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Fresh out of the desert, it was my second camping trip with Back 2 Basics Sober Living Outdoor Adventures and my first time at the Grand Canyon.
Looking out on to the Grand Canyon feels like being in several worlds at once for two ideas antithetically crashing together. It is the epitome of the yin and yang, mother earth and father sky, nephilism and absurdism, making a nostalgic intertwining of paradox.
As I walk down into the canyon my feet feel light and stumble down the trail. My feet fear falling but my mind wonders the undulating cracks dripping down the canyon. I imagine the canyon before tourism became a fad, when the Colorado River was roaring and erosion just started to make its mark. Melancholy rolls through me like a broken record. I realize it is impossible to take in the whole canyon. My mind is far too incapable to even try to grasp the canyon. It is like searching for an answer to a question that has never been asked.
When we got to the three mile mark from the top, vegetation was just starting to be visible. I looked for comfort in the greenery but the trees and plants were just laughing along as they whispered secrets of the past before. I started to walk back up the Grand Canyon at a fast pace feeling like I was looking for something I had lost long ago. Going faster and faster, I reach the halfway point and sit next to some backpackers.
I chuckle because the feeling of optimistic nephilism sets in. As I look into the crevices and the river beyond, I think to myself that nothing really matters. The world is far too unique and wondrous to worry about anything else. I continue to walk up the canyon laughing louder now. I laugh at all the crap I fret about, at all the absurdity and contradictions of humanity. My mind races, I start to feel light and a splurge of peace comes over me. This nephilistic mindset is usually upsetting to me but in that moment I felt a heavy weight lifted from me.
If there is a word to describe what I was feeling it would be complete and utter gratitude. Gratitude for my legs, arms, and heart pumping. Gratitude for trees, a warm sleeping bag, my sobriety and a bowl of oatmeal in the morning. I felt gratitude for the most mundane and arbitrary things in this world. Gratitude for all of it, the good and the bad. It was as if there was a harmonious connection with order and disorder, beauty and chaos. When beginning to feel sucked into the disarray of society, it is nice to remember that there is more than what meets the eye.
The last mile up I met a woman in her late sixties backpacking through Europe and the Middle East. As she told me her stories I could see contentment plastered on her face. A contentment that is not often found in this world. For a minute I felt that I too could accept the ebb and flow of the universe. That no matter how terrible a day can be, I can still laugh at the absurdity of it all and be happy just to be alive.
Journal from Back 2 Basics Sober Living Client