Curiosity

by Wendy Lee

January 20, 2015

I’ve never fancied myself as adventurous.  Adventurous is the woman who will walk away from her life for a year to explore three countries solo in an attempt to find herself (think Eat, Pray, Love).  Adventurous is the guy who will fill his backpack with food and water and various supplies, and with his hiking boots, a map, and a compass will head out into the hills just to see what he can find.  Adventurous is the woman who flies solo across the Atlantic Ocean.

I am often paralyzed by fear, stopping myself from all the adventures I wish to have.

Adventurous is the word some have recently used to describe me.  It baffles me, but it is a matter of perspective I suppose.  If someone does something different from your own world, you might think them brave or explorative or interesting.  I think of myself as rather fearful, but I have a qualities that I value.  Curiosity, in the safe environs of my personal reality.  And a need for experiences, experiences far more important than any material possessions or related to the daily pressures of life.

I am reminded of my trip a few years ago to Blackhawk, Colorado, a gambling town.  I was in a bad frame of mind.  The divorce was looming.  Few, if any, knew the amount of pain I was in.  My world as I knew it was crumbling, the facade exposed brick by brick.  This trip was a quick escape from my actuality.

Rather than spending the weekend glued to a slot machine, I decided to explore Central City.  I walked around the old town, lamenting at how gambling had taken away its charm, yet knowing that without it the town would no longer exist.  I was partially to blame for its demise, wasn’t I?  During my exploration and through a fortunate alignment in timing, I was able to get a private tour of the Central City Opera House.  It is a beautiful gem of history with many intriguing stories hidden in the walls.  My mood was improving.

After some more minor exploration on foot, I decided to finally solve the mystery of what was up the road to Nevadaville.  I had passed by the sign a dozen times, Nevadaville, one mile.  In truth, my husband and I had tried to explore it before but the dirt road was covered in snow and ice.  We turned back.   This time, in the comfort of my all-wheel-drive vehicle, I headed up the road.

There isn’t much left to Nevadaville.  It, too, was an old mining time.  Still standing, only a few buildings.  I pulled off the road, parked, grabbed my camera and started my own little adventure.  I imagined the lives that everyone must have led.  The hardships they encountered.  The extreme comfort of my own life in comparison.  I was fascinated, lost in someone else’s story, a consolation given what had been going on in my head and heart.

A truck pulled up in front of one building, an older gentlemen looking a bit rough jumped out and sized me up.  He scared me just a little because he didn’t appear friendly, a judgment I quickly and falsely made based on absolutely no information.  It didn’t stop me.  I continued taking my photos, walking closer and closer to his location.  He still stared at me, with a bit of a frown on his face.  No matter.  As I reached a spot directly across the road from him, I managed a somewhat timid “hello.”  He offered the same greeting in return.

“Do you know anything about this town,” he asked after a few moments.  I didn’t, I admitted.  I was a little embarrassed that I had nothing to offer on this point.  “I can tell you about it,” he responded, a little gruff, yet friendly. “Yes, asbsolutely,” was my exaggerated response.  I did want to know about it, but I have been taught to be weary of strangers, especially tough old men in pickup trucks on a deserted dirt road up in the hills.  I didn’t want to be impolite, and I was truthfully curious.

This lovely gentleman provided me with a full accounting of Nevadaville, including the fires that destroyed it more than once.  He walked me around the foundations of the long gone structures and told me what once stood in their place.

He had purchased one of the remaining buildings only recently.  As I looked closer at the building, I wondered how much longer it would stand.  It was leaning a bit too much, even on the slope it sat on.  The floors sagged, the stairs were crumbling, the boards were rotted, yet its beauty was apparent.

He, himself, was an explorer.  He combed the hills looking for artifacts from a time gone by.  He had some prized findings to show me.  He opened his truck and pulled out the small display case he carried around with his most precious finds.  A child’s shoe, a cup, a fork, a framed picture of a family, the barrel of a gun, a tool of some sort.  Rusted, dirty, tattered, bent, broken.  All exquisite remnants of past lives.  He was proud of his finds, and even prouder to share them.  I was delighted.

He had pictures of the town in its various incarnations.  He carried them in the cab of his truck as well.  He brought those out, showed me the buildings, and pointed out their location in relation to where we were standing.  He even showed me the building he owned, a photo showing the building before some additions were attached on.  I was engrossed in another era.

I spent over an hour with him, but could have spent hours more.  He had to get back to his work, he apologized.  I appreciated every minute he spent with me.  Why had I been so frightened of him?  Am I that afraid of life and people?  Certainly there are lessons in there for me.

That unexpected experience is the type of adventure I will gladly sign up for, but often appears out of nowhere.  A gift, really.  Life is full of such experiences if we simply allow them to happen on their own time.  All it takes is a little curiosity, a little openness, and a lot less fear.

If that makes me adventurous, well okay.  I didn’t go far, I had a working vehicle with gas in the tank, I was close to a populated town, I still had a signal on my phone.  That is not much of an adventure.

If you call me “curious,” that might be a better description.  I will proudly wear that badge, with no qualification or explanation necessary.