I drove by myself to the Sequoia National Forest a couple summers ago one Saturday morning, basically trying to do a repeat of a great trip I took by myself the year before. The prior September I drove to the coast of California to the redwoods, and it’s still one of my favorite memories. The Sequoia trip doesn’t quite hold up. In fact, it was quite a disappointment. I wouldn’t call it a disaster; it’s not like my car broke down or I wasn’t able to see the trees. But where I came back from the four-day redwoods jaunt feeling refreshed, hopeful and clean, the Sequoias left me thinking that it was a two-day trip that was a day-and-a-half too long.

I guess it mostly had to do with timing. The two trips were only ten months apart from each other, but on one end I needed nothing but the pleasure of my own company, and on the other end I was never not conscious of how pointless the whole experience was without anyone there to…I don’t know…validate it? Walking through the woods and hiking up a hill seemed ridiculous. It was sort of like: When you’ve been hanging around the same friend for too long, but you’re too polite to tell them they’re getting on your nerves, and then you go ahead and spend that extra day too many with them, and it’s obvious there’s tension. Except the other person was me. One solitary, grumbling sightseer, dutifully loitering around the largest trees in the world because that’s what I went there to do, wasting all that useless beauty. The trees may as well have been Styrofoam.

After being underwhelmed by one of the Earth’s greatest wonders, there was really nothing left to do but find a place to stay that night. For some reason it never occurred to me that all the cool, nice motels in the general area would be booked solid. I had to drive for miles to some dirty little town I can’t remember the name of to find a room. I ate crappy Mexican food in some small town restaurant where I swear everyone was looking at me. I just kept wondering why anyone would choose to live exactly there. How do people end up where they do? Were they born there, and just never became conscious enough to realize how miserable it all is? Or maybe they are truly content. Maybe they managed to find something that I’ll never have or understand. Maybe they really have everything they’ll ever want in that inconsequential dusty hot little town. I bet some of them never even bothered to go see the trees.

The sun was getting low in the sky, and I couldn’t bear the thought of going back to that motel. I drove most of the way back near to the entrance of the park, where there was a large lake. I parked high on a hill where I could see the whole thing from above. I’m really into that. I was getting there just as most people were leaving or had already left. I watched a line of small motorboats get pulled out of the lake one by one by a process of various pickup trucks getting as close to the water as possible, trailers behind submerging down a road that lead into the water, and then the boats would maneuver onto and be pulled out onto it, instantly on land and on wheels. It was an incredibly depressing thing to me for some reason. But I kept watching it happen, over and over.

There was one motorboat carrying two young men and two women that really didn’t seem to want the day to end. It must have been a truly wonderful day on the lake for them. Even from so high up, I could see their coolers of drinks and ice. And I could hear them. Bits of laughter floated up now and then, but mostly it was the music blaring from their stereo. Horrible, awful music. They were very partial to one song in particular: I Don’t Want to Lose Your Love Tonight by The Outfield. They must have played it three times while I stood there waiting for the sun to fall. I placed all my focus on those people, wondering about their lives, guessing at what they did for a living, what they liked to do when they weren’t out on the lake, etc. Were they married or was this the night that the captain hoped to hook up with this girl he’d been chasing for weeks? Did everyone enjoy that song he kept playing as much as he obviously did? Was one of those girls counting the seconds until she could get off the boat so she could just get home and read a book?

Strangely, this wasn’t as amusing or entertaining as usual. Thinking back on it now, I realize that it was one of the few times of my life that I was unable to escape myself by turning my attention to other people. Whatever the truth of their lives might be, the real truth of mine was that I was standing alone on top of a hill at sunset watching other people at the end of what must have been a glorious summer day. What would I ever do? Move to another city? I did that once already, and it was the hardest thing I’d ever done, and that was when I was still young. I used to think the world was wide open and full of possibility. But the truth is, I’ll only be able to move again to a place where I won’t be left standing alone on a hill. The world seemed so incredibly small all of the sudden.

The Outfield was taunting me.