There is an advertisement on television for some prescription drug that features a fit, silver-haired couple doing outdoorsy things.
There are scenes of them turning off their car’s navigation system, them snuggled up inside a baked-potato-like RV, them looking at an atlas of Arizona. A clip in the commercial shows the couple—for a second—standing at the rim of the Grand Canyon, wind in their hair, wearing wide smiles.
The marketer behind the commercial probably intended the message to be, “If you take this drug, you’ll be as healthy and happy as this couple at the Grand Canyon.” I interpret it as something different, more sinister. I see it as those jerks taunting me.
Perhaps I’m a tad sensitive. I had a chance just a few months ago to stand at the rim of the Grand Canyon, wind in what’s left of my hair, wearing a wide smile. But then, Congress shut down my vacation.
You may remember that stalled budget talks forced the federal government to curtail operations in October 2013. The shutdown closed many government services, including the national parks. This closure started on Oct. 1, which happened to be when I was to make my trek from Las Vegas for a several-day visit to the Grand Canyon. It also wiped out planned visits to Zion National Park and Death Valley National Park.
“The Grand Canyon’s a giant hole,” you may say. “How can the government prevent you from taking a quick peek at a massive, miles-long crack in the ground?”
A good question, and one I had myself. But not wanting to take a six-hour drive for nothing, I called around to some people in the area. A representative at a hotel in the area told me not to even bother driving out; park rangers had barricaded the park and weren’t letting anyone get within miles of it. They even closed a state highway to deter people further from trying to enter the park. Ladies and gentlemen, that’s how you shut down the Grand Canyon.
At the time, I managed to stay calm and improvise. I was out West, with a suddenly open itinerary. I might as well make the most of it. Vegas, baby, right?
But I must have suppressed my disappointment because, now, every time I see a depiction of the Grand Canyon, it drives me absolutely nuts.
The last time I saw that drug ad—the last ad of a Jeopardy! commercial break—it sent me into such a rage, I blacked out. When I recovered, I was informed I just had answered every question in the show’s “Chemistry” category correctly. You hear stories of mothers lifting cars or performing other impossible feats when given motivation. This was my Mama Bear moment—it’s the only logical answer considering I struggled to comprehend the most basic elements of high school chemistry. (True story: my chemistry teacher visited me in another class—computer science, I think—to announce, in front of everyone else, that I had gotten a B on her mid-term. She smiled, and walked out of the classroom backwards, all while giving me a minutes-long double thumbs up. It was nice of her. Also, mortifying.)
So, clearly, I have had some unresolved issues simmering for nearly four months. And now—with the federal budget back in the news—they’ve begun resurface.
It’s taken me this long to even talk about the trip with anyone aside from my immediate family and a few co-workers who figured out my vacation coincided with this shutdown they’d read about online. I waited because, deep down, I guess I felt the shutdown had rendered months of saving and planning utterly useless.
My only solace in moments of negativity are the stories given to me by the shutdown, absurd anecdotes from a larger—yet still absurd—occurrence.
My favorite: My girlfriend deals with her feelings more directly and immediately than I do, which meant, in this case, she had sporadic fits of tears throughout the morning of Oct. 1. One of these fits came as she was handing over $20 to the casino pastry shop cashier in exchange for our breakfast of blueberry muffins and tea.
The woman, who was not a native English speaker, looked upon her with immediate concern.
Cashier: What’s wrong?
Girlfriend: The shutdown. *sob* They closed the Grand Canyon, and our vacation is ruined.
C: No, sweetie, they can’t close the Grand Canyon.
G: They did. *sob*
C: No, it’s still there. You can go.
G: *Looks at me*
I now had the task of explaining to this very kind person, in her second (or third) language, a situation I could hardly comprehend myself. I blathered on about budgets and shutdowns and cash flow, when all I really wanted to say was, “Thank you for your concern, but apparently, yes, they can close the Grand Canyon.”
The cashier didn’t respond to me. She simply looked at me with wide eyes and a fake smile, and handed me the food we had ordered. For the best, really.
While I transported our breakfast to the nearest table, my girlfriend went to the restroom to compose herself. This particular casino had a soundtrack of Frankie Valli songs it broadcast everywhere—in elevators, walkways and even the restrooms. When my girlfriend returned, she started laughing. She claimed, upon entering the restroom, she was greeted by the sounds of Valli’s No. 1 hit, “Big Girls Don’t Cry.” I don’t doubt her story. It’s too perfect not to be true.
That day, bolstered by Frankie Valli’s pep talk, we took a drive to Valley of Fire State Park, which features incredible sandstone formations in the middle of the desert. We were at least an hour from the nearest town. The only living things I saw were tourists and lizards.
I had no reception on my mobile phone, but my girlfriend somehow spent a portion of the day video chatting with her aunt in Lawrence, looking for hotels. Our planned resting place for that evening shut down with the Grand Canyon, and we needed somewhere to stay. They managed to book a room from right there in the remote Nevada desert, and this is why I now consider Facetiming the 21st-century equivalent of building a lean-to.
The next day, we ventured out to Springdale, Utah to take advantage of our nonrefundable hotel room on the outskirts of the shuttered—and amazing—Zion National Park. We walked across the Virgin River and to the pedestrian bridge that leads to the park’s entrance. There, a metal gate had been swung across the bridge, preventing anyone from entering. The gate had a “Do Not Enter” sign on it.
My girlfriend and I were alone for a moment, until a busload of senior citizens—along with a weary bus driver—arrived alongside us. I had read stories of veterans and other members of “the Greatest Generation” storming the World War II memorial in Washington, D.C., occupying the landmark they said belonged to them, not the government. My girlfriend got an idea.
Here, we had dozens of people from that generation. There was a chance we could incite them to storm the gates, and we’d all run and find sanctuary in Zion’s remarkable wilderness. We mentioned the plan. They laughed, snapped a few pictures and then left. Their reply seemed to carry in the air: “Life’s full of disappointments, you know.”
Rejected, I stuck my arm over the gate as far as I could reach, stared longingly at Zion’s peaks in the fading sun, then meekly walked away. I had never felt as powerless as I did then, dwarfed by nature and barred by the government from getting a closer look.
We did get to drive through Zion the next day, thanks to Utah’s decision not to close the state highway that runs through the park. A helpful hotel employee named Micah mapped out a route that allowed us to see and hike in areas that would give us an approximate Zion experience. Micah’s goodwill is the only reason, I’m sure, I have fond memories of Utah—and not the slightly different feelings that arise when the Grand Canyon appears.
My girlfriend and I are planning another trip to (different) national parks currently. It appears the federal government will avoid another shutdown, but—thanks to October 2013—I’ll have doubts about every vacation I take for the rest of my life. After all, there are droughts, forest fires, earthquakes, bears, marmots and countless other horrors lurking.
And, unfortunately, the trip helped me develop a reputation as Bad Luck Bob. Just the other day, I overheard my girlfriend talking to a co-worker about this year’s trip.
“That sounds fun!” the co-worker said. “I hope the parks are actually open this time.”
