Soul Mining

Over the weekend, the wife and I celebrated 20 years of not killing each other with some friends we had not seen in a while. It was our first outing in our new healthy frame of mind and we took all the precautions we could to ensure we made the right choices and stayed on track. Food wise we brought stuff to make at the hotel and when we we were out and about we made a pact that we would stick to places where we could control what and how much went onto our plates. Aside from a clandestine calorie fest in the local wine tasting rooms, all went well.
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About 2 hours or so from where we live is a small town called Angels Camp. This quaint little, gold rush era, town was made famous by Mark Twain when he wrote a story about the Famous Jumping Frog of Calaveras County. This place is interesting to say the least. It has a lot of character and drips with history at every turn. Other than it's rundown ghost town like charm and an obvious obsession with amphibians, there is lots of wine to spit out, a multitude of ancient caverns to gawk at and of course, abandon mines to explore.

The drive there was pleasant, but as we sped further away from our house the Blah week I was having seemed to continue to nag at me. I could not see much in the way of scenery. That tends to be an issue when it is pitch dark out side, so I couldn't really get into the trip much on the way there.

We spent the rest of the night priming our pallets for the tasting that would take place the next day, with copious amounts of wine we imported from home. I began to forget about the events of the week after a while. Morning came without to many embarrassing moments (all photographic evidence has been destroyed) and we got moving around 10:30 or so thanks to a few beers (sure hangover cure) and a couple cups of coffee.

We had wine tasting planned for latter in the day but had no immediate ideas for entertainment. So throwing caution to the wind we decided to drive around until something grabbed us. My head wasn't really in the game, my memory of the week started coming back into focus as my hang over subsided. I was hoping that something would snap me out of this funk and soon.

The landscape looked like something from the Lord of the Rings. Hills slightly sloping into one another as tall grass waved in a slight breeze. Patches of trees covered the hills concealing homes and farms and I half expected to see the heads of Hobbits to pop up from the meadows like the Wack-A-Mole games that routinely stole my money as a kid.

As we turned down one particularly twisted road, a huge sign advertising one of the largest gold mines in the area, came into view. I had seen several documentaries on mining and the Gold Rush, but never actually set foot inside a working mine before. I am a huge history and so I spoke up and we stopped to take a tour.

The next tour wasn't starting for another 30 minutes, just enough time for us to walk around the gift shop pedaling what seemed like legitimate historical artifacts. Of course upon closer inspection I found that most of the history in the place was manufactured in China or Brazil. No matter. I was there for the physical experience and not the overpriced trinkets. Little did I know that I would soon be walking away from that mine with something more precious to me than the gold that was stripped from it's corridors so long ago.

We gathered at the mouth of the mine where we were greeted by gritty black and white pictures of scruffy men holding archaic looking equipment. Tools that seemed more suited as medieval torture devices then instruments of fortune. As I looked at the photos I wondered what had driven these men of such different social and economic backgrounds to this place. I wondered how many came out of sheer greed and how many from pure desperation. Their eyes seemed to pierce right into my soul and haunted me for the rest of the trip. It was as if I could feel the pain, desperation and hope they had to embrace everyday as they struggled for the legal tender. Feelings that must have rode with them through the days. Days with an uncertain end. Would this be the day they strike gold or the day the emerge empty handed. Pretty much how I had been feeling throughout the week.

Eleven o'clock rolled around and it was time for the tour to begin. The guide had us dawn our protective gear and we began our accent into the mine. The further into the rough hewn tunnel we went, the more I felt the walls around me tighten their grip. As if I was being lowered to a final resting place, cocooned in a metal casket with wheels. The tour guides monotone voice droned on, the words sounding like recited scripture at the edge of a grave. Just as I felt a wave of claustrophobic panic sweep over me, the tunnel opened into a massive cavern filled with more antique mining equipment. We stopped and began to explore what felt like the center of the earth. I half expected Mole men to jump from the shadows and abduct the crying children in the group, but no such luck.

Along the walls there were full size effigies of miners in period dress, miming the various acts of the mining process. I felt like I was 8 years old again, taking in the sites on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride but at the most depressing place on earth instead. As the tour guide began to explain the scene we were staring at, I began to realize what these men had gone through to find, what to them I am sure was, their only salvation. I began to hear the clank of the pick axes and scrapping of the shovels. I could see the sweat dripping from their pours, turning every layer of dirt they had accumulated during their twelve hour work days into mud.

At that moment I realized that the reason for them being there didn't really matter. Whether it was greed or need, It was the pursuit of a dream that was the common tie. It was the thing that bound these men to this caustic hole in the ground. They must have relied on each other to make it through the day as they searched for the dream that was buried deep in the earth. I could hear them talk about their homes and families to each other and the hope that they had for the future. It was a very different scene to me now.

The tour ended and as we ascended towards the light at the end of the tunnel a feeling of peace washed over me. It truly felt as if I was having an out of body experience. I felt like I was coming back to life from what as near death experience. The feeling I had when I entered the mine changed to one of relief. In that instant the hellish week I had had, came squarely into perspective and I realized that my days had been a lot like that of the miners. Strangers who had posthumously taught me a the biggest lesson I have learned since my new life began.

The fact that I had a bad week was inevitable. It was the first and it won't be the last. It was my friends down in the mine with me (my SPFs) that helped keep me focused on the task at hand. I saw that showed me that everyday that I continue to work hard, regardless of success or failure, is a day that I should be grateful for. The fact that I carried on and stuck it out was the shining moment that proves I will finally have a chance at a second life. To realize that everyday I continue to dig, the closer I get to the treasure that is buried deep within me.