On my way to Yosemite National Park, I stopped for coffee at my favorite coffee shop. As the girl at the counter handed me my Americano with steamed milk she said, “If you’re staying at the Upper Pines Campground, check out the Happy Isles trail. It’s an easy walk from there and goes along the river.” That’s how I roll when I visit national parks. Some people like to plan ahead; I like to follow the plans that unfold as I go. So the next morning, I drove my camper van to the Happy Isles trailhead.
Fall hits later in California, so I decided I could get away with dressing Sunny, my 10-lb terrier-chihuahua mix, in her red sweater with reindeer antlers on the hood. I slipped on my North Face sweatshirt and hat, slid the van door shut behind me, and we started down the long wooden walkway that cut across the Valley floor toward the tree line.
The Valley was surrounded by Bigleaf Maple, Black Oak, and Dogwood trees inflamed with bright yellow, orange, and red leaves. We disappeared into the trees on the path that led us to the bank of the Merced River, where the reflection of the golden leaves lay beneath a bridge with a majestic display of Half Dome in the backdrop. I took out my iPhone and joined the likes of Ansel Adams and countless others who have traveled far and wide just to capture photos of such beauty.
We merged with the trail leading over the bridge to Mirror Lake. The Redwood trees towered above us as we began our ascent. Fresh crisp air drafted off the snowy river beside the trail and chilled my lungs as they heaved from the elevation gain. The higher we hiked, the more snow and ice covered the path, until I decided the slipping was more distracting than anything else, and we turned to head back to the van.
Our next stop was Yosemite Chapel—except it was locked. And, the air was much colder on that side of the Valley because it was still out of reach of the sun. On down the road we went.
Just around the bend, I noticed the branches of the Black Oak trees at the base of El Capitan swaying in the wind and dropping their leaves to the ground. The trees in the field across the road were doing the same. I signaled to pull the van over to the side of the road, leashed Sunny, and together we bounded through the field to get as close as we possibly could to the falling leaves.
We ran as far as the large boughed trees in the middle of the field facing El Capitan. We stood underneath with golden leaves falling all around us. With each gust of wind, more leaves fell—tossing and turning in the golden sunlight before gently landing on the ground. I squealed with delight, took Sunny off her leash, and the two of us spent our last few moments in Yosemite National Park running free through the field in the warmth of the sun.
A few days later, I woke up to the sound of the garbage truck collecting our recycling bin outside my bedroom window. I rolled over and grabbed my phone. “6:30AM. What the hell?” I thought. I reached over to pet Sunny. She didn’t move. It was too early even for her. I shuffled to the bathroom and then made my way downstairs to make coffee. As the Moka pot was percolating on the stove, I turned around to find Sunny sitting eagerly on the kitchen rug in front of a certain cupboard. I guess she decided to get out of bed for her breakfast treat after all.
7AM alarm. Coffee. Prayers. Readings. Journal. It was my morning routine every day, and every day I listened to the sounds of the city waking up all around our home—traffic on Broad Street, beeping delivery trucks, clanging garbage bins, leaf blowers, and the sign being dragged down the street that pointed passersby to the local grocery co-op. Feeling particularly disgruntled that morning after such a sublime escape to Yosemite, I started my journal entry that morning with this:
November 7th
The traffic noise is killing me. I want to rewild my soul. I want to connect with God, myself, and others again. I want to go back before I decided to be the next Beth Moore. Since I was 19 years old, I have never moved anywhere or done anything apart from following this ministry dream. The happiest and most connected I have ever been was when I was living on the farm.
The summer before third grade, my parents moved us from the city to a farmhouse in the country on 100 acres of woods. It was just after my mom filed for divorce for a second time. There is a term in the 12-Step program called “the geographical switch.” Perhaps buying the farm and moving away from the city was my parents’ last attempt at saving their marriage. However, as they also say in the 12-Step program, “Wherever you go, there you are.” We soon found out their problems followed us to the country.
It wasn’t long after we moved that my dad started drinking again. I soon learned that no matter how many times he promised he would be home after work, he wasn’t going to pull up our driveway until at least a half hour after the bars closed. Night after night, he would find my mother waiting for him in the living room, embroiled in rage, and the fighting would ensue. My youngest brother, barely two at the time, mostly slept through the yelling in his crib, while my other brother and I huddled together in my bedroom, waiting for them to wear themselves out.
The woods became my escape from the reality of living in our home. Each morning, my brother and I would grab a white five-gallon bucket and a plastic cup and disappear into the woods. When the sun was shining, it was the perfect time to hunt for crayfish in the creek, because they were easier to spot camouflaged in the mud. We lifted each rock very slowly so we wouldn’t stir up the mud and make the water all cloudy. If we were lucky, a crayfish would be there, exposed in the sun. Slowly, slowly, we’d position the cup, scoop up the crayfish, and dump it into the bucket. At the end of each day, we’d release our little ecosystem of crayfish, minnows, frogs, rocks, and water back into the creek.
I was eight years old the first time I remember being mesmerized by the light in those woods. Walking down the trail to my dad’s tree stand, I happened upon a beam of sunshine cascading through the trees. The branches of two trees on either side of the trail intertwined and formed a sort of arbor over the trail. I stood in the sunlight under the arbor as the leaves danced in the gentle breeze, casting playful shadows across my face. I closed my eyes and dreamed, “I want to get married right here in this spot someday.”
A year later, my mother broke the news that she and my dad were getting divorced—for good this time. She came outside to where I was playing by the woodpile and said, “Sara, I have to tell you something.” I sat down with my legs dangling over the side of the woodpile while she explained her decision. I noticed her voice began to tremble as she described what the divorce would entail. Desperate to rescue her, I felt myself age about twenty years in that very moment. I responded, “It sounds like you are making the right decision. Then there won’t be fighting in the house anymore.” She seemed relieved. Then, she turned and went back inside. I never shed a single tear.
After the divorce was settled, my mom moved us to a small house next to a busy street. She opted for a lump sum of cash to buy the house and go back to school, and my dad kept the farmhouse and the land. Although we were just across town from my dad’s, the life I once had on the farm seemed a million miles away after that.
Directly across the street from our new house was an industrial property with an oil derrick out front. It was constantly drilling up and down, up and down, and smelled like sulphur for some reason. Cars zoomed past our house at all hours of the day and night, going well over the 45-mph speed limit. Gone were the endless trail systems, the high meadow on the back side of the property, the creeks, hidden tree stands, and the wide-open farming field to run in. We had one tree in our new backyard, and its branches were mostly bare and so thin they could barely hold our weight.
That fall, I was assigned a “Leaf Collection” for my fifth-grade class project. Except we were no longer living at the farm, and the only access I had to woods was the small parcel of trees beside the industrial property across the street. With my mom at work during the day and attending grad school at night, I had to ask the neighbor kid if her mom could take us to the woods.
We waited for the cars to pass, then the three of us ran across the road. We walked around the side of the industrial building to a clearing in the tree line. The deeper we went, the darker, colder, and damper it got. I collected as many leaves as I could before my neighbor’s mom said, “OK, we have to go back now. My oven timer is about to go off. We’ve gotta go eat dinner.”
Back at my house, I laid the small pile of leaves I had collected on the kitchen table. My heart sank. Oh no! I thought. I think these are all the same kind. I wondered how on earth I would identify them, and where I was going to get enough leaves to fill a whole binder like the other kids had. The reality was, no matter how many times I asked my teacher if I could have more time to finish it, my leaf collection wasn’t going to get done. All the trees I had ever known, with all their dancing leaves in the golden sunlight, were dead.
November 7th (continued)
I grieve for that land. For the child inside me who hasn’t found a place to really live ever since. Rewilding. Walking through the woods. Running through the fields. Spaciousness. Nothing had to be perfect. There was no such thing as decorating the house. I don’t even remember what my bedroom looked like because the outside is where we lived. I remember bees in the attic. Mice in the back room. Pincher bugs in the bathroom. Crayfish in the creek. We were friends with nature. I just want to go home.