I went to the desert to heal a wounded heart.
I had sat around in the valley long enough, in the growing cold and shadow of the late season, wracking my brain and heart after he left, wondering if he wanted to see me again. “He’s an idiot if he doesn’t,” my friends reassured me over hot coffee in the lodge cafeteria, commiserating in our own versions of aching hearts. I couldn’t get the pit in my stomach to go away, to stop physically dragging me down like an anchor to the bottom of the sea.
So I had to leave.
Packed up my van and headed south to the open, sunny desert of the Eastern Sierra.
The first few days I still felt the aching sense of loneliness, standing in my kitchen in the eerie quiet of the night, not quite knowing what to do in this new space I occupied.
So I face-timed my mom, drank wine and cooked steak. And all of that felt right, and nice. But I pined for a bigger distraction. So when my roommate asked if I wanted to go to Indian Creek for the weekend, I quickly agreed.
Four days later, covered in red desert dust, reeking of campfire and sweat, I felt happy for the first time in over a week. Waking up in the below-freezing chill of the morning in my tent, feeling the sun warm the air as I sipped coffee and watched the frost melt in our campsite, stretching my calves which were sore from the vertical approaches, my forearms which burned from long splitter cracks. I exhaled visible breath, and felt like myself again.
