Trippin’

Sixteen years ago I watched Mike and Rachel’s car drive away. I took a deep breath, turned around, and scanned the barbed wire fence that ran alongside the highway. Time to make camp.

***

It was spring break of my sophomore year in college and I was up for an adventure. Everyone in my motley crowd had been making big plans of one kind or another for weeks, and since I didn’t have anything better to do, I decided to hitchhike to Sedona, Arizona.

I asked around to see if anyone was up for joining me. A few of us were high on Kerouac and Edward Abbey, though I was the only female to enjoy hitching rides. And I had never taken a cross country trip. But since no one else was interested in coming, I started to plan a solo trek.

I looked at maps, gathered advice, and tied up my sleeping bag, totally confident in my ability to journey there and back in one piece. Although I would be starting out from my college town in southern Colorado, I wouldn’t be on my own for the first leg. A couple of friends were heading to Taos, New Mexico, for the week and could take me as far as Tres Piedras before they turned east. From there I would head south until making the fabled left turn at Albuquerque to travel I-40 into Arizona.

Why Sedona? Why not? I’d heard it was beautiful. Going there for spring break sounded like a lark. I had three dollars. I had a stash of crackers and cheese. I had a canteen. And I had the full support of everyone around me. Until the night before.

“Are you sure about this, Geph?”

“Hey, if you want to crash with us over break, you’re welcome to come…”

“Man, doing this alone may not be such a hot idea.”

You know why they were saying that? I knew it was because I was a woman. A bunch of the guys had traveled alone and no one ever showed any concern. Now here I was the morning of leaving and everyone was saying goodbye like they would never see me again. No way was I going to back out now. So I smiled and razzed them about their hangdog faces and got in the car.

***

Now Mike and Rach were gone. It was dusk and I needed to find a place to sleep. (Because I wanted to be on the safe side, I had vowed not to find rides after nightfall.) So I chucked my pack and bedroll over the fence and eased between the wires. On the other side there was a gully to camp in that would be out of the breeze and hide the light of a fire from the road. Homey.

Before it got too dark, I gathered firewood and laid out my little camp. It was a pitiful, sad start. Did you know that it is cold in northern New Mexico in April? And did you know that piñon pine is a bearcat to get burning? True and true. And once I got a fire going, and once I found a spot to sleep that didn’t have any cactus, I found out something I didn’t learn from reading all those adventures: dang, it’s lonely out there on your own.

My parents didn’t know where I was. I had no one to talk to. So I settled, fully clothed, into my bag and lay under the giant, clear sky to listen to the coyotes and wait for daybreak.

 

———–

 

I woke up at daybreak after a cold, wary night. My fire was out. I had kept it going through the night, since I had only skimmed the surface of sleep. Cars were rushing down the highway just over the ridge so it was time to pack up and begin traveling in earnest.

It was a good morning to set out. The air was crisp, the sky still streaked with pink. I eased back through the barbed-wire fence, strapped on my pack, and started to walk. I felt blissfully unconnected from my life, my stuff, or anyone I knew. As I heard cars coming I turned around, chin thrust and thumb out, and waited for a ride.

I didn’t have to wait long. A white pickup pulled over and I trotted up to meet it. A woman in her late thirties with a smart, dark bob and business attire smiled at me and asked, “Need a ride?” What a great way to start the journey.

“Thanks!” I was on my way.

“Where are you headed?” She asked. As a rule, that’s the first question a driver asks when you hop in. When planning the trip, I had prepared a story.

“I’m going home to Sedona, Arizona, for spring break to see my folks.” It was believable and also let the driver know that someone was waiting for me on the other end. It seemed logical that I would be less likely to be hurt or messed with if I was expected somewhere.

I wasn’t stupid – I knew that hitchhiking had definite risks. So I had personal guidelines to minimize my chances of trouble. In addition to no riding at night, I wouldn’t ride in a vehicle with more than one man in it. I wouldn’t hitch in semi trucks. I would keep my backpack on my lap in case I needed to jump ship. I had pepper spray tucked into the sock that was nearest the passenger-side door. And if I ever got a weird feeling when someone pulled over, I would tell them thanks but no thanks and walk away. All in all, I figured I was pretty safe.

“Do your folks know you’re hitchhiking?” She asked me.

Lady, I thought, you have no idea. “Oh, no. My ride fell through at the last minute. I like the road, anyway.”

“I make a point of picking up girls like you. What you’re doing is dangerous, you know. It’s not like years ago – there are a lot of bad people out there. Anyway, I can get you safely to the other side of Santa Fe.”

“I appreciate it. Thanks.” I sat back and relaxed. It was worth a lecture to ride with someone so nice. It was usually the nice ones who lectured, anyway. I watched the scenery go by and we chatted back and forth until it was time to drop me back on the side of the road.

“You be safe, now. And think about catching a bus.” she admonished. Then I closed the truck’s door and she waved and drove away. I paused long enough to eat a few crackers and drink some water. The day still stretched long in front of me and I had far to go.

I zipped up my pack, slung it on my back, and started looking for another ride.

 

—————-

 

So far, things were going pretty well. The weather was sunny, I had nothing but time and road in front of me, and the first ride of the day had been kind. After my light snack, I was ready to get going again.

Cars zinged by as I waited. The lady in the white pickup had taken me all the way through to the southeast edge of Santa Fe and dropped me on Interstate 25 west. Being on a main road brought more possibilities and I leapfrogged from one vehicle to the next until I had worked my way through Albuquerque and ended up on a nowhere stretch of I-40.

I had time to scarf a few more crackers before a long black Chrysler driven by a little black man pulled over. “You need a ride?’ he hollered in a light Cajun accent. I got in, told him where I was headed, and he said he could take me as far as Gallup.

A lot of hitchhiker’s tales involve pretty strange people, even improbable people. I think it’s mainly because it takes an unusual mindset to pick up strangers off the side of the road and give them a ride. Whatever the case, my drivers so far had been pretty run of the mill – even the businesswoman that began the day. Now I found myself traveling with a character. What was a Cajun doing in the west armpit of New Mexico, anyway?

Oh, this and that. He spun tales about his kids, his jobs, different people he knew. He was one of the most talkative, jovial individuals I had ever encountered, punctuating his stories with raucous laughter. Then he interrupted himself. “Hey, what you got there?”

I had pulled my kit out of my pack and was rolling a cigarette. As a broke college student I economized by rolling my own from a can of loose tobacco rather than doing the logical thing and quitting. Since my ride was smoking, I figured it would be okay if I lit up, too.

I had underestimated – he was pleased as punch. “You’re good! I bet you roll a joint pretty good, too.” he laughed.

“Been known to.” I smiled.

“Well, girl, I got a friend in Gallup. I’ll set you up with some good weed for the road. I’ll just give it to yuh.” And he launched into a story about that friend, too.

Of the entire route to Sedona, the one place I had been told over and over not to stop was Gallup. By all accounts it was the La Brea tar pit of evil consequences for unsuspecting girls like me. It was violent, it was crime-ridden, and I had promised not to thumb there. Now I wasn’t just stopping, I was being driven around in it. You know those neighborhoods where you lock the doors on your car and hope you get green lights the whole way through? That’s where I was. But what could I do? Staying put was a much better option than getting out.

We wandered around, street to street. Now and then he would see someone he knew and pull over to ask if they had seen so-and-so because he needed weed for this girl he picked up on the freeway. They would nod hello. “You should see her roll a cigarette!” he cackled. He thought I was a novelty.

After what felt like forever, he admitted defeat and headed back to drop me off on I-40. “I’m sorry I couldn’t find him.” I assured him that, honestly, it was no big deal. He told me to be careful and to enjoy the rest of my trip. I said thanks, I would, and restrained myself from kneeling down and kissing the gravel shoulder as he drove away.

There wasn’t time to celebrate, anyway. I wanted to get going again as quickly as possible, so I started walking and waiting for the next car. It seemed like traffic was picking up and I wanted to be ready.

 

———————

 

I had survived an unscheduled tour of the seedy side of Gallup, New Mexico, and was more than ready to get back on the road again. It was getting along into the afternoon and I had a lot of ground to cover before reaching Sedona.

I started walking and thumbing the passing cars. It was the quiet part of the day and traffic had thinned, but I had never had a problem catching rides before.

Until now. I waited. And I walked. I took off my jacket and tied it to my pack. And I walked some more.

Wow. Was it ever quiet.

It started to occur to me that I may be stuck camping outside The Forbidden City that night when a little red pickup pulled over. Battered and faded, all it needed was the “YO” on the back to complete the picture. I hustled up to the window.

“Need a ride?” Sitting in the teeny truck were two guys about my age, only a whole lot bigger. They seemed good-natured and wouldn’t have been alarming if I had passed them on the street or seen them playing on the football field, which is what they were built for. But where did they expect me to sit? The two of them pretty much filled up the whole cab.

The guy in the passenger seat smiled. “Where you headed?”

“Sedona, Arizona…” I said uncertainly, trying to assess the situation and size up my chances.

The driver leaned over a little. “We can take you as far as Flagstaff. Throw your stuff in the back and hop in!”

You know that little teeny voice in your head? That feeling that warns you when something is an incredibly bad idea? Even though my mama had taught me to listen to that voice, I had carefully cultivated the ability to ignore it. Or to see it as an invitation to jump headlong into adventure.

But now was not the time for youthful rebellion. “Um, you know guys, I think I’m going to catch the next one. Thanks, though.”

They grinned and assured me that they were safe, but I felt better the minute I turned them down. It was the right choice. So I breathed deep and watched them pull back onto the road and wave goodbye. And I was back to looking for either a ride or a long walk until I found a place to spend the night in the bushes.

As I hiked the shoulder, a white sedan pulled over. “Hey, where you headed?”

Driving the cluttered car was a big Native American man, but at least he was traveling alone. I put my bedroll in the back, climbed in, and shoved my pack down by my feet. The warning feeling was still nagging me, but I brushed it off as leftovers from the jocks in the pickup. After all, I needed to get away from Gallup and here was my chance.

How bad could one guy be?

 

—————————-

 

I was finally out of Gallup. I settled into my seat, watched the land slide by, and prepared for the usual chitchat with the driver.

He was a big, big man. Not like a sumo wrestler, and not like Arnold Schwarzenegger, but tall and stocky. He had a place on the Navajo rez, he said, but traveled in his car a lot. That was obvious, from the looks of the interior. Clothes, wrappers, magazines… for all I knew he had small appliances and furry animals back there, somewhere in the castoff heaps covering the back seat.

His slow, deep voice seemed laid back, almost nonchalant, at first. He had the typical questions about who I was and where I was going. I gave the usual vague answers. This wasn’t my first ride with a lone man, so I wasn’t nervous. I stayed alert but calm.

He said he could take me all the way to Sedona. “Awesome! That’d be great, thanks!” I smiled.

But that brought up a whole new problem. He wanted to know where to drop me off. Where did my parents live? Of all the scenarios I had gone through in my head, I had not planned out what to tell the driver who brought me to my destination. A small flicker of panic tickled at the base of my spine. That’s when he began asking more pointed questions.

“What part of town are you from?”

“What did you do, growing up?”

“When are your folks expecting you?”

And the question that sent waves of outright alarm up my back and over the back of my scalp to my eyebrows: “It’s getting close to dinner. Do you think your parents would let me come in, maybe have a sandwich or something?” He watched me carefully, sizing up my reaction. I gripped the seat with my hand closest to the door. Such a harmless question, but asked in such a quietly menacing way. If nothing else, he knew for sure that I was lying. But recanting was out of the question.

I smiled and tried to put on believable face. “Ha, ha! My parents will totally kill me if they find out I hitched to get here.” At least that much was true. “You can just drop me at the first gas station in town. I’ll call them from there.” Never mind that I couldn’t tell him what station in particular since I’d never been there before. I was going to stick with my story to the end.

As we zigzagged down the canyon to Sedona, the afternoon rays lit the red stone cliffs. Wow, I thought, it’s like a natural cathedral here. For a few awestruck moments, I forgot where I was inside the car and marveled at what was passing outside. I was so glad I had come. Now all I had to do was disentangle myself from my ride so I could enjoy it.

A Circle K loomed ahead, and I tried to stay steady when I spotted it. “Right there’s fine!”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to take you home? I don’t mind…”

I assured him that, no, this was great, but thanks. I hopped out, grabbed my stuff, and went in. He stayed parked out front and watched as I went to the pay phone just inside the front window. Any doubts he had about my story were roundly confirmed as I picked up the phone book and started thumbing through it. (After all, who needs to look up their parents’ number?) Eventually he drove off, and I leaned my head against the booth. I was safe.

So I rifled through the yellow pages. Time to call the oasis in the desert, the friend to the poor and homeless. Time to call the local Catholic Church.

—————————-

I had made it from Alamosa, Colorado to Sedona, Arizona in record time. I had seen wide miles of country pass under my feet while riding with strangers and I was tired out from being constantly alert for two days.

I had planned very carefully how to get here. I had given a lot of thought as to how to stay safe. And then I cheerfully left the rest up in the air. I had no one in town to stay with; I didn’t even have a map with me. To this day I can not explain why I didn’t think of what I was going to do once I got to where I was going. I had a vague notion that there might be a hostel nearby, even a homeless shelter. And though I wasn’t Catholic, I wasn’t above mooching a little from the church that is so famous for taking in the destitute.

So I used some of my precious change to call the church office from the Circle K pay phone. A man’s voice greeted me on the other end and I explained my situation.

“Hi! I’ve been hitching, and my last ride just dropped me off here in Sedona. I was wondering if there was any place I could stay for the night and get my bearings.”

Long pause.

“Little girl, you came to the wrong town.”

I stood there in disbelief. Basically, the good Father was not just saying no, but no way. I asked if, please, there was any place at all and he assured me that no, there was nowhere and goodbye. I hung up and stared out the window into the darkening parking lot. I took a deep breath, picked up my pack and bedroll and went outside to assess the situation.

I was exhausted. I was lonely. I was broke. And I was in for a long night. I started walking down the road past tourist shops and signs with coyotes wearing bandannas and turned right on the first street I came to. Down the hill was an RV park full of actual happy campers. By now it was completely dark and since I couldn’t find a bridge or culvert to dig into until morning, I snuck to a camping spot in the back of the park and laid out my sleeping bag there. I hoped no one would see me and report me. And I hoped that if I did get caught, they would just make me leave and not call the police. But it was nice to hear friendly voices close by.

It was not the arrival I had hoped for, not by a long shot. I snuggled down into my bag and thought about what I would do the next day. I would have to get out before the sun was up so I wouldn’t be seen. After that, who could say?

————–

I woke up to a sky just starting to lighten. Stiff from lying on the packed earth of a parking spot, I peeked out of my bag to see if anyone was awake in the campground. Only a couple of early birds with the lights of their trailers on. I quietly wriggled out of my bag, packed up, and tiptoed out unnoticed.

Back on the road and walking uphill to the highway, I exhaled - half a sigh of relief, half a gust of disappointment. The sun was coming over the edge of the cliffs but it wasn’t beautiful here anymore. I was exhausted. I was hungry. I had traveled across two states with only a skeleton of a plan and had found out that tourist towns are not receptive to penniless hippies. On top of it all, the last ride that had brought me here had shaken me up more that I had realized at the time. Now I shuddered to think about the long ride home and the many rides I’d have to negotiate to get there.

No time like the present to start. Sedona wasn’t going to get any friendlier.

Trudging along the side of the road, I had plenty of time to mull over my decision to leave so soon, since the least likely demographic to pick up a hitchhiker is that of the vacationing family. As car after car whizzed by, I took in the sight of the red rock canyon in the morning. What had I come here for? To be some sort of Edward Abbey-esque misanthrope, howling in the woods and climbing the hills? To soak up the sights without the distraction of companionship? Instead, I was too tired to care. After all the work to come this far, all I wanted was to be back where people loved me enough to worry about the stupid stunts I pulled.

Finally, and enormous two-door pulled over. It was the color of a not-quite-ripe banana, and was big enough to be a contender for parade float status. I looked in as the passenger window rolled down and saw a roly-poly man with Colonel Sanders facial hair and a pale straw hat at the wheel. “Little girl, you need a ride?”

“Yes,” I sighed, “Yes I do, sir.”

And that was that. My big trip to the red towers was dead and I was high-tailing it home. Now all I had to do was get there.