Jenna Nienhuis

This story first takes shape as a scramble of words into the notes section of my iPhone, then in folklore form to my family. But what is the “story” if nothing happened? 

Daytime in the wild brims with adventure, freedom and possibility. We chase sunlight around the redwood-shaded campground and float in translucent water where the creek opens into a pool. State park rangers point out poison oak in plain sight. Nobody panics. 

After a full day of leisure, we arrive back at camp for hot dogs and Hail Marys. All five of us sit around the campfire with our necks reclined toward the sky, attending to the last drop of light as it disappears into a dome of darkness. Daytime takes the busy gnats with it.

Radiant embers catch wind of coastal air and vanish on contact. The first star appears between towering redwood branches, then another, and another. We tell popcorn-style stories about “redwood hollow fairies” with rainbow hair and mystical powers.

When the last of the hypnotic firewood crumbles into itself, and the stories reach “the end”, we stretch up for bedtime. Tonight is my turn in the tent with two of my daughters, while my husband and the youngest enjoy their well-earned night in the van.

I tug on the raucous zipper mouth and duck into our den. 

Nighttime asks nothing of me and yet I still find it rude when I’m not in the comforts of home (and sometimes even then). The field of perspective narrows inward rather than out. 

Faint echoes of dishes clanking, redwoods creaking and cars grumbling keep me company as I lay my head back into solitude. The Big Sur River pulses by on a never-ending quest a hundred yards below my feet. Estranged thoughts flip open like a rolodex. What if a tree falls? What if I need something and don’t have cell service? What if we get accosted by a mountain lion?

Restless, and unsettled, my heart follows the speed of my thoughts. A night is brief while dreaming, never-ending while begging for a dream.  Ugh, I have to pee again. 

I realize I have fallen asleep when I awake to a loud presence atop our campground. My muscles clench into another layer of protective maternal fear, while my daughters snore in their sacs next to me. Only thin nylon separates us and this heavy, four-legged creature tramping next to my head. Everything freezes —

The thudding ceases. Background noises carry on. Crickets, river, trees, wind. My body summons me into a light rest. 

I wake with the beat of morning — first a single raspy squawk of a scrub jay; then another and another.  The river hums along and sunshine pours through the veil of my tent. The sanity of morning evaporates the guise of sky-falling fear. 

Local author and infamous personality, Henry Miller, stated that Big Sur is a town “where nothing happens”.

I have hit the pulse of this mystical place.