Ethics, Rain and Confusion (September 2009)

 Part 3 in a series of unpublished articles that I didn't want to lose into the cracks.  Here we return to S. Fork but a season later, now almost October.

It was great to experience this place in it's wild days.  Today, the habitat will take a long time to recover to what it was.  But what is 1000 years to old Mother Earth?  A millionth less than the breath of a moth.

They called me Hambone in those days, and a few still do.  The Bus Camps were taking on steam...we were also getting more bold with remote locations and bad weather.

I make no apologies for the ramblings of this younger man, but I do support his cause for it is mine as well.

"Ethics, Rain and Confusion"

What a jumbled mess my head is. Maybe it's the stockpile of intoxicants, the change of seasons, or just encroaching madness. Does anyone else feel crazed after spending time without a roof, then returning? Today has been especially powerful, I feel like I'm in a funk. Too many conflicting feelings; perhaps it should be handled in the land of no-thought, where all peace arises. Perhaps the mountains are stained by too much beer. But I do know that merriment and the bond of rekindled friendships touch more than can be defined.

Plans made way in advance crumbled like old wet cracker boxes. As I started my sunny Friday, bright and early with kindergarten delivery, I felt a sense of sadness, alone in a crowd as my kid mingled with the pool of other children. As mercury drops they form and dance as one. Soon fighting traffic and crossing guards, I knew I'd be alone and far removed from this workday bustle. Companionship seemed like a lost ship as I drove further away, high into the bright Old Cascades. For weeks I've studied maps, searched for written history - to only be dropped into the reality of the place, far removed from inkstains and imagination. This was real. A spinning dividing green sea, defining logic or understanding met my gaze as the road lifted like a rocket climbing thousands of feet into this leafy maze. It almost seemed too much to eat as one meal.

Arriving onto the knob-top peak of the world at nearly 5000' encased under deep blue skies, I tacked up an old hubcap and smiled, king of lofty peaks.

The day passed slowly. Funny, some times I feel a deperate need for solitude. This day was different. I felt a strong need for kinship, for connection of a deeper human source. But instead I sat perched in perhaps the lonliest loft in Oregon, biding my time and watching the slow sweep of the second hand on my chipped and well worn Walgreens watch. I amused myself for a spell climbing ridges and chasing ghosts, but dreaded a twisted ankle down the slippery slope of a recovering clearcut. How can a path turn into an impassible tangle? Time, the great void enforcer. None can detangle from the Great Web.

The night fell splendidly, slowly as the finest silk gauze, thin as breath, smoke flowing with temporary form and caressing the hills with the milky glow of starlight.

"Where is everybody?" I thought, spoke, paced and yelled.

Hours pass. "this is most disappointing" I frown, as midnight approaches. Every jet is a VW, every breeze tires on gravel. I note that most flights are heading south with frequency, then taper off as the night progresses. I see Portland twinkling orange in the far off valley, and wonder how the people I care about are doing on this fine lonely night.

Suddenly, the sound of motors pierces the night.  I am bathed by headlights, crabby and reluctant for company once the moment has arrived. I am tired at this point and in no mood for chit chat.

Maps, the wires that hold the current of knowledge have been forgone this vast evening causing a delay in human delivery, but at least everyone arrived safely. It is not an easy path up to South Fork, it's like the road itself is Coyote the Trickster, intent on confusion. "Every road will take you there". Perhaps, but not to this place. It's ridiculous that a road even exists where a helicopter or some sort of buzzard would roost, but it's ordinary in this armor clad world. For a spell at least, until the Earth again folds in like cake batter and all is made new again.

In spite of my mood, it was very good to see my friends in such an unlikely place. We watched the stars dance, and nearly the sun slip from the shadows but the call of slumber was too deep, and well earned by this time.

I am awakened by the tinny dance of raindrops on the thin steel above my head. As promised the rain has arrived, ocean borne clouds streaking and dropping their heavy payload as the new dawn races quickly behind. Suddenly it is daylight, and the mists are howling past. It is time to face the water element head on. Soon I am soaked, but enjoy a hearty breakfast and a hot cup of tea. It is not cold, just wet wet wet and the clouds are hurtling sideways. The boys set up camp a bit down the road from me, so I become the High Count on the hill, overlooking the serfs down below. It is a position I hold with great power and I'm sure they still tremble with fear at my might.

Fortified and with some deliberation we decide to head down the old trail to Memaloose in the rain. With little dogs providing amplification to footfalls, I slowly fall behind as I chop brush on the soggy hillside so the trail can exist as an independent entity. Once again alone, but too busy now to care I slowly make my way down the mountain to the glorious gray lake, veiled in rain and clouds, washed away by the watercolors of the cold earth. Soon, it's time to head back up the hill and we repeat the performance, I lagging behind to clear trees and bushes, history denied root, but this failure quickly extinguished by my mindless chopping. "why do I do this?" I wonder...

Back on top I marvel at how autumn has become, as witnessed by gentle hues of golden and red in the huckleberry bushes, soon to sleep for another winter. At the lake it is still summer, with a green quilt and ripe berries fat for the picking, but here on top fall dances with the rain.

As clouds begin to part, and the day slowly drops, we cheer momentary breaks of sun, as the glorious orb appears like the moon thru these racecar mists. Alas we are forced to endure the gray until evening approaches. Various whiskeys appear and the fog of my own brain seems to escape out my ears and mingle with the clouds. Great Discussions ensue, "does a man have an ethical duty to project God thru their lifework?" The results are still undetermined. The jury is questionable at best.

As a huge stump is carried like a coffin up the night road, a growling comes from the darkness. No, it is the insane Gypsie scaring the crap out of us. Thank you again for that. A Sasquatch bride sits lonesome this evening, missing their true counterpart.

Sleep comes quick. As another new day approaches, the mists do finally part allowing the splendor of God's Green Earth to explode below in all directions. But it is time to pack and deal with the red dirt encasing everything, red mud ash from eruptions before an atmosphere.

And then the numbing drive home, snaking down miles of pothole roads, into the womb of human creation, the grids snaked out, the streaked peaks fading into the background like a Jr. High lunch, forgotten, eaten, gone but causing an intense self fortification.

These places seem to exist in a dream. My bus is only a lozenge dissolved under the tongue, while my eyes soon dart awake, fearful, full, and facing the light at whatever cost and internal consequence. One can plan and read all about it in various papers and personal anecdotes, but only when the poison pen is destroyed and the viscous paper extinguished can a person truly experience these mysteries of life.