#RSRSeesTheUSA Days 57-59: Redstone, CO
It’s been a few days of being (happily) offline while reproductive rights go even further into jeopardy in this country. I took my friends out to the Western Slope of Colorado, returning to the area I last left behind in December 2020 after resigning from the job that I’d moved out there for just before the pandemic hit in a globally massive way.
It’s going to take me a while to untangle and peruse through all the feelings this brought up. It felt good to bring this group of friends to these places. This is the group that grew closer throughout the pandemic through mutual support, that watched movies together online and shared our sourdough recipes and played Settlers of Catan together on the internet and hung out for hours on Zoom. These are the friends I was talking to most when my life was falling apart on me in Aspen.
So for them to visit this place (and yes, we did drive through Aspen, though there wasn’t much in the way of getting out of the car and walking around) felt like I was bringing them to see the places we’d talked about, as though they were visiting me here. It felt nice to have a sense of the familiar routes and places to recommend to them. It felt nice to see that, mostly, I was OK to be in this place again, where so much of my life had been re-routed so comprehensively.
Mostly.
I felt a fair amount of anxiety and discombobulation, as well. I felt grateful to have a prescription for an SSRI that has helped keep my emotions on a relatively stable keel for a couple tumultuous years now. I felt sad that my idealized life in the mountains didn’t materialize. I felt wistful about hypothetical alternate paths I might have taken and sad I didn’t get to make those choices all in the way I’d have liked to.
But I did make choices. They were the right ones for me then, and they’re still choices I stand by: all the way from taking the Aspen job to trying to make the Aspen job what I dreamed it could be to resigning from the Aspen job when it was very clearly not going to meet that dream.
It felt good to have a new set of memories as my most recent recollections of time in and around Aspen. To have a string of new jokes to remember; the pleasure of seeing others’ discovery and awe over the magnificence of this natural world; a shared experience of soaking in the geothermal hot pools of Avalanche Ranch (one of the more magical places I’ve been) instead of a solo one.
I have loved spending the last few days exploring and adventuring in company as curious as I am. I am also deeply drained after a whirlwind of a few days.
I’m heading into the last phase of this trip, which is the part where I head for home. I will miss all of this adventure and discovery. I will miss the blend of solo time and friendship time. I’m also looking forward to going home to see my parents and dog, all of whom I miss. I’m looking forward to the coming week of driving East as a time to reconnect with my own inner thoughts more quietly and reflectively.
Wildlife update:
elk
bighorn sheep
