Please Make a U-turn in the Next 500 Feet…

“Thelma and Louise are on the road again!” My mom or I usually shout that at the start of our adventures. Two minutes after we started our drive to the Eno River today, the GPS told us to please make a U-Turn. We laughed at the glitch, but the GPS’ mistake made me wonder why so many people make a “U-Turn” from the outdoors and head to malls or movie theatres for entertainment.

In John Steinbeck’s Travels with Charlie in Search of America, there are plenty of examples of Steinbeck coming across natural wonders without another soul in sight. He rarely comes across others outdoors and the people he does bump into are the likes of migrant French-Canadian farmers and a traveling actor.

So why do we often choose the air-conditioned strip mall over a hike in the woods? Comfort is probably a major reason-let’s face it, the woods are riddled with bugs, snakes, and spider webs. I hiked around Umstead Park this past weekend with a friend and woke up Tuesday with an alarming number of bug bites on my torso.  

Convenience is another reason the outdoors are avoided. A mall offers a smorgasbord of soft pretzels, handbags and make-up samples all in one consolidated location. Parks are often large enough to get lost in and there isn’t an Auntie Anne’s stand at the end of that yellow brick road. Restrooms are few and far between so you might have to *gasp*, drop trow in the woods.

But, I think the biggest reason Americans generally prefer staying indoors is that the woods are scary. I don’t mean scary because you might get a snake bite or get shot by an overzealous deer hunter. When Steinbeck visits a redwood forest he makes the realization that we are fearful of these trees because of their size, but also because of what they represent. Redwoods have existed as far back as the Cretaceous era. The history of these trees far outweighs our own, and these quiet giants live much longer than we could hope to even with anti-aging lotions and advanced health care.

The scariest thing about nature is not the potential dangers that exist there, but the fact that we are forced to remember our own mortality. Nature continues on despite economic downturns, disease, divorce and many other d-words that plague humankind. However, I think this is a blessing rather than something to fear. The world keeps turning despite our own problems, so maybe we can gain some perspective from the persistence of nature.