Chesler Park

My goal for the drive into the park was to re-instill absolutely stupid levels of confidence to compensate for the previous twenty four hours.  I yelled over the top of Ice Cube, butchering what lyrics I knew, my speakers rattling my car’s innards so ruthlessly that I couldn’t see into my trembling rear view mirrors.  By the time I left my little jeep at the Elephant Hill Trailhead a second time, I was faking a go-get ‘em attitude so well that I’d just about convinced myself—and where that fell short in easing what was left of my anxiety, the beauty of the day was starting to take care of the rest.
Elephant Hill, like the rest of these lands, had always been somewhat otherworldly—yet under the blaring sun, the bright colors and bizarre terrain, it was hard to believe it was real whatsoever.  The earth had turned a shade of magnificent copper, blanketed by the spiny black clumps of cryptobiotic soil and unevenly speckled with vivacious dark green swatches of pinyon pines and junipers.  Outlandish, alien-like flowers shot up between vicious spiny desert brush.  The sandstone alternated in shade from to light taupe to deep rusts with every ancient corroded layer, a technicolor mineral display on the boulders, pinnacles, and slabs. The sky, a delicate powder blue, met the harsh red desert in a stunning clash of hues, a perfect oppositional compliment.  ‘What an earth we live on, where things like this can exist,’ I thought to myself a few times.
God, I was lucky to experience it.  I told myself that then.  But I had also told myself that through the berating wind, through the freezing flood crossings, through the hours climbing in and out of rock gullies, through hiding in the bottom of my sleeping bag, through being chewed up and spit out by these canyons—somehow, I’d managed remember that being in this place was an honor, regardless of the discouragement it had dished out to me.  Every experience, every lesson given at the hands of this prophetic land was a gift—whatever those experiences may be.  Hell, I could undergo the ultimate experience at the hands of this desert—meet my inevitable mortal end—and I’d shrivel up on my sandstone deathbed oozing gratitude. I’d be a blessing to go down by the beauty of the wilderness, to be ushered from the physical world by this serenity, to return my vessel to the earth and offer its consummation to sustain the next spirit’s vessel.  
Not to say I was ready to go.  But I could accept it.  I was so grateful to simply be alive, to exist, to be a part of the world, that if I were to die right then… At least I’d gotten to participate.  A sentiment I always carry within myself, I believe, but takes something like a desert—moreover, the natural world in general—to bring out.  Every now and then, I need the gentle (or harsh, I suppose) reminder of how impossible and remarkable my (or any) existence is.  Whether the responsible party(s) is some almighty being—in benevolence or wretchedness or plain and simple boredom—formed all this from nothingness, or whether few random molecules decided to do a few arbitrary things that lead up to widespread atomic happenings that ultimately formed the universe, the existence of anything, really, is an undeniable miracle.  And I’ve somehow become lucky enough to play a role in this original enigma of existence. To die is to give back to the mystery what it gave to me, to contribute to continuation of the grand, beautiful marvel, to assure the next being the inexplicable wonder of being alive.  I wouldn’t wish death upon myself, but at that moment in time, I’d understand if it needed to happen.  The readiness is all.
The beauty of the day had urged more of my fellow species from their wheeled metal boxes and onto their feet.  I tag-teamed with a family of nearly fifteen midwesterners all the way into Elephant Canyon—I plowed past them on anything flat or downhill, but they caught me on uphills without the thigh-killing weight of a pack.  They were rather curious about my solo trek, asking me a myriad of questions every time we overlapped.  They informed me that they had been considering their own backcountry trip, which apparently I helped plan and inspire as I rattled off the necessary sights and steps to get there.  The interactions steadily rebuilt my confidence, and by the time I parted with them at the edge of Chesler Park, I wasn’t faking the go get’em attitude anymore.
In the sunlight, Chesler Park reminded me of a massive uncut gem.  The Needles were protrusions of the underlying amber-colored jewel; the prickly pear, grass, and cryptobiotic soil of the open range was the moss at lichen still lining the non-precious rock shell.  The Majority of Chesler Park was open range, ringed by stone towers and pinnacles on all sides. The same remarkable colors that painted Elephant Hill drenched the land, but the grass on the miniature plain-land between rock towers added swatches of silvery ochre and sage. 
I tromped across the expanse, I imagine, with a persistent grin subconsciously spread from ear to ear.  The trail zigged in and out of the open range, favoring the perimeter of the Needles and placing me at the very feet of the monstrous towers.  I had to stop moving altogether and crank my neck back as far as it’d go (more accurately, as far as the backpack would allow) to attempt to spot the meeting point between rock and sky.  Occasionally there’d be a break in pinnacles, opening a window to Elephant Canyon far below.  I wandered off trail to one such vista, teetering out along an uneven shelf in the rock face, basking for a minute in the thrill of “if I lean half an inch to my right I will topple a hundreds of feet down cliffs, boulders, and cactus,” and “holy shit, this is an incredible view.”
And that was how I continued to make my way through Chesler Park—leisurely, explorative, considering the metaphorical and non metaphorical value of the cliffs that lay a tip away from the marvelous view. I arrived at site CP2 at about 12:00 PM, one of a series of campsites privately nestled in a string of boulders in the center of Chesler Park.  I choose to set up shop in a triangular space between one large boulder, a smaller, vertical slab of rock, and a measly juniper—a cozily sheltered corner.  Only after I’d fully poled and staked my tent did I realize that the split between rock slab and boulder was actually a wind tunnel.  I prayed the weather stay forgiving while I sat down to eat lunch.
Naturally, of course, it didn’t.  The wind picked up, and with it my previous anxieties; I patrolled the site for hoards of extra rocks to weigh my tent down despite the fact I’d already triple-checked its stability.  The sun began to disappear every now and then behind clouds; some of which that drifted in the distance had telltale smears of rain from beneath their bellies.  I decided to additionally double check the rainfly and move any of my outside belongings into the tent.  At some point I ran out of trivial security tasks, so I rounded up my notebook, camera, raincoat and Satellite Messenger and wearily proceeded with my plan to day-hike the Joint Trail.
The Joint Trail doesn’t fully qualify as a slot canyon—it isn’t water-formed—but similarly is a slit in the land that is not somewhere you want to be should it start down-pouring rain.  A brief eighth of a mile long, it leads you through a three-foot-wide break in the sandstone, at times as deep as thirty to forty feet.  A fabulous choice for a claustrophobe, such as myself—especially with looming weather.  
I took off from CP2 nervously toying with my raincoat, wondering if I had made a mistake in leaving my down sweater behind at camp, hoping with every ounce of my being that my tent wouldn’t blow away.  I watched the clouds neurotically, trying to see if I could predict what they had in store by what direction they were moving, how thick they were, which way the wind was carrying them, how they got broken up over the canyon walls in the far-off distance.  All useless, of course.  I didn’t have a clue what they are going to do.  However, that didn’t change the fact they spelled an impending doom.  Just like that, the lighthearted joy of traveling through Chesler Park earlier was replaced by obsessive planning for the worse.  What the hell was I doing?

I came to a full stop on the trail.  I mean, for Christsakes, how could I possibly be upset over something as petty as weather? I was there!  What more could I ask for!  Look around, Lex.  Is this not the most beautiful place you’ve ever seen?  It’d still be goddamn gorgeous (albeit unpleasant) in the wildest, wicked storm concocted—but that hadn’t even happened yet, and even if it were to, I would’ve wasted all my glorious pre-storm moments thinking about the damn storm.  All of the gratitude for life that had swelled in my belly earlier hinged on the wonder for the present moment; the second I uninvolved myself from that, I lost sight of every reason I had to enjoy myself.  I slapped myself lightly on each cheek as if somehow physical stimulus would wake the mental up, then continued on the trail thinking to myself that maybe those zen buddhists are really onto something with their present-moment obsession.