevant plot points leading into the final fifth season when the entire cast become alcoholics, or develop strange neurological diseases, in attempts to increase sagging ratings.