Gusty trees

Well, I'm back in the bay area now, after the past week's insanity composed of lab wrapup and packing. The weather was (and still is) horrible. The drive up from south Cal involved going through two hills of reasonable altitude (I hesitate to call them mountains, but I'm not entirely sure what I should be calling them when they're high enough to make my ears pop while driving up), and the drive, I can safely say, was the most terrifying driving experience I have ever had in my life. Both places had parts where it was raining so hard that it felt like someone was dumping giant buckets of water on the car, and parts were foggy as well. The Gilroy part was slightly better but it was windy, to the point where the car would be blown partway into the next lane over. Both regions of course, involved sharing roads with giant trucks which always terrified me whenever I drive long distance, even when the weather is good and I don't have to worry about traction and inertia relative to mass and speed. There were parts where I had visibility of around three feet and spent the entire time clenching my steering wheel until my fingers started to cramp (which doesn't actually reduce my chances of accident, but was done to have something to hold on to and make me feel a little better), and the really fun part was how, because of the low visibility, I can't even see the hills around me. It felt as if I was driving through a dream, with the heavy sheets of grey pouring down on all sides and nothing but the yellow lines on my left and two faint glowing spots of red in front of me to let me know I haven't, in fact, wandered off the surface of reality.

Well-- that and the feelings of caffeine and andrenaline burning through my veins, the music turned up so loud that I can feel the bass in my teeth.

(I caved in and bought a mocha. Yes it was really that terrifying -- there was a point where the weather worsened so suddenly in the middle of the turn that I'm pretty sure that I managed an "Oh fucking hell", when the road seemed to suddenly disappear from beneath me -- my classmates would be so proud. And there was a point where Bon Jovi was singing about how it felt like summer and I started laughing because it really, really, didn't.)

But you know what?

Somewhere between the expletives and trying to make sure I don't join the many, many cars parked / being towed on the side of the road, it was fun.

There was a region near Fresno where we crested a slight rise on the Five, and the weather was clear so you can see the acres of orchards in every direction, the yellow grass shot through with green from where life is reviving itself with the much needed water. There were hills in every direction, gold and green with splashes of indigo-violet, and there were layers upon layers of cloud, piled into another, more ethereal landscape on top. Maybe it was the "omg no rain" bias -- and I'll be lying if I said that the process of getting there had no affect on my perception, because the experience in reaching the ending will always influence my perception of the ending -- but that place -- that place / moment / feeling -- it was beautiful.

There was also how, after the initial shock of "Oh God, this is really bad", I got to the part where I was grinning madly (no doubt from the combination of andrenaline and caffeine) and felt really alive after weeks and weeks of fruitless trouble shooting experiments in lab have sent my mind into (what now felt like) a kind of robotic haze. It was how, I think, that the experimence really drove home the feeling of how my life is now in the hands of no one but myself, in the most literal, visceral sense possible. Possibly I could've had that epithany without braving the inclement weather, but I doubt it'd make me feel quite as intoxicated and gleeful.

My least favorite part was, actually, how the glass kept fogging up and I had to turn on the air to get rid of it and the air was really. I was already wishing for gloves about an hour out of LA.

It was ironic that the region with the highest density of accidents was the twenty minute stretch right after I left Lucy's. In fact the first accident I encountered was the one on the highway ramp right outside of her house, which was blocked enough that I ended up going to the next street over to enter the highway. That was also the only real spot of traffic jam that I had to deal with.

That being said, I will never take this kind of trip if there's someone else in the car with me. Or at least, I will break the trip into an additional day or something, and stick to the right most lane. I don't recommend driving six hours in downpour, nor do I feel particularly inclined to do it again, now that I've proven to myself that yes, I can indeed drive for six hours under less than optimal conditions.

Now I'm going to eat dinner, sleep a lot, and possibly regret sounding like an idiot come next morning.