This week has been an absolute hoot, let me tell you. In preparation for our Grand Road Trip, and also just because we wanted to do something fun and different, Jevon and I decided to do a test trip up to Humboldt County this week. There were many reasons for it: I'd never been there, and it is so quintessentially northern California, his mom's family is originally from the area, and we wanted to see just how uncomfortable it would be sleeping in the car before we commit to doing it for a week on the way to Illinois.
Also: there's a semi-famous theater company up there I'd never heard of, the Dell'Arte International School of Physical Theater, and they do a month-long theater festival every summer that Jevon had always wanted to see. So, we got tickets to the opening night of "Mary Jane: the Musical". That's right, a full length musical theater production about marijuana growers in Humboldt. It was so interesting. Like, way more interesting than I'd expected. I wasn't all that jazzed about watching a musical comedy about marijuana, seeing as that's not exactly my scene (I know, I'm a Berkeley grad student, I should stop being such a square all the time...), but it was actually fairly nuanced social commentary from a really interesting perspective. Plus the songs were really good! I can't say I ever expected to be sitting in the grass (no pun intended) at an outdoor theater in a tiny town in Humboldt County, wrapped in a sweater and a sleeping bag for the cold California summer night, watching a musical with a bunch of locals about the complicated economic and social issues surrounding marijuana growing. According to the play, marijuana brought in $2.6 billion to the Humboldt economy last year. Whether that figure's exactly right or not (although I'd think they'd have the best idea of anyone), I had no idea the extent to which pot dominates the local economy. I guess I'm totally naive, but it was a completely different social climate up there. Of course, the audience at the opening night of "Mary Jane: the Musical" is probably a self-selecting group, to a certain extent, but it really seemed like everyone was on board with preserving the pot-growing way of life; for them, it's a cash crop, and the fact that it's illegal seems to create a lot more problems than the plant itself. My impression was that they just wanted to be left alone to keep producing a product that there is obviously huge demand for, and that they're going to keep producing whether it's legal or not, since it just brings in so much money. But in the play they talked about how people have very different attitudes toward legalization; some people think the tax revenue would be great, and that the reduction in crime and crime-related expenses would be incredibly beneficial to society, but some people worry that if it's legalized, the price will plummet and the local economy will suffer tremendously. Really interesting stuff.
Anyway, we did plenty of other stuff besides watch a musical about pot. Mostly we wandered around little towns and went in to used book stores and breweries. (Northern California is a pretty excellent place for used books and local beer, in case you were wondering.) We also went to Grizzly Creek Redwoods State Park, which was amazing and gorgeous, and I think Jevon got a kick out of my wonderment at the redwoods. It's fun going around California with a Californian; he takes so much for granted, and I'm sitting there bug-eyed going, "What?! Do you SEE that?!" The trees were just unreal, and I got plenty of pictures of them, which I will soon upload in a supplementary post.
So, we left Berkeley early on Wednesday morning, spent all day Wednesday and Thursday wandering around Humboldt, went to the play on Thursday night, and then decided to start driving home late last night. It's about a 5 hour drive, and we had slept in the car on Wednesday night and weren't looking that forward to doing it again, so we drove for a few hours, took a nap for a few hours, and then made it home early early this morning. Once we got up and moving today, we decided to look into buying a tent for our Illinois trip. Sleeping in the car was fine, but it'd be really nice to have the option to camp, too. So we got on Craigslist and, lo and behold, there was a sweet tent for sale in Berkeley. We called the guy, and it turns out he lives about two blocks directly north of me, and we're going to check out his tent tonight. He bought it in the late 60's and has used it a grand total of 6 times, but he said it's spent the last few decades sealed in a bag, perfectly dry and in storage, and that it's in nearly perfect condition. We looked up the brand of tent, Stephenson, and the equivalent of this tent would go for over $600 today, so I'm thinking it's totally worth the $50 this guy is asking, even if we only use it on this one trip and never again. But the guy said apparently Stephenson - which is now known for super high-tech, fancy-schmancy tricked out backpacking tents - was originally a nudist organization, so their catalogs back in the 60's were filled with naked people hiking around. I love this. I am buying a tent from an old Berkeley nudist hippie for my epic road trip across the country.
Speaking of my epic road trip, I remain über-excited. I think we're leaving on Thursday!! We're playing it by ear, but the itinerary looks something like this:
Leg 1: Drive to Medford, Oregon. Stay with Jevon's mom for a day or two.
Leg 2: Stop by Crater Lake National Park on the way to Boise. Spend a day in Boise, maybe.
Leg 3: On to Yellowstone National Park. Spend a day or two in Yellowstone.
Leg 4: Swing up through Billings, Montana, then back down to check out Mount Rushmore, the Crazy Horse Monument, and Badlands National Park, in South Dakota.
Leg 5: Depending on how tired we are of being in the car, either swing up to Fargo and then down to Minneapolis, or head straight for Madison.
Leg 6: Madison, Wisconsin for a taste of civilization again. Then on to Chicago for a day or two.
Leg 7: Chicago to Home Sweet Home, where we will hopefully recharge our batteries for a few days, eat at Papa Del's at least once, and see everything C-U has to offer! It's no Santa Barbara, but I am so looking forward to it.
I'm tired of typing, so I'm going to go! If you will be in any of the aforementioned locations in the next 2-3 weeks, drop me an email, because I would love to see you (yes, you!).
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