The Drive
We had a few false starts on the drive up, which didn't get started until a bit later than we wanted anyway. Add in stopping for dinner, gas, and two fruitless attempts to find men's swim trunks on clearance (nothing but sweatshirts and hunting gear as far as the eye can see) and we didn't actually get to the hotel in Mackinaw City (we're staying on the mainland the first night) until after midnight.
I was disappointed at first that our drive was so dark because I couldn't see the colors change. The further north you go this time of year, the more advanced the change in the leaves. I really looked forward to seeing that. But then I realized that there was something else to see. Stars. The moon didn't rise until around midnight, which meant that the stars were amazing. Living in the light-polluted city, I usually only see an amazing sky filled with stars once or twice a year when I go up to camp. I was thrilled this evening to see three shooting stars. I don't remember the last time I saw a shooting star.
It seems to me that living in my smallish city limits my scope. Trees crowd the sky, buildings crowd the ground, the river is hemmed in by banks, the lakes are small. I spend most of my time in my office at home or in my small fenced-in yard. But driving down a black highway in the blackest night and finding myself rediscovering the sea of stars above helps ease me back to a state where I can experience something big.
Looking out the sliding glass doors of my Mackinaw City hotel room I see a lazy half moon laying on its side, it's radiance reflected in the waters of Lake Huron below. In the morning, the rising sun will reveal that great expanse of water under a cold, clear sky. And then this trip will truly begin.
I don't know about you, but I get a very specific feeling when I am confronted with the reality of my situation on this earth. I am small and the world is so amazing. When I sit under a sky saturated with starlight or gaze across the water toward the far horizon or walk through a silent pine forest alone but for an ethereal moth floating by, those are the moments when my chest tightens and I feel as if the weight of this incredible world is pressing down on me—in a good way. The immensity and importance and history of the world bears down on my heart and I am overwhelmed.
It's a feeling difficult to describe, but I do think the lyrics of a favorite Indigo Girls song begin to capture it:
This world falls on me with hopes of immortality.
Everywhere I turn all the beauty just keeps shaking me.
