The Road to Caronport (Day 6)

27 October 2010

As it had been with most other places I stayed, the walls lacked sufficient insulation to muffle the noises from adjacent rooms. And as it happened throughout my trip, at just the moment I climbed into bed and pulled the covers to my throat, someone next door was just traipsing in from a night of heaven knows what. First it was the family to my left. About an hour later, the room above me was astir. After eating, though, my head had stopped throbbing, so at least I wasn't so hungover from the journey anymore. And it seemed that I would be grounded anyway. In light of all the hubbub, I couldn't guess at which time I fell asleep. I suspect, and so I include it in this post, it was past midnight.

Around 3:00 a.m. I was roused by a hissing sound that reminded me of sleet. Being from Nova Scotia, where precipitation is abundant and the temperature is quite fluctual, the sound of wet snow is a familiar one. Frustrated, I got out of bed and pulled back the curtain which faced the swimming pool (my room was a short walk from the parking lot). I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was rain. Legit rain. At 3:00? I had thought for certain it would have been below freezing at that hour. I got back in bed and the little gears in my head began to move. "If it's warm enough to rain outside, maybe Idaho is being unaffected, at least for now, by the cold front that has littered much of the midwest with snow."

I emancipated myself from the bondage of sterile motel sheets and darted to the washroom. Within seconds, I had a toothbrush in my mouth and was spelunking through the room, gathering all my belongings and placing them on the bed. I set aside my map and a few food and drink items, and by 3:30 I was sitting in my car waiting for the windows to defrost. My key card was locked away in my hotel room, which could have been mind for another eight hours or so. But not anymore. There was no turning back. Uncertain how far I might get that day, how soon it would be that the mighty hand of Yahweh would unleash some flurries upon me and ground me somewhere I didn't want to bunk up, I was hightailin' it outta Twin Falls, Idaho. Hadn't really seen the place; didn't want to know if the casinos looked any better in daylight. Nay, my heart was already in Caronport, just as the Lord had convicted me. Stubborn though I was, I was intent on getting there. No matter what. Maybe the Lord wouldn't change the weather for me, but maybe He'd have some mercy on ole James. It's not good to test Him, but I suppose it quite a stretch to assert I was thinking clearly.

I followed the signs to the interstate, but because of the darkness I didn't notice that there was a rural road a few car lengths before the ramp. It could very well be that it was clearly marked, but I just didn't see it. I assumed, also, in light of the fact that no one seemed to be heading in the same direction as me, that all the traffic I was seeing to my left was elevated because the highway was divided. But then I started to notice transports going in the same direction as I was, and it occurred to me that I had made a wrong turn. I had only driven for ten minutes, but it was mildly discouraging to retrace my steps and take the real freeway toward Pocatello. I flipped out again, uttering at one point some idle statements to the effect that God really didn't like me. In my journal that night I recorded the following quote: "Praise be to chaos." Nevertheless, I made it back to town and took the real freeway entrance.

The roads were clear, and there was hardly any traffic, so this was quite luxurious as far as freeway driving was concerned. I met a convoy of transport trucks at one point, and getting through them was a little cumbersome. They have a tendency of passing one another at a fraction of the time it would take me, and they do it at times that would be opportune for me to make some gains on them. In any case, I think their presence kept me from dozing off, seeing as I had more in the way of visual stimuli than signs and paint. I did, however, have to variously turn the heat up and down, crack the window, and drink some Red Bulls. This plan I had hatched with little thought was starting to seem like a fool's errand, being that I had barely rested from a very productive travel day that ended a few hours prior. Nevertheless, I was probably going to hit the storm systems and halt my journey by the time I could become a real hazard to myself or others. I do think, mind you, that if I had been travelling with anyone else I never would have tried this. At least then I could have had someone to chat with. Spending most of my time in the car and hotel rooms just left me cold, lonely, and cabin feverish.

I did at one point ask the Lord why He always have me do these things alone. Most of the significant events in my life had been solo. Let's see. There was conversion. Going to Briercrest. Anyway, I soon discerned that this wasn't a healthy mental pursuit, so I tried to focus on other things.

At one point I saw a billboard that cited Ephesians 2:8-9 just as the song "Your Grace is Enough" started to play on one of the CDs my friends had given me. I had received many confirmations in the days leading up to the trip, and it was encouraging, in light of the post-Shasta experience, to receive another in this context.

Pocatello has a bunch of industrial plants just outside the main city, so the first thing that greeted me as I approached was the scent of sulfur. I continued on to Idaho Falls, and from there I headed north toward Butte. The sun was finally starting to illuminate the sky, and I was starting to run out of plains. And there it was. The terrain was starting to rise again, and a big, honkin' purple cloud hovered above the mountains ahead. The temperature was ripe for snow. This was it.

At this point I need to pause and make a disclaimer. I could spend the rest of my days trying to describe the signficance or the power of what happened, but I'd never capture it. Even in telling the story in person, it seems that listeners inevitably miss the force of it, or at least their expressions seem this way. I'm not writing this to suggest I've shared it and no one has cared. Nor do I think anyone has doubted what happened. But there is a sense in which everything that happened to me since my conversion culminated in the moment I'm about to depict. Every thought, every trial, every blessing, every failure, the things I'd spoken to the Lord throughout my trip, especially in Reno and in Twin Falls--it all just melted inside me. I have described this incident as the defining moment of the journey. It is on account of this incident that I said, upon my arrival in Caronport, and I reiterate now, that 27 October 2010 was the second most significant day of my life. (Nonbelievers may need the further clarification that my Christian birthday was and will forever remain the most important.)

So I drove into the weather system. Ahead it was dark. The clouds were so thick. A few miles west I could see some precipitation falling. I was driving into what seemed to be the same system. I had no snow tires. The roads were steep and curvy. I looked up as if to petition the Lord for His help, but I beheld something that, as I already mentioned, words can't capture. Directly above me, the clouds began to part. It was as if Jesus had told them, "I curse any one of you who casts a shadow on James." I looked ahead, and they split open before I could get to them. For the next hour and a half, I could predict which way the road would veer, because it was directly above the freeway that the clouds were parting. If there was a hill or trees or some obstruction to block my view of the freeway, I could uncannily anticipate the route because the clouds were parting above it. A wave of comfort passed through me and I wept as I drove. God said He couldn't cater the weather to me, but He did it anyway. I could belabour this point, but it's too precious to taint with many words. I guess you probably had to be there, and perhaps you had to be me, but it's an event I will never forget.

With my faith built to new levels, I reached the city of Helena to discover that a fair bit of snow had fallen and the roads hadn't been cleared yet. It seemed the Lord was giving me an opportunity to trust Him, being that I felt led to continue north. I found myself driving in precisely the conditions I had dreaded, going up and down slopes, rounding 40 degree turns, and yet the car never hinted that it might skid out my lane. I was patient, and many others, presumably with appropriate tires and/or chains, passed me, but for all the drifting I could feel the car doing, I felt as safe as I would in my dorm room on a sunny day. The Lord spoke to me then, saying that I should not think myself safe because of what my eyes see, but that I need Him just as much at the library as I do in treacherous weather. And as I've been told by many older disciples, the safest place to be is within His will. Before long, I was past the snow, and the temperature started to rise to about 6C as I approached Great Falls.

I drove past Great Falls, and it rose as high as 12C. I listened to worship music, singing my vocal chords raw and praying throughout the journey. I suddenly came upon a bunch of trucks lined up in the road. I was at the border!

Because there were so many oversized vehicles, the customs agents were preoccupied with getting them through, so there was only one lane for smaller vehicles. It seemed like such a long wait, but I was in good spirits. I made it through customs and drove past Coutts, stopping at a railway crossing to allow dozens and dozens and dozens of train cars to pass by. I was boxed in by some big vehicles, including one that was carrying one of those moveable houses as its cargo, so my vision was quite limited.

I had to watch my speed in Alberta, since the posted limits were significantly lower than they had been in Montana. As I headed north toward Lethbridge, I saw this mist that filled the entire sky. I'm not exaggerating here. It wasn't just horizontal. Its vertical reach was like a mushroom clouds that just impregnated the entire flippin' sky. This is no small feat in the prairies. I drove into it and discovered that it was akin to fog, but I didn't know that it was fog. It was this strange mist that I imagine had spawned from the warmer weather that evaporated all the melted snow I'd been hearing about.

I had perfect roads all the way to Swift Current. The sun was setting, and there didn't seem to be any convenient places to get a sandwich right on the highway (unless I wanted to cross the median, which I couldn't!). So I pressed on toward Caronport and was pleasantly surprised to discover that the roads were still clear... until I reached all places familiar. I had no sooner driven past Mortlach, which is about 20 km from Caronport, when I hit solid black ice. Parts of the road were under construction, and nothing had been cleared! My car fishtailed about three times before I finally crawled into the Sundbo parking lot, having been passed by many vehicles who clearly had much better traction than Isobel's tires. I pulled into my parking spot, turned off the engine, unbuckled, opened the door, and fell to my knees just outside the car. I gathered all the items I cared to bring in with me that night, and struggled to my room. I hugged a bunch of friends, observed many of them play Apples to Apples in a stupor, and went to bed shortly thereafter.

Mileage: 5376 km