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In the Jebediah Smith Redwood State Park Ranger Station in a town that we believe to be called Gasket we were presented the proverbial good news and bad news and I, for one, was not amused. As that Ben’s legs were not cooperating enough to allow him to dismount from his bicycle, I went in and asked the ranger warden — who wasn’t nearly as pretty as my fair Lacie in Chilmut or as interested in me for that matter — whether or not there might be vitals and a place to rest our weary heads. She said:

“Well, the nearest campsite is about two and a half miles from here. Other than that, you’ve got to go another ten or twelve. As for food, your best bet is the country store across the way.”

That was all. She turned away to talk with someone obviously more interesting than I but I, for one, was not finished. In fact: I had hardly even begun. The post-prandial had effected Ben’s legs but it was my head that suffered.

“Ah ah ah, my wonderful warden of all things green and growing, before you return to your petty conversation with this lemming about tedious and trivial matters, please tell me more about this campsite and how is it that my Heterosexual Life Partner and I might come across it?”

“It’s that way.”

Her finger pointed in an all too familiar direction. A direction that was familiar to myself only because that was the exact direction from which Ben and I had most recently ridden; a direction from which we had coasted down a considerable incline the past two and a half miles; a direction that, if chosed to pursue, would require that we backtrack.

Unspoken rule between Ben and Damon #2,453: under no circumstances, including death, loss of loved one, or scurvy, shall we ever “backtrack.” (See footnote: Backtracking: traveling in a direction previously traveled without initial intention of revisiting said roadway; otherwise known as: admitting you have gone the wrong way; otherwise known as: acknowledging that you should have asked for directions sooner; otherwise known as: something Ben and Damon refuse to do.)

“Is there nothing else,” I ventured, “O warden of growth and greenery, nothing else that might suit as a reasonable and affordable resting place for our tired buttocks and weary legs in that direction?” I pointed my finger.

“Yea, ten or twelve miles from here but they’re full up; you’d have to go to Crescent City and that’s another fifteen to twenty miles after that.”

“Curses!” I shouted. “Of all the rotten luck.” I slammed my forehead against the contour map of the area and closed my eyes for a moment and imagined how things were the last time I had ventured into a ranger station, how my eyes had met a fair beauty in green, how there was drywall and the musky scent of sex in the air, how she had touched my hand and I had stared into her eyes, and how she had told me –

“Dispersed. Good God woman if you value nothing in this wretched hovel of a workplace answer me this one question and I will either forever revere your visage or spit upon it and piss curses in cursive on the grass while singing On Top of Old Smokey — can we or can we not disperse our campsite?”

She cracked a small smile then — as if a secret word had been exchanged between two foreign operatives that signified they were on the same side. Stepping away from the lemming, she nodded, and she warmed to me immediately and I could tell we would be great friends but not great lovers. Very poor lovers. So poor, in fact, that it was obvious to both me and her that it was better to remain friends.

“Why yes,” she said, “Yes you can. And before you continue your search for love, truth, and scrambled eggs, I have some wonderful dispersed campsite suggestions for you!”

A new person. New life. She pulled out a map with more detail than a life sized re-creation of the entire Jebediah forest and soon: we were on our way.

DAMON: It is July 6th, Ben and I are un-dispersing our dispersed campsite, as it were. Last night there was an unfortunate incident with a Cliff Bar and a bunch of sand, which I am not yet comfortable relating. I don’t feel emotionally ready just at this stage. Needless to say, it was horrific, sad — we had a moment of silence. We tried to wash it off. It made it only worse as the gravel seeped deep into chocolate-chippy caverns of the Cliff Bar. And then it was tossed like so much hot water. This morning, woke up a little bit later, did a little yoga, ate by the river, went and dropped a tremendous load [chuckling fondly] into the dispersed campground latrine. It was joyous. Sounds reverberated through bass-like proportion for miles to come. Now we’re packing up and going to Crescent City where all our hopes and dreams are. We need internet, we need movies, we need Indian of Thai food, we need — as it were — civilization. Over and out.

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