As I stepped out of the dark theater into the waning sun-light over Hannover, New Hampshire’s town square, I had Tom Hanks on my mind, and a need to get back to my campsite in time to cook some food before full darkness. In contrast with the just watched Forrest Gump stumbling into the center stage of American history, I was squatting in a nature preserve south of town, isolated and lonely, living in the wings of my own life.

I would be teaching high school in Texas in the fall, but that summer I was doing contract work repairing and inspecting ropes courses throughout New England. Three years earlier, I’d worn my interviewing clothes as I walked through the doors of the beautiful Georgian-style brick buildings of Dartmouth to interview as a Ph.D student in Physics, and chatted with a professor about black hole physics. All that netted me was a passing knowledge of the good vegetarian restaurants in town, and a renewed love for Dr. Suess, who’d gotten his start as a cartoonist for the campus newspaper. Maybe some of Suess’s irreverence for institutional learning had rubbed off on me as well, but Dartmouth wasn’t going to let me in either way. 

Now my worldly possessions fit into my two-door Pontiac, and the only bed I slept in that summer was while inspecting the course at a summer camp, which was a two day gig. That luxurious night was still a few weeks away when I walked to my car, and drove away, after using the payphone in the town square. My nearest friends were a three hour drive away, and I don’t remember who I called. 

Driving out of town felt like setting out from port into the ocean, like I was starting my thousand mile journey to Texas, and not just a few miles away. I was living one strange day at a time that summer, never knowing how I would feel when I woke up. The dry pine needles on the ground made for a noisy but acceptable carpet for my Megamid open tent, and a pouch of Lipton Noodles cooks on a camp stove just fine.