A Road Trip Around Iceland’s Ring Road
With the passage of time, small details leave me. Entire swaths of experiential minutia evaporate without me even noticing. I’m often left with the feeling of something having happened and having never happened. I don’t know if my mind has always been this way, or if my ability to metabolize experiences has changed over time.
In an effort to stave off the little bits of memory fluttering away, I try my best to jot down initial reactions and couple it with images that catch my eye. It takes me a while to properly process a journey, but I know I can’t wait forever to eke out a few mutterings. This is my version of a scratch in the tree bark to denote a time and place.
Iceland was such an immense experience. Lonely, powerful, bleak. There is a depth there that I haven’t felt elsewhere. The word is misused often, but Iceland is truly awesome. I’m thankful for the time I was able to spend there. The freedom to putter around and explore at my leisure was very much a gift.
Fading Light of Eastern North Carolina
Eastern North Carolina is a region I’ve grappled to understand over the years. Despite being born and raised here, I’ve never felt like I was from here. In large part, this was a result of my parents being transplants and me popping onto the scene by happenstance. Growing up, I always felt like I was supposed to leave. It’s an odd thing to be all-encompassed by something but to never truly feel like you belonged. Perhaps that’s what granted me my observer lens, and many moons later, this is my effort at being a participant.
However, one thing that always spoke to me were the tobacco barns scattered about the local fields. You could drive for miles in any direction and encounter no shortage of these barns in varying stages of disrepair. Something about it always seemed beautiful to me in a melancholy way; these structures that were once full of life, imperceptibly fading away.
Climbing Mount Rainier
The initial seed that would lead me out to Mount Rainier was planted back in January 2018 by a conversation with a co-worker who shares a love of the outdoors. Upon actually trying to figure out what it would take to climb Rainier, I was quickly met with an impasse, as all guided trips for the 2018 season were already sold out. I tucked away my little mountaineering idea into the recesses of my brain, and merrily carried on with my mundane day-to-day for the next few months.
Flash forward to the very tail end of July 2018. My work situation had changed considerably, and I found myself in an NYC hotel room casually perusing various guided Rainier expedition websites (as one does in major metropolitan areas). That’s when I finally stumbled across the diamond in the rough. A spot had opened up on one of International Mountain Guide’s trips. I hastily made a few phone calls, filled out the appropriate paperwork, sent in my deposit, and in a matter of 24 hours realized I would soon be hucking myself at an active volcano at the end of August.