The Open Road

On the open road: Obsessions beget obsessions. Not long ago I became fascinated with Thomas Jefferson and all the amazing things about him. “There is a reason they carved his face into a mountain in South Dakota” a friend said to me. This statement lead to my first adventure beyond the banks of the Mississippi River.

I was on my way to see a man. A man carved into the side of a mountain. Rushmore: The climax of my favorite Hitchcock film, and where Nick Cage found the hidden Indian gold.
There were minor goal set along the way. Eat Buffalo in as many forms as possible. See the Badlands. But at the time, the most important goal was to get to that mountain.
But then again, like all great adventures, the thing to go looking for isn’t always the thing you treasure the most. As the hours and scene passed by I began to fall in love with the journey itself. I was captivated by the seemingly endless rolling landscape. The Mississippi river, the Missouri.

I was overwhelmed by the colossal openness; the wind threatening to whip you off your feet like a childhood bully. A sea of grass dropping down to the ancient jagged rocks as far as you could see. We hiked and climbed through the terrain. I felt truly connected to world around me. Small and insignificant compared to the form of Time and Nature.

We defied the marked path and tested ourselves. There is no match to the awesomeness of what was around us, we simply wanted to throw ourselves into it to see what kind of men we returned as. Could we be the heroes of our minds?
As John climbed to the highest point he could summit I considered safer perches. But this was an adventure and as the wind and Sun assaulted John on his upward climb, I find myself face to face with the Prairie Rattlesnake. The moment possessed me. Wildness still exists, and I was allowed to share its space.

The next day we were going to go see Rushmore. We did see Rushmore, but only after a detour to Wyoming, Devils Tower. The desire to more of the day before was too strong. Finally on the return home we stopped at the mountain, obligation to the mission. A display of what man could do to a mountain in honor the greatness of our nation, while the contradiction, the pink, fat, ignorance walked and rolled on the paved walking paths with their Ben and Jerry’s Ice-cream.

The West has her hooks in me. Soon I will depart on a new adventure from the Great Lakes to the Pacific. I don’t know what to expect, although my hope are high. This will be a space dedicated to that adventure. Don, Chris, Matt and I hope to keep updates posted along the way, so you can join the Langlois Men On the Road.