How a young, adventurous poet uses road trips to experience nature for creative expression and spiritual growth.
Brady’s 4Runner in the Mojave. Taken by Brady during a solo travel trip.
Open on a vast, sweeping shot of the Mojave at sunset. Everything golden, and the nearby San Gabriel mountains casting long shadows. In the distance, seeming particularly small, an old green Toyota 4Runner and the glow of campfire. Zoom in on Brady Sullivan, sitting alone near the flame and watching the sky change, entirely at peace. Peace, in a world this broken.
What does it mean to travel and exist someplace different, apart?
There’s nothing like life on the road. Moving yourself somewhere different and existing there, on your own and in the grace of nature, is a beautifully unique experience. Yet, constantly in the middle of our lives and facing countless stressors, most of us don’t get the chance to go out and experience that tranquility. There’s so much to be gained creatively, personally, and spiritually by placing ourselves out there, in the process of travel.
Ask Brady what it means to him… or, rather, ask him when he gets back. Getting outside and interacting with nature is a central part of the 27 year old poet’s life, and it has been since the moment he left home 9 years ago. Between trips he took during his 8 year stint in San Francisco and new haunts around his home in Los Angeles, he’s explored much of California’s natural and historical landmarks. He says that driving out past the city limits and finding somewhere to sit in nature is one of the most spiritually fulfilling experiences you can have.
Everyone has their own version of home, whether somewhere present or past, that contains all the comforts and familiarities of life. For Brady, though, there’s something more important than returning to that stability: finding a way to be at peace in a place away from everything you know. For him, that space is the Mojave. “You’re always a stranger to the desert, even if you go back to the same spots,” he noted. “You don’t ever really know this place… In that way, the desert and the ocean have the same awesome vastness to me–they both make me feel small and want to be bigger. I really look up to those spaces.”
Brady says that the first night out alone is always the hardest, because he has to shed all of his city habits to feel safe. “Being out there after the sun goes down… it gives me a little bit of a spook for sure,” he laughed. “But that fear comes from being jaded from all of my city life– from shit you should be scared about.” But, once he gets past that fear, the space opens up beautifully, and the stars seem to shine brighter.
Brady (right) and his pops, Joey (left).
Brady barrelling by a 4Runner in San Francisco.
Return to that opening shot of the Mojave except, now, at daybreak. Sand shimmers in the morning light as Brady packs up his 4Runner and removes all traces of his stay. Brady knows how he came to this spot (he took the 210 East to the 15 North, then got off up aways), even though it’ll be different next time he’s around; you know how we got to the end of this story, too–by passing through. It’s just like he says in “[I know about 5 ways to trick my brain]”, a poem from his new collection, Nothin to Write Home About: “a man like me / looks inside to find a friend / and sees someone in the mirror / he hopes to recognize again”. Solo travel is a creative act. When Brady travels and exists somewhere apart from the things and people he knows, he somehow gets closer to himself. He replaces the identities and obligations of the LA bustle with joshua trees, ancient mountains, and great processions of desert clouds, even at the expense of recognition. California, similarly, got caught in the bustle; over time, with colonization and industrialization, attention in the state shifted from treating land as a living, breathing entity to one of perfect weather and easy urban living. We know how we got here. The real question is: How do we get back?
The answer is with decision. By being stewards of the environment, working to embrace the traditional ecological knowledge and customs of California’s Indigenous groups, and respecting our natural spaces, we can all break down unsustainable habits and lifestyles to reach reciprocity with the land.
The journey to a more open, loving, creative relationship with California will feel more natural than we might expect–in fact, it’s just like heading out on a road you already recognize. Brady notes the feelings he gets entering and leaving spaces during his travel, saying “The ride in and the ride out are totally different. Even if I’m only going somewhere for the day, there’s excitement on the way in and nostalgia already hits every time I get going. It’s like sunset every time. It’s time to go home.”
---
Ford Melillo is a poet and writer of Cuban and Azorean descent from Southern California. They study English and Environmental Communication at Stanford, but they've also spent time writing in England and Washington state. Ford has a love for language and creating that they’ve cemented over years of storytelling, translating, and conversations with people from all walks of life.
Comments