My old flagship-story. It all really happened.
Victor's Odyssey
Since I walked so much in San Antonio, like two or three years, I finally took that all as training. Towards the end of 2002 I decided I was going to walk all the way to California. From San Antonio, TX. It would have taken me about three months, two thousand miles. All I need is a destination. Patience is a virtue.
Well, on Christmas night around 2:00am(technically the 26th), I grabbed two backpacks I had found over time and stuffed them full of clothes and supplies. It was going to be kind of awkward with two backpacks, but I had to take more stuff than I could fit in one. I hiked five miles down to my friend's house in Babcock North, because he lived closer to I10 than my mom did. I was going to crash there and take off walking in the morning. I knock on my friend Bob's door at three in the morning. I wake him up, he opens the door, looks at my bags and says, "Oh shit, Victor. You're really going to do this. We all thought you were full off shit." Bob told me, "You know what, I am going to consolidate that for you so you'll only need one bag." Bob had been in the military and he hooked me up with his badass army rucksack. Huge bag, frame, back pad. Felt like I was meant to do this.
Bob called my friend Andrea and told her, "Victor just showed up. He's really walking to California." They talked a little more and then Bob tells me, "Listen, if you want to leave right now and not wait for the morning, Andrea and I will give you a head start." I promptly agreed. I was really excited that I was actually going to do this. They ended up giving me a forty mile jump to Comfort and I started walking I10-West.
I wasn't going to hitchhike one bit. I was walking to prove for a fact that we have two legs for a reason and it's not to push the gas and the brake, and that cars are killing the world and have made everybody lazy, impatient and overweight. I was also going to do it without money, just to prove that could be done too. Well, I wasn't going to use any money I'd worked for, at least.
I walked that night and the whole next day, like twenty miles. I stopped to rest my feet right outside Sonora when all of a sudden I see some car pull over. I didn't have my thumb out or anything. The car had a big Jesus is Lord sticker on the back windshield. I walk up to him and the driver tells me, "I'm going to California. Where are you going?" Bam, West Texas to LA. I didn't even have to ask. Generosity picked me up, proving me right once more. I'm following signs. His name is Rusty.
Everybody goes, "Oh, you cheated, Victor. You didn't walk." To that I tell them, "When was the last time you walked twenty miles in one direction on purpose? I felt it was in the best interest of all humanity that I made it there sooner, so I made an exception. You know what, I walk so much I fucking deserve a ride once in a while." Everything in moderation.
Let me back up a little. Before I had left San Antonio I had put everything I owned, my computer monitor, my whole wardrobe, everything you need for a one-bedroom apartment, I put it all in my mom's front lawn. I put up a big sign that said, "Free Stuff." I figured if I gave all my shit away I wouldn't have anything to lose and I could walk to California. When people stopped and picked up my stuff I would tell them, "Hey, keep in mind I'm walking to California soon. I accept a donation if you want to give me something. If not, just get it out of here." I made fifty bucks like that. I gave like more than half of it away.
By the time I got to Los Angeles I only had thirty seven dollars left. I had bought some food. I crashed at the homeless shelter downtown and got a good night's sleep. The next morning I wake up and start wandering downtown LA, not looking for anything. I end up at the Greyhound bus station. Now, I had considered taking the Greyhound all the way from San Antonio, but I thought a bus trip would be boring. If I walked, half the fun would be getting there. Just imagine the education I'd receive from all the people I talk to on my walk to California. You can't get that shit in school. That's the school of reality. Where you learn the truth. And it's free like knowledge should be.
I had been sending all my ideas to the San Francisco chat room on AOL. They were kind of expecting me. At the bus station in LA I asked them, "How much is a bus ticket to San Francisco?" The lady told me forty two dollars. Shit, I only had thirty seven. I needed five bucks. I was all bummed out, so I go outside the Greyhound station and bum a cigarette. The guy I get the cigarette from, this Mexican dude named Ernesto, I tell him about my mission and ideas. I tell him I'm short five bucks for my bus fare. Before I even had to ask him he hands me a five dollar bill and tells me, "If you're going to get marijuana legalized, more power to you." Bam, San Francisco.
In San Francisco I rode the bus around for three days and walked around and learned the city. I didn't pay bus fare one time in San Francisco. All you have to do is get on and ask for a courtesy-ride. Every single driver gave me one. Other people were paying. It just goes to prove the whole generosity of the West Coast. You can do that anywhere. Well, probably not New York City. That's how I get around in San Antonio. Every bus driver hears my story. Every pretty girl. Even the ugly ones, hehe.
I crashed in Golden Gate Park for three days. It was like a fairy tale. I was there for the big New Year's celebration. After about three days San Francisco started to get on my nerves. It was just way too crowded and all run by money. I had to get out of there. I told myself, "Let me go look up my friend BJ in Oakland. Last I heard he lived there. I don't know his address. I don't know his phone number. Maybe I'll run into him or something. If not, I'll get to learn a new place." Well, the random courtesy ride I scored in Oakland landed me on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley. Are you familiar with Telegraph Avenue? It's where all the hippies were in the sixties. They have People's Park there and The University of California, UC Berkeley. In the past they had big protests. It was a huge landmark for the peace movement back in the sixties.
I hadn't heard about any of that shit. Isn't it a bit ironic that on my quest for world peace I accidentally land on Telegraph Avenue? The bus didn't say Berkeley on it or anything. I was in Oakland.
Telegraph Avenue was like heaven on Earth. I didn't have to worry about anything. They had breakfast at the church at eight every morning, a meal at four. People just gave you stuff on the sidewalk. They've got the Free Box in People's Park full of clothes. Hell, five minutes after I got off the bus, this street kid hands me a loaded pipe. Welcome to Telegraph. I was crashing in front of the church every night. Taking showers at the public pool. Everything was cool.
When I first got to Telegraph, I noticed all the kids, all the hippies on the sidewalk asking for spare change. I thought, "Hmm, I'm going to tap that medium." I made up my own sign. It read:
"With the Internet I plan to...
- eliminate money, make everything free, prove that it's human nature to be generous and bring world peace
- get rid of cars in big cities, make everyone healthy and save the ozone layer
AND
- get marijuana legalized and chill everybody out.
I'VE GOT IT ALL FIGURED OUT
ASK ME HOW
rightprotect@hotmail.com
Just doing it for the cause."
Hold on, I've got a visual-aide.
That's Telegraph and Haste. In front of Cody's Book Store. That's my corner.
When I first started flying my sign I just stood it up and no one would just stop and read it. So, every single person who walked in front of me, tons of pedestrians on Telegraph, lots of college kids, my generation, I would ask, "Hey, will you read my sign? I just want you to read it. It's really important." People would eventually stop and read it. When they would read the whole thing and I would explain it to them I would tell them, "I want to put some flyers up around town and get the ball rolling a little faster, so if you have any spare change that will help. If not, just take down my email address and I'll back my shit up." Man, people were handing me dollar bills. Fives, tens, twenties. I was making a hundred bucks a night easy with that sign. I had a damn good paying job in Berkeley.
The coolest thing happened when I started flying that sign. The first night I flew it this one girl stopped and read it. She started freaking out. She told me, "Oh my God, my grandmother told me I would meet you tonight! She said I would meet Antonio." I was all tripping out. Antonio is my middle name. This girl ends up taking me out to dinner that night. Gourmet Indian food. It was pretty good. Just a little weird.
Anyway, I was in Berkeley for fifteen days. On the last day this one girl stopped and read my sign. She ended up talking to me for hours. Some eighteen year old girl named Sammie. She tells me, "Later on my friend Kate and I are going to hang out at my apartment and drink some beers. You're more than welcome to come if you want." Cool, so I went and met her friend Kate. I was telling Kate about how I was traveling and Kate says, "Oh, do you want to go to Arcata?" I freak and tell her, "Umm, you mean Northern California, Humboldt County, where all the weed is Arcata? Umm, yeah!" That night we drive up to her mom's house in Pitsburg. I get a guest bedroom to sleep in, shower, laundry and the next morning we drive up to Arcata. Five hours north. Man, she even lets me drive the car! It was a rollercoaster.
Arcata was awesome. It's up in the Redwood forest. I was still getting everything I needed, but after about six days I got bored. It wasn't nearly as populated as Berkeley. I couldn't fly my sign too good in the plaza. I felt like I had to go back to work. Hmm, how am I going to get back to Berkeley? What I ended up doing was riding the city bus as far South as it would go to Scotia and started walking 101 South. I wasn't going to hitchhike. Somebody's going to pick me up. I'm sure. It's California.
Well, I ended up walking for another two days. On the first day, when the sun came down, I ended up at an RV park
on Stafford Road. I noticed the sign said Camping on it so I went inside and asked the manager, "Do you have anywhere I can crash for free? I'm just walking through." He tells me, "No, we're not letting anybody in. It's too wet." I say, "I don't see why that matters, but I guess I'll just crash under the bridge I just passed." Which would have sucked, because if I would have slept under that bridge I would of had to sleep on the sidewalk right next to the street. I start walking to this bridge and all of a sudden change my mind. I tell myself, "Screw that, I'm going to walk back into the RV park and see if I can talk to some tenants. Maybe one will let me crash under their trailer or something." I walked back in the RV park and I spotted this father and son talking at their car at a trailer right next to the manager's. I walk up to them and say, "I wouldn't be so fortunate as for one of you guys to have a spare cigarette?" They both look at me funny and say, "No speak English." Shit. I talked to them in Spanish. I told them how the manager wasn't going to let me crash. This twenty year old kid ended up working for the RV park and tells me, "Just go crash in one of those buildings back there." This cool little camping shelter they had. They were using it for storage, nobody was in it. I found me a rug that rolled out, perfect bed. I had a great night's sleep. Umm, except in the middle of the night when the skunk woke me up and stole the last of my food. I wasn't going to argue with him. Skunks stink. I was like, "Enjoy."
The next morning I wake up and use the restroom they had for the campers and start walking the highway again. I walk to the nearby town of Redcrest where I get hooked up with breakfast at the Eternal Tree House Cafe and start walking the highway some more. I walk for about two or three hours and it starts raining real hard. I had a rain poncho, but I couldn't fit it all the way over my rucksack because my arms couldn't reach. My bag was all getting wet and my feet were all tired. I thought to myself, "Damn, I wish there was a place I could stop and rest." I noticed there was an exit coming up on the highway in one of the many places it crossed Eel River. South Fork.
I figured there would be a bridge I could go sit under. Sure enough, there was. I went and rested my feet. I stood up and as the cars were stopping at the intersection I would yell, "Will somebody help me with my rain poncho?" No one stopped. They thought I was asking for a ride. I said screw it and started walking the access road. All of a sudden, I walk into a forest! The Avenue of the Giants,
these big tall Redwood trees. I noticed the road the forest was on seemed to run pretty parallel to the highway, so when I got to the Freeway South sign
I just kept walking straight in the forest. It was a lot dryer. I walk this road for about a quarter mile and right when it turns left, like it almost touches the highway, where I could just hop over the rail
to get on, I see a truck pulled over. I think, "Cool, somebody can help me with my rain poncho." I wasn't going to ask for a ride. They were going north. I walked up to the truck and there was this twenty three year old kid and his girlfriend sitting there. Tony(Soalfire4@aol.com) and Molly(medusalocs22@hotmail.com). I walk up to them and ask them, "Hey, will you help me with my rain poncho?" Tony said sure. Then I asked, "Hey, will you give me a ride to the next town south, Weott? It's about three miles." Tony says, "Sure, when the gas gets here."
Now check this out. Tony hadn't run out of gas yet. Tony had noticed that he didn't have enough gas to get to the next town, so he chose that random spot on the highway to stop and call someone on his cell phone to bring him some gas. If I would have done anything differently right before then, if it hadn't been raining, if I hadn't rested my feet, if I would have gone to the highway instead of staying in the forest, I would have never met Tony and Molly.
Everything happens for a reason. I was in the right place at the right time.
First off, I pull out my pipe and tell him, "Hey man, I got like one hit of weed left on my pipe. You're more than welcome to it." Tony tells me, "Man, we've got it covered," and hands me a loaded pipe. Ran into some stoners! I tell Tony about my ideas and he goes, "Whoa, that's weird. Looks like we're working on the same thing." Tony was on his way up to a medicine camp in Oregon. A healing camp. He was hauling all this wood and was going to help them build a kitchen. He ends up inviting me and I say, "Well, I really should be getting back to Berkeley . . but I guess I can go back to Berkeley after I see Oregon. I shouldn't pass this up." When the gas finally gets there we drive up to his friend Jesse's house in Arcata and crash there for the night.
The next morning we drive up to O'Brien, OR. This small town about six miles north of the border on 199. This Vietnam Vet Shadow lives there. He owns forty acres at the base of a mountain. Eight people live there. All without money. Exactly how I want the whole world to be. How perfect it is that I end up there on accident. They were total minimalists. Living in travel trailers, old buses, a big barn. Solar power for electricity. Generators. They had a garden and grew their own food. Frontier life almost.
At this place they had an Indian medicine woman. She would have healing lodges, channel spirits and heal people. Her name was Fawn Journeyhawk. Mandan. When I first got to this place Fawn had to run me by the spirits just to be sure I was cool. Well, before I even explained it all to her she comes up to me and tells me that the spirits told her that I was a beam of light for others to follow, that I was the one who was going to bring balance to this world, and that I was a child of love. "Whoa, the spirits got my back," I thought. I never really believed in spirits, but now I play around with the idea a little bit more. I mean, what more do I need to motivate me and keep going?
I have confirmation.
I was totally accepted at this place. Anytime I got hungry I would just go up to Fawn's trailer and she would fry me up some potatoes they grew in the garden. I got to go hiking in a mountain in Oregon. I'm from Texas. It was just awesome. I was there for about a week when Fawn comes up to me and says, "Okay Victor, we're going to move you on your mission." They sent me to live with these hippies in Williams, on the other side of the mountain. Nate and Vivian. These sixty year old hippies that have been at it since the sixties. They lived in a trailer in the country. Long hair, long beard, 215, medical marijuana. They grew their own weed in the back. When I first got there they gave me own private stash. Like a whole eighth. I was helping them out as much as I could. Doing the dishes all day and restocking the firewood. They let me crash inside. I was going to help them with the computer stuff. They had an old 300mhz system not even on the Internet. I even called my mom in San Antonio and told her to put my 1.2ghz in a box and ship it over there. It ended up costing more than a hundred dollars and I told her to forget it. See, on my adventure I had my microcassette recorder with me at all times. I logged the whole experience, every detail. With the hippies I thought, "Okay, I'm ready to go back to San Antonio, type up my book, unleash it on the Internet for free, try to score me a traveling partner/girlfriend(because to get the true measure of joy you must have someone to share it with), and head out for a sequel trip. East Coast. Go live another book.
I have now decided I'm not going to go to the East Coast until after I save the world.
I wanted to double back. Arcata, Berkeley, LA, San Antonio. The way I came. I got a ride back down to Arcata and the first day I was there rumor had it that some street kid was willing to trade a bus ticket to San Francisco for a dimebag of weed. I thought, "I wish I knew who this kid was. Umm, I wish I had a dimebag of weed." That night I ride the city bus six miles south to Eureka. I go hang out at this place called The Raven House where they let you take a shower and eat food. I meet some girl who hooks me up with a little bag of trim. Not that much weed at all. A little pouch of shake. Well, that night I get bored in Eureka so I end up walking the six miles back to Arcata and crash under the 7th Street bridge where I had been. The next morning I'm in line at The Endeavor, the care center where they feed lunch every day and this kid walks up to me and asks me, "Hey, do you want a bus ticket to San Francisco?" I freak and tell him, "Oh shit! You're the guy who wants some weed for it, right?" I showed him my little pouch and tell him, "I really don't have that much." He looks at it, smells it and then just hands me the bus ticket. Bam, ticket to Berkeley!
I ride the bus a hundred miles south until it stops in Garberville. In Garberville the guy on the bus next to me was telling me how cool Garberville was. That it was like Arcata before the cops got there. I thought I just might check it out and I got off the bus. I figured I had two hundred miles left to San Francisco. I could just start walking and someone would pick me up(that was before I learned I could have used the same bus ticket). Garberville ended up being kind of lame. No kids anywhere, all these old people. I stopped and told this group of homeless guys my stories. When I finish one of them looks up at me and tells me, "Trade me hats." Man, my hat wasn't nearly as cool as this rainbow beanie
he gave me. I've had it ever since. It's an integral part of my uniform.
You see, everything I've needed for this mission has just fallen into my lap. I used to have this pair of nice military style combat boots. You know, made for walking. I had found them. About a week before I left for my walk to California the house across the street from my friend Bob's got evicted. I found me a whole new wardrobe. Two pairs of boots. These Dr. Martens and those combat boots. Both size twelve. What I wear. I have been equipped.
Back to Garberville. I got bored real quick so I started walking the highway. After the sun came down I walked past this building and saw some guy smoking a cigarette. I asked him if he could spare one and he hooked me up. It ended up being a drug rehab retreat in the mountains. I tell this guy my stories and I notice some lady inside sitting down to eat. I ask the guy, "Don't suppose you could donate any gasoline for my stomach?" He tells me, "Let me see what I can do." About five minutes later he comes back out with this big plate of food. Two fat drumsticks, some mashed potatoes and some greens. He then tells me, "There's an RV park a couple miles down the road." I think, "Cool, I can talk to the manager or sneak in if I have to." I was all fueled up so I walked the two miles easy. In front of this RV park they had a gas station. It was still kind of early so I was outside bumming cigarettes, asking people, "Anybody going south?" After about an hour or so I ask this one kid and he tells me, "Sure, hop in." This kid ends up smoking me out all the way to Santa Rosa. In Santa Rosa I crash in the park downtown and the next morning I ride the bus and the train back to Berkeley.
Telegraph Avenue. Everybody recognized me. I ran into this guy named Joel. Now, Joel I had met the first time in Berkeley, in People's Park. I had told him how much I walked and he took his wool socks off his feet and gave me a twenty dollar bill. The second time I go back to Berkeley I see Joel again. He ends up taking me to his house in suburban Hercules, let's me do my laundry, smokes me out and gives me food. I ask him, "Hey, I don't suppose I can bum some bus fare to LA, so I can make my way back to San Antonio from there?" He goes, "Let me check," and gets on the computer, greyhound.com. He couldn't figure out how to order the tickets online so he stands up, turns around and hands me $130 for my bus ticket all the way back to San Antonio! Round trip adventure. All expenses paid.
There is many a magical update to this true story that would bring me to my current position. I could seriously talk your ear off if you let me. This seems to be a good stopping point, though. Thank you so much for listening.
- Victor Antonio
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