Coming Home

It was time to head home, tired after so much time in the van I was now excited for the familiarity and stability that I had been so desperate to leave last September. Really, I couldn’t get home fast enough. It was stormy when I left Encinitas, I spent a bit of time around Santa Cruz wrapping up loose ends. I’d thought maybe I’d stay longer, but found it felt like I was just waiting to go home and so I left in a window of good weather.

Now dear reader, you may think that I am irresponsible and naïve. In fact, through this journey I’ve found that yes, I am. I’d like to work on this moving forward, so save the thoughts of scolding and enjoy the story.

Safe to say that when I left Santa Cruz I was pretty desperate to get home, and I was stressed. Money was tight and that Transmission Paranoia was really starting to scratch at me. I planned to go inland rather than taking the coast, it was faster. I didn’t look into what this route entailed at all (stupid). I had a small weather window during this time before another storm was to hit and I was planning to take full advantage. The van actually felt relatively good as I started off, I was taking it slow though. It felt less good up hills, but not terrible. I planned to drive six hours a day, giving the van breaks whenever it needed.

Things changed when I hit Southern Oregon, the I5 goes through a pretty significant mountain pass. I’d been driving for about four hours that day when I hit it. As soon as we hit the inclines I was going about 60km/hr and pushing it. I felt like I was climbing that stupid mountain forever, white knuckled singing empty prayers to Virgin Mary on the roof box.

To my right a shiny green sign read 3000ft. I held my breath, the van whined.

3500ft, I read as another sign floated by, “Surely this is it” I pleaded.

4000ft. “Oh god.”

We were slowing down, my transmission started slipping and all I could see around me and ahead of me was snowy mountain tops. Panicky I pulled off to check my fluid levels (it was all I could think to do), they were fine. Sitting on the side of the highway, alone in southern Oregon and with no other options, uneasily I climbed back into the van and continued on.

4,310ft the final sign read.

The next sign I happened upon was much more welcome, it advertised a mechanic in the first town up here, Ashland. I immediately pulled off. I strode into the auto shop nearly shaking, “I think I overfilled my transmission fluid, how bad can that be?” I asked (I had slightly overfilled it while topping it up the day before). There was at least 6 men sitting in the cramped office space, chatting and joking. “You think?” One of them laughed with raised eyebrows, they all stared at me amused and said someone would come look.

Ron came to look, he told me the fluid level was fine and “in fact these old engines actually like a bit more”. He assured me that these vans were powerhouses and that I would make it home, but that whirring sound? “That’s your transmission, just take it slow.” I don’t know if he actually believed that I’d make it, but I think he sensed that it was what I’d needed to hear. Maybe he was just sending me down the highway to become somebody else’s problem.

I looked at the auto shop.
I looked at the van.
Both dwarfed by the mountains surrounding. Everything felt very big, I felt very small.
Whisps of my hair floated in the wind, sifting through my field of vision. I watched as snowflakes fell around me, I was bundled up in the warmest clothes that I had but still the cold mountain air nipped at my skin. Time stood still.

What the fuck.

Back to the van I went.

I made it about another 30 minutes and pulled off just north of Grants Pass, it was getting late in the day and the van was tired, all I saw ahead was another incline.

I holed up for the night under the watchful eye of Ray’s Food Market, tucked beside dumpsters and trash. Basically, I was on a stretch of the I5 where I could take a three hour detour and back track to California and get to the coast through this weird side highway or stick it out on the I5 through the mountains to Eugene, OR. I spent about six hours alternating between topographical maps and flattestroute.com (which turned out to be very useful) trying to figure things out, trying to get any semblance of idea about what lay ahead. My thinking was that if the van didn’t make it out of these mountains I’d need to be prepared to well and truly ditch everything. How on earth was I going to get my valuables, 3 surfboards (including a 9ft longboard), wetsuits, and other things out of here without the van? I wouldn’t, I concluded. Also, I wasn’t out of money, but should the van quit in these mountains I was going to be out of money very, very soon.

So, the back tracking to the coast route seemed enticing, I’d rather be stuck on the coast than in the mountains and I figured it would be easier to get my belongings home from there should the van give up. Alternatively though, this side highway I would take to backtrack also seemed to have tricky inclines and spots without cell service - not sweet. To make everything worse, I had only tomorrow to get out of here before another storm with a bunch of snow hit Oregon. Adding to it, I didn’t feel the safest in the town I was in, and maybe that was a result of the anxiety I was already experiencing, but I slept with a knife in arm’s reach and peaked through the windows at any sound that didn’t sit well. I spent that night spiraling for sure. It was one of those nights where you recount all of your sins and try to make deals with a god that you don’t even know if you believe in. You know the, “If you let me out of this mountain pass I promise I’ll be a good person forever.” schtick.

I lose my appetite while on the road, and that doesn’t help with the whole rational thinking thing I needed to be doing, so I was essentially force-feeding myself this day and the rest that followed (I don’t do well with stress). I even tried to sit in meditation at one point, hoping some magical answer would come to me. It didn’t. So, I decided to sleep and that I would know what to do in the morning.

I woke early, I’m going to Eugene, if I can make it to Eugene everything will be ok. So, to Eugene I went. And after a slow, white knuckled morning, whispering affirmations to the van as we crawled through the mountain pass I made it to Eugene. I was well and truly ready to throw up. After that though, I knew things would be fine, in other words I wouldn’t have to ditch everything I held valuable. I was taking it town by town and the Astro did just keep trucking along. I got very used to being the slowest car on the highway. Every new destination passed felt like a blessing.

A day later I was in Washington, mapping my path to the Port Angeles ferry via flattestroute.com. I’d been in contact with my family and through the grapevine been invited to stay with a cousin in Victoria until I sorted myself out. And of course, throughout this all my eye had been on the surf forecast back home (sue me). So, somehow I managed to weasel my way into having a friend wait up for me so that I could hop off the ferry, clear customs, and immediatley jump into their van to go an hour west of town to the surf.

Now, when I showed up to my cousins house later that day I don’t know if he and his lovely fiancé knew what they were getting themselves into; letting the derelict surfer of the family stay at their place. I showed up 5 days unshowered, hungry, and soggy. I’d stay a night or two I graciously told them. I had literally no idea what was going on or what I was doing, I was just trying to get back to Tofino. And then the realization of being 23, somewhat homeless, and unemployed sank in. Ah yes, just where I’d pictured myself. It would be the grandest of lies if I said that I didn’t seriously question literally every decision I had made to land me here. I mean I’d chosen this when I moved into the van months ago, it just didn’t feel as good in this current moment as it did back then.

So, I went to get the van looked at. I took it to a transmissions place, and guess what! That Transmission Paranoia that I’d lugged around with me the past few months existed solely in my head. I’ve never felt so happy and so stupid all at once to be proven wrong. Now, don’t get too brash and start judging me too much. I’d had two mechanics look at the van and listen to the issues and tell me that yes, my transmission was likely on its way out. But in summary, you can literally never know what is going to happen. So why bother trying to predict the future? Why bother harboring anxiety, the disease of the future, as that’s all it is really. Anyways, the van did need some decent engine repairs, but my transmission being ok meant that I still had a van, and I rejoiced.

The next day I continued to Tofino, I was going to make it home! Something I’d been very unsure of up until I was actually heading up the island, and at a better pace! After some much needed love the van was feeling fresh (Ron was right, these vans are in fact powerhouses). Me on the other hand, I was exhausted.

Slide the door open
Just to feel it stick along its track

Feet on pavement
Ground

Swivel right to gaze upon the department store
Or the busted camper van a few spots over

The highway sits left
I trudge into the café

Tidy the van before you clamber in
We’ll wobble through morning nausea

Onto the highway once again
Hear the podcast about freedom

See the lot shrink in the rearview
We’re free, remember?