2021 was the most fucked up time in recent human history. We are all still collectively recovering from the trauma of the past two years, still in the grips of an isolating pandemic with seemingly no end in sight. Ever tired of our tiny bubbles, the bonds are breaking in our families and in our societies. Old inequities are finally eroding the iron base of this great nation, and the entire structure seems perched to collapse.
The natural world seems to be crumbling like a poorly fired clay vessel. Record fires, unprecedented drought. The ancient ice is melting while thousand year old trees go up like Roman candles. We are choking on our own fog and vomit.
Astrologers have been predicting this time of chaos and rebirth for some time. We have begun the Age of Aquarius, a time of death to old and outmoded ways. This is the end of a 2000 year cycle where we say goodbye to the Age of Pisces. We are entering a time of discovery, of innovation and progress. I know very little about Astrology, but it does seem to fit the spirit and intensity of the times.
Like all of you, I have weathered 2021 with a nervous uncertainty. "Will the forests stop burning?" I asked the Earth with alarming frequency. "Will we ever gather again? Can we sing music and laugh with one another?"
The answers to these questions still evade us. I celebrated the beginning of 2021 with an almost paranoid caution. I had rekindled a bond with the love of my life, a woman who I dreamed about before our union. Between the fires and other global heartache, our bond grew stronger as it weakened from within. I loved her with my life, but it didn't matter. Like the destroyed forests it was just a suggestion of a tree, a charred trunk that lacked any structure at all. Are we betrayed by the shape of a burned forest? Is the snake really a rope?
Nature never ceases to heal and amaze. When the shit really hits we all retreat to our green Mother. She is always there, and will always gather us close in Her arms. This is the one lesson that I take away from the complicated mess of the past two years. I have found that even fire has been brought about to purify our world. We are all carbon, and fire allows us to see the content of our bones and bodies.
A lot of people have been affected by the recent trauma of Covid and race wars. Freak storms that cause never before seen damage. We have all run weeping into the forests and through our fragile meadows searching for an escape. Are we a frog in a pot of water slowly boiling alive? Never before have I seen so many humans crushed into natural areas like city tenements. In between the 1000 year old trees lies a camp culture borne from drug abuse and homelessness. Suburban families who have never weathered a night in the woods leave behind piles of excrement and mounds of soiled toilet paper to melt into the woody duff. Drunk young men have left a litter of broken bottles, thousands of red shotgun shells that stain the floor with plastic. A car cut into sections and left abandoned aside the wilderness. We can see what they left behind, but we can never know what they took back with them.
Did you make it out alive? What lessons did you learn from the past year of hell and miracles?
I'm still nursing a very wounded heart. I grieve for my people. I struggle with my own significant losses, the loss of my beloved and the bittersweet sadness of watching my daughter grow up and independent. Most of all I'm deeply affected by the accumulated loss of our natural areas. Electric mycelium runs from my fingertips deep into the rich soil, into the trunks of trees and through the eyes of bats. I feel the weight of an immense fir snag as it collapses and crashes into the ferns with a crushing thud. I'm the scattering of birds that flutter away excitedly in the flecks of dust in the sunbeams. I'm also the quiet sky at night, the moment between the calls of owls and a soft rustling breeze that barely disturbs the darkness.
How do we begin again? Again? See over there? Nature, and she is smiling at you. Take Her hand. She will show you the truth. She will laugh with a child's joy, her sweet melody pours over you with the tinkling of small diamonds. You will be torn apart and sewn back together backwards. Suffering will ultimately set you free. Each violation from a mosquito's tube will be a gift that clatters with an accompany of crashing thunder. She will teach you to see without eyes.
How did I leap into 2021?
It began with such a deep love I feel I will never recover. She became part of the blue flame that runs through my nerves. I have not felt so connected to anther human being. She made me feel whole and overflowing with joy. Was this equal? Some live in a vault without windows. Only painted scenes cover the walls.
My year started on the Oregon Coast, in the pounding rain and the oysters. Will this be a new start? Can I finally leave the hurt and failure in the past?
Soon back into the city. The months of winter struggle, job and toil. The woods are frozen and buried in deep drifts. Dark nights and damp to the bone. Finally, spring. The season slowly folds into sunshine and the clouds melt away for a day or so. Bees begin to hum around the musty gardenbed. Snow beds dissolve into rushing rivers filled with icicle trout. Are the rushing waters attempting to speak?
It has been a long time since we have been able to share each other's company. It has been a great joy to celebrate the mountains with my friends, but a global pandemic sure makes it difficult to gather and breathe each other's poison air. This spring was different. "It's surely almost over," we console. "We're safe out in the woods at least." 6 feet apart and please don't give me the plague.
Screw it. Let's have a Volks Camp. It's been too long.
March is the traditional "first camp" of the year. As we have discovered, the east side of Mt. Hood is accessible much earlier in the season. The snow melts into the muddy ground. Soon the yellow basalmroot blooms will carpet the tan soil. Snow will still fall in great white flurries. A golden afternoon may fade into a blaring sunset, with purples fighting orange over the love of red.
"Little Badger?" I ask the few friends still left who are brave enough to face each other. At the last minute, she will not be coming. Should I even go without her? It is a tough decision but I promised I'd be there. Eva is counting on me. Everyone is expecting ol' Hambone to ramble on about lanterns and "you people". With some reluctance I pack the Bus and we continue on course. The edge of the high desert, where forest can not exist. It's just too damned dry.
sunlight! it's been a while
I have a habit of searching out the forgotten parts of our world. Here at Badger Creek, there were a number of trails that were replaced by roads and lost. This trail once climbed from the creek canyon to the top of a ridge. At the top is a lovely old camp to bask in the sun like a lizard. No rain! Can you imagine?
Eva and Randy make their way up an abandoned trail
Eva, almost all grown up
Back to the solemn camp in the afternoon shade. The creek is crashing nearby, chatting like an excited preschool class. The water flows and bubbles, knocks under rocks and talks continuously. Did you hear that? Were those voices coming from the creek?
CT Ham Co. circa 1900 and still at work. Where will our plastic crap be in 100 years?
Randy and Robb share a moment in the afternoon warmth
I can't sit still/let's go on a hike! With Jasan Robb, Jill, and Eva
A special place on Badger. Can you feel the peace?
Stephan plucks a tune in the afternoon chill
Stony Stumble 2021! The tradition continues, let's wander the nighttime woods. Sure why not.
Hambone Me, Eva and Jasan keepin it real
We share laughter and food, sweat and relaxation. The heat of a muted sun and the frost at midnight under a confection of starry night. The days rush away with a smile and it's time to go home. Back to that other reality of traffic and noise. And oh yeah, don't forget your mask.
Even in the city, Nature continues to yell at me like an old Brooklyn cabbie. "Heyy Bobb-eee come on out here! Sometimes all you can do is get away for an afternoon. It's not enough, but better than nothing. An hour from Portland you can still find patches of ancient forest if you look hard enough. For this lucky day, we have Eagle Fern Park to roam around the soggy ferns. While it is small, the trees are impressive and have somehow escaped the saws.
Eva at the gates of Eagle Fern Park
I'm feeling weird. I just received my first Covid shot and really should be resting somewhere warm. Instead we're having a spacey adventure. It seems like something I would do. Woah, don't fall off the mountain ya dizzy assed adventurer. Eva just laughs.
Eva crossing Eagle Creek 2021
same place, 2008 with Erin
What do you want with me, Time? Is this some kind of joke? Well I'm not fucking laughing.
It's my birthday. 52 are you kidding me? How the hell am I a half-century plus? Screw this let's go camping. Back to Badger Creek. It will be one of the best camps of my life with so much joy and connection. Three days to explore Badger Creek.
It is the first day of turkey season. After two hours of searching the dark forest roads for an open campsite, we finally settle into a pleasant spot on a high ridge, where a twinkling sky is already putting on a show. The stream of trucks passing by is truly endless, every 5 minutes another Ford filled with desperate hunters crashes down the washboard road and churns up dust clouds. We just huddle closer and laugh about it. Happy Birthday! And it's all that I want.
Gluggggluggg gobbble! Gobble guggggulggug! Turkeys are yelling at each other thru the thin woods. All of these hunters and no one is finding a turkey to kill. They're all too wise for you buddy. I guess I'm a turkey too.
It's the end of April. The snow is finally melting from the middle elevations. Let's go for a hike on the Fanton Trail. Once one of the earliest trails on the western Cascades, it's now on the edge of national forest and receives it's fair amount of abuse. On some days you will be greeted by motorcycles, illegally ripping up the dirt with their shrill engines.
We are joined by a couple of boys who have never been on a wilderness hike. They aren't impressed. Weary boredom soon takes hold. No matter, the low snow will send us back.
Almost to Squaw aka Tumalo Mountain
Another month passes. Our gardens bloom and trees explode with flowers. It's a rich time of green and every color in between. Did you see that blue sky? Nothing is more surprising after an eternity of rain. Colors!
It is time for another camp. Let's go somewhere new. The Clackamas is still closed from the terrible fires.
Quartzville Creek looks so promising on the map. A deep river canyon lined with old growth forest. The maps, however, do not show you the sketchy meth-fueled camps that follow the river for a good twenty miles. They do not tell you about the constant traffic and the clearcut hillsides.
A carabiner breaks! The hammock crashes to the earth and bruises 4 delicate cheeks. And it is the last straw, a weekend is ruined and the cars continue to stream by. Randy doesn't feel safe leaving camp gear unattended. I have had enough. Fuck you Quartzville I'll never come back. There aren't any photos to provide testament. Trust me. Maybe the lack of evidence is evidence itself.
...
It is almost June. The year is already half-over. Soon there will be an historic heat wave that bakes the Northwest. Temperatures of near 120 degrees scorches the earth for days and we just huddle in the dark with an air conditioner struggling to keep the heat at bay. We have been talking about taking her kids camping. Although they have never known the wilds, I am looking forward to showing them a sacred place in the wilderness. Let's go back to the Eastside. I know somewhere special.
Badger Creek in her deep summer canyon
old growth forest below, sagebrush oak desert on top. All because of the creek.
The weather is hot and it keeps getting hotter. We hike down to the creek with much consternation. We play Whiffle Ball in the dusty asters, the yellow blooms like miniature sunflowers almost everywhere. I throw a lazy pitch and get a Whiffle right in the throat! Serves me right. She reads them pirate stories as the night chill gathers and we're soon asleep in the celibate Bus. It is fun, and also not fun like a camping boot-camp. They are having a good time I think, but also seem pretty miserable. Being exposed in Nature is often hard work. We get used to air conditioning and electricity. All of the convenience with none of the effort.
I sing them one of my silly songs and we all laugh about the verses, this crazy guy Bob dragging you into the woods. I hope that they will remember the experience with some fondness. For me at least, it's an honor to know that I brought the wilderness to their lives, at least for a few days. It's not easy to forget.
July. A month without a camp and it's the best season to be wandering the Cascades. The bus is packed, let's go! I want to take you to High Rock.
We have another fight. She doesn't want go. She won't talk to me. The bus gets unpacked.
...
The end of July. Summer continues to bake us in our shoes and cauterize all wounds. Eva and I are going to our most sacred place in the Salmon Huckleberry. They call it Draw Creek these days, I wonder what the old names are? Eva has come into her sense of self in this place, at the dawn of her expanding consciousness. It is her favorite place to be, I'm sure of it. I have my own encyclopedia, memories that will stay with me forever. Sacred time on an old orange blanket. Finding trails that have been lost for 50 years. Laughing and bleeding at the same time. I want this place to last forever, then I will dwell there in a secret cabin that defies time. I will befriend generations of deer and amuse ten thousand owls. I will become old man of the creek and the moss will be my beard.
a climax forest of old growth helmock. Only this small valley survived the fires from the 19-teens
Eva and Mama Bus
to the Salmon River
Three miles down a trail so abandoned that it has forgotten its own name. Someone has been down here recently! What are the odds? It was certainly a Trail Advocate, probably Don or Rob. It's another two miles to the end. "What do you think, Eva?" Her sweaty red face says she's had enough. I hear the beers calling my name, time to head back to the comfort of camp and the singing creeks. I only miss her a little bit here in this sacred place.
my girl
August brings a most incredible experience! Truly life changing.
When I came to Oregon over 20 years ago, the PBS series Oregon Field Guide became my inspiration to explore the incredible riches of the natural world. Each and every Sunday, Eva and I would wait and watch with great excitement. She would sit on my lap in entranced silence, the scenes and stories of beautiful Oregon leaving her quiet with wonder. They became a sort of blueprint for the life of adventure we both wanted to live.
As you may know, I have been researching history and lost natural places for a number of years. I have written a book about the Oregon Skyline Trail which will be published soon! How thrilling to find out that Oregon Field Guide wants to do a story about our adventures along the Skyline. For four days in August I will be the host to a forgotten part of Oregon's important history. It is really a dream come true.
Mama Bus all pretty
Are you ready, Eva? I'm not sure who is more nervous
Skyline Trailhead at Summit GS
It was a very intense experience, it is wearisome to be "on" for many hours each day. the crew was smaller than I expected, just the producer Ian McCluskey and the photographer Kevin Freeney with a crazy assortment of cameras and drones. We begin at Government Camp and ended the shooting at Olallie Lake, just like the storyline in Searching for the Skyline.
After a summer blazing with white hot heat, we encountered many cold gray skies and the fingers of icy breeze tickling under the flannel. It rained a bit, just tiny shower droplets that soak the scrubby green brush of salal and huckleberries. By the time we arrive at Olallie a few days later, a brilliant sun casts the lakes in heavenly hues. The burned forest from the previous year's fires gather around the lakeshore with their blackened trunks, trying to get a better look at the action.
It was difficult to recognize that my little trail partner for the past 17 years will be off to college soon. When asked about it during an interview, I had to hold back my emotions for they were very strong.
PBS isn't sure of the release date, this spring or even autumn. But it will come out in 2022 please stay tuned! We're both very proud to be part of something so important. Truly a dream neither of us could have predicted. I can only hope the message of conservation will make some sort of difference no matter how small. For the first time I truly feel like an Oregonian.
ol Hambone plucks out a tune on the Skyline, photo by Ian McCluskey
Shooting is over! Let's go back to Portland. Eva needs to go home. I have another week off! And can't wait to have some Nature time.
yes, baked at Fred Meyer's. Tremendous irony.It wasn't a very good camp. A disaster, in fact. Our communication degraded by the hour. It was time to go home a few days early. Blue again under the promise of wilderness? Such sadness after a life changing event? What the hell. The high mountain lake doesn't care.
Never mind, Bobby. The wilderness Mother is always there for you.
looking a little tattered after 52 years of camping...
September. Another camp? It is Labor Day and summer is slip sliding away. It has been a very hot summer and the fire danger has been high. We haven't enjoyed a campfire since June and the homeless camps are on fire. A bunch of lanterns in a circle doesn't quite cut it. Patricia and Ian will be joining me. Ol Ruckman too. Let's go to Dry Meadow, what do you guys think? "Oh you're the one who knows this stuff! It's up to you!"
I don't know, but I do enjoy the company immensely. Especially in times of trouble. Music and wilderness friends will heal everything. This I absolutely guarantee. Warranty written AND implied. The last thing I want to be is an expert. Perhaps a co-conspirator.
Bertha Bus keeps ticking for 50+ years
Ian and Patricia. They are so sweet together! a truly kind and loving couple.
buzzzzzzzzzz! A hidden hornet's nest nearby? But they never gave me any trouble.
The meadows are bright and crisp as the sun. Good beer flows with effortless company, and another whiskey yes please. It's not at all necessary but very appreciated. Everything tastes better in the forest. The Skyline ran right through here! Yes, but those are just words and it's hard to believe under the umbrella of jet traffic.
in-between the dusky crossroads of autumn and the sun, Ian
Night falls, and I don't. A Stony Stumble with Patricia to the end of the road while everyone else is asleep. It is far enough to stumble. The lanterns seem like lighthouses in the dark.
A gift! Patricia's mosquito screen fits my bus. Thank you!
We left Neal standing there. He's still there to this day. Some say he's as old as the hills. Others say that's a lot of ageist bullshit and they are probably right.
There is a committee that has been formed that periodically sweeps off the snow and feeds him hoagies and IPAs. You can contribute here: [link]
...
In between the isles of the passing seasons, a lot of life happened that is contrary to the spirit of this story. There was deep love shared, communion and miscommunication. A great distance began to form without knowing it, like a hidden pocket of air in the ice. It is hard for me to see the faults in someone I love. I can see my own quite clearly and they often guide me, sometimes to lesser places. I had a hunch that my life was about to shift, but just a hunch and not a prediction. Instead of discussing any of this, I present to you a September salad created by Eva with the last of the garden vegetables.
and a counsel of elders at the Lucky Lab. With Hal, Randy, Joseph, and Neil
October arrives like a jack o lantern in some kind of hurry. "Where you goin bub? Some kinda hurry huh?" I'm not ready for autumn. Summer was a wash, between the Covid and the world on fire, the canceled camps and arguments. My dearest daughter Terian is getting married! This means I'm off to Chicago, my hometown. I haven't been back in over a decade because these damn forests have stolen my heart away. I'm a mountain man now.
12 seconds off the plane I'm back home again. Da Bears for sure.
Impossible to get the coal tar grit out of the man. It's there for life. Da Bears.
Although this has little to do with Oregon wilderness (!) please allow me to share a few photos of the trip. It was such a beautiful wedding, I was a slobbering joyful mess. So proud to be a Papa!
Terian and Eva stuff their faces in Wicker Park
your author lived here many years, on the 3rd floor
 |
| Bob at Margie's Candies |
Here along the dense North Shore of Lake Michigan, the Gold Coast, I'm startled to find a bit of native prairie has been restored. This used to be cut green lawns, now it is full of native Midwest plants. It is really special to see in such an urban place. A small token but someone cares. How wonderful to walk through the winding paths! Just beyond, the mountains of architecture line the canyons of Downtown.
My kind of town, Chicago is. The most skilled yet humble place I've lived or visited. One hell of a hot dog too.
Chicago AKA "Wild Onion"
And a wild happy night with my old friend Bill Wagg. Over 30 years I've known this guy.
October falls away. November and almost the end of the season, and the end of this story.
Autumn sunset at Vista House on the Columbia River Highway
One last trip. She is taking me to Breitenbush. It is unusually warm and dry for this time of the year.
Yoder Store. Just like me, in service since 1915
It was one of the best trips of my life. My lower back was in intense pain, but it didn't matter. I was with my person in the healing waters of Breitenbush. The fires tore through here too. How difficult to see your favorite memories erased from time and space. The little cabin village from the 20s now just a vacant lot. We stopped at Silver Falls on the way home. She held my hand up the muddy trail, to help me along. In a few days, she would walk away for good.
December. Sauvie's Island with Eva. Just a jump away from Portland. This place used to be densely packed with Chinook communities but now it's rural farmland just outside the Urban Growth Boundary. Strange to find yourself in farmland when the city is so close by. The dismal rain is creeping in. And the clammy damp which will remain until May.
Eva in the cottonwoods
The Solstice. When everything dies and starts new again. Hal and Stephan are going shooting, do I want to come with? Not particularly but I miss you guys. It will be better than sitting home lonely.
The Yacolt State Forest, growing back from a fire 100 years ago. A very impacted place filled with roads and clearcuts. Shooting galleries filled with trash. POP POP POP!!!!!! Man those guns are loud.
It was better than staying home alone. When your friends give you love when you're hurting.
Stephan and Hal warm their buns between rounds
December is here and I'm in denial of the cold rain and long nights. A VW Holiday light parade? Sure why not. Especially because it hasn't stopped raining for weeks and the whole Northwest is flooding.
Randy, will you come with me? Sure.
We drive into the pouring rain, 100 vintage Volkswagens covered in holiday lights and snaking through the subdivisions where all the houses look exactly alike. The colored lights are wonderful in the rain and reflecting off the shiny streets. Randy jokes that we are actually racist old Germans and pretends to smile slogans to the happy holiday families. Heil! and all the rest. A dark night to be sure, but brighter because someone is there to share it with.
2021 is done with. Dead. Thank God for the experience, for love and connection and cycles.
Life on Earth is indeed a miracle, even with these fragile bodies made with meat and carbon. Just when I think I can't take any more pain, I stand up stronger than ever. In that moment when a stalk of grass dies like a child, she does so willingly and with great joy. The wind doesn't have to know about sadness and birth, that is our domain. I find that when my world gets smaller and smaller, I should retreat to the wilderness. To reset the sense of scale. To feel the true vastness of space while we have air to breathe. Wilderness is solitude, wilderness is home. We are that.
It's a Wonderful Life
2022 is here. The end of this terrible pandemic is almost here, can you feel it? Change is here, the true deep change of an Aquarian. This time is forced upon us, none of us have any choice about our families or the world we were born into. We can choose to be good to one another, and to walk with a deeper respect. If humanity doesn't start to work together, we are all fucked. Will our castles be washed into the sea?
2022 will be the year we all connect with our communities and our deeper selves. I hope you will join me out there, in the last wild places on Earth. Let's celebrate together while we rebuild.
No comments:
Post a Comment