Alexandersmap

    Author: nhcarmichael

    • Not Often a Beautiful Relation

      “While almost all men feel an attraction drawing them to society, few are attracted strongly to Nature. In their reaction to Nature men appear to me for the most part, notwithstanding their arts, lower than the animals. It is not often a beautiful relation, as in the case of the animals. How little appreciation of the beauty of the landscape there is among us! We have to be told that the Greeks called the world Beauty, or Order, but we do not see clearly why they did so, and we esteem it at best only a curious philological fact. For my part, I feel that with regard to Nature I live a sort of border life, on the confines of a world into which I make occasional and transient forays only, and my patriotism and allegiance to the state into whose territories I seem to retreat are those of a moss-trooper.” – Henry David Thoreau, Walking

      The New Hampshire sky at dusk last night was filled with the wispy smoke of fires from California. Instead of moss-troopers crossing the border and plundering the land, nature is taking over and reminding us that the world is on edge. Burning, warming, and recoiling from mankind’s continued affront. I see the fires out west and look at the drought in the White Mountains and understand it could easily happen here too. Were it not for the steady march of tropical storms coming up and soaking us we could well be there already. But that endless string of tropical storms is yet another symptom of climate change. The earth has a fever, and ignoring it will not make it better.

      There’s a certain draw to the life of the 17th century moss-trooper, those Scottish brigands who would plunder the British across the border and then melt back into the landscape. The inclination to melt into the landscape seems more natural than mankind’s push to conquer nature. I’m like Thoreau in this respect. Too much of mankind has the opposite view: plunder nature to fuel profit. No appreciation for what we have, only how much money we can squeeze out of the land and sea.

      I’ve found that the same people who believe that news they don’t want to hear is fake are the first to question science around climate change (or COVID-19 for that matter). In America anyway, the rhetoric around the rights of the individual fueled by the limitless opportunity for self-expression the Internet provides has created a world where the adults in the room are constantly being shouted down by the maddened crowd. Something has to give. We’ll either plunge into chaos or rally towards a unified focus on sustainability and order. I fear for the former but hope for the latter. I wonder, what will it be?

    • For this Moment

      I’m a bit lost this morning with the writing. Most days it comes naturally. Not so much today. This morning I found a lovely poem that I thought might be a great starting point but, upon reflection, reserved it for a eulogy I’m writing. Unless I scrap it for another passage I’m contemplating. But either way I just can’t use it for myself at this moment.

      And so there’s my dilemma. Write what I’m thinking at the moment for a blog post, for the eulogy, or perhaps even the novel I’m slowly chipping away at that doesn’t seem so important today. And so I simply write and let the words come as they may. There will be other times for observation of the world at large. For the moment the writing turns inward. And there’s that word again: Moment. Here we are.

      Living for the moment seems a bit selfish, really. It’s the grasshopper not preparing for winter the way the ants do. But living in this moment, well, that’s a bit different, isn’t it? Living in this moment is being present. And so I’m embracing the moment at hand, filled with wonder yet sadness, possibility with reflection. There are things to do at the moment, while honoring the things you can no longer do, or perhaps never could. In the moment distracts. This moment clarifies.

      So get on with it already.

    • The Path of Further Understanding

      “If you think it is ever warranted to stop on the path of further understanding, you are very far from the truth. The life which we received was given to us not that we might just admire it, but that we should ever look for new truth hidden from us.” – Leo Tolstoy, quoting John Milton

      I thought I was pretty clever stacking up my list of quotes and observations about the ocean, at the ready for a sailing trip northward in the Gulf of Maine. But plans change, as I wrote yesterday. And sailing will have to wait for another year and another boat. Other forces are at play now. So today I return to introspection on my own path to understanding. This year is full of moments of clarity, but also searing injustices that are difficult to understand. We do what we can to discover the truth hidden from us.

      “Well the heart that hurts
      Is a heart that beats
      Can you hear the drummer slowing
      One step closer to knowing…”
      – U2, One Step Closer

      U2 writes big arena songs that lift people up out of their seats in unison. And I love rising out of my seat with the rest of the arena. But for me, their songs of quiet reflection often left off the set list stick with me long after the adrenaline of the big songs wears off. One Step Closer is one of those songs, and I found the lyrics running through my head when I woke up this morning. Losing a loved one shakes distractions away abruptly, even when expected. And serve as reminders that we’re all one step closer to knowing stir such remembered words from the cobwebs of the mind. The truth is always waiting for us to find it.

      Is there a bigger cliche than “We’re all on this journey together”? I’m guilty of using it several times in this blog. And yet it rings true. Those who came before us offer the accumulated wisdom of their lifetimes to light the path. Our own accumulated wisdom adds familiarity and confidence that we might know the way. But none of us know where the path leads us beyond the next step. We can only walk the path as countless souls have before us and be fully present on the way. It helps to remember that we don’t walk it alone.

    • A Change of Plans

      “Death is one prophecy that never fails. Every person is born with a death sentence. Each second that passes by is one you’ll never get back.“ – Edmund Wilson

      We all have other plans. Each day is expected to be roughly what we thought it might be when we went to bed the night before. But God, the gods or the universe (depending on your belief) tends to laugh at such silly things as plans. And so it was that today my own plans were set aside for the immediacy of a life well-lived ending sooner than any of us would want.

      Last week my step-father told me privately that he would die soon. It turned out to be prescient as he passed away this morning. We talked then about this blog, and he challenged me on why I wrote so much about death. I told him I don’t write of death because I’m in any hurry to arrive there, but because it’s a stoic reminder that we all face it someday. And so it reminds me that we should truly live today. Embrace life, embrace your loved ones, and fully relish this brief time we have together. He accepted that answer, and I believe he did because he did fully embrace life and those who were lucky enough to be part of his life.

      Today the world is hollower than it was yesterday. Its up to those of us who have survived him to fill that hollowness as he did over and over in his own life. I believe we do so by rising to the occasion. Our lives, fully realized, serve not just ourselves but those we touch along the way. By rising closer towards our potential we have more to offer the world. And the world could use the help. I suppose that’s all we can do in the end.

    • Rising Up in Sterner Days

      Well, it’s 9/11 once again. And judging from the animation on both sides of the political spectrum, we aren’t as unified as perhaps we should be as we stare down a pandemic. I have friends who chafe at wearing a mask, friends who chafe at Black and/or Blue lives mattering, friends who despise the current President, friends who go on boat parades and friends that despise the boat paraders. I struggle internally with some of these friend’s beliefs, but they’re friends just the same.

      This speech by Winston Churchill is famous for the never give in bit, but to me the most powerful words are the final words. I recommend reading it in its entirety – its not that long – and reflect on what kind of leaders we want for our own country in these sterner days.

      “Do not let us speak of darker days; let us speak rather of sterner days. These are not dark days: these are great days – the greatest days our country has ever lived. ” – Winston Churchill

      Churchill said these words during the Battle of Britain, as his country stood against Hitler and fascism. I wonder what he’d say to us should he look around at our discord? The pandemic is a challenge, but as a nation shouldn’t we rise up together to face it, as we once did in the days after 9/11? I should think so.

    • In Search of a Border Marker

      In 1622 Captain John Mason was granted the land between the Kennebec River and the Merrimack River and the territory was named New Hampshire. The border with Massachusetts wasn’t the middle of the river, but a distance three miles north of the river’s shore. This made for an interesting, zig-zagging border that meanders along as the Merrimack River has from long before settlement by the English. That’s 398 years of continuous service as the official border between two similar yet completely different states. Barring wholesale changes in the borders that virtual sharp point should remain forever.

      Today, instead of eating lunch like a normal person I drove over to find the sharpest point on the border between Massachusetts and New Hampshire at a spot that on a map looked to be accessible in two directions. Using Google I zoomed in on the satellite image and decided the easiest possible way to get to this point was to walk the maintenance “road” that ran under the power lines adjacent to Route 213 in Methuen, Massachusetts. This worked out well until I reached the place where I needed to head north to the border point and scanned a swampy mess overgrown with cattails and impenetrable brush. This hike turned into a dead end but a good education on the lay of the land.

      Next option was to drive to the town transfer station, which was the next closest public land, to see if I could get to the woods that the border ran through that way. I had a great conversation with the woman weighing trucks in at the entrance, and she was politely curious about the quest that I was on, but received a no-go from the decision-makers on the other end of the radio. Not to be on this day. And that leaves me two options. Find another way in, potentially across private land, or to simply wait for the heart of winter when the ground is frozen solid to attempt the power line route again. I suppose there’s a third option of just dropping this pursuit of a border marker that may not even be there, but tell me, what’s the fun in that?

    • Over and Over

      “To do the same thing over and over again is not only boredom: it is to be controlled by rather than to control what you do.” – Heraclitus

      Heraclitus seems to be trending on the blog, coming up a couple of times in the last 24 hours of writing. Purely coincidence, but then again maybe there’s something in the September air. The days grow shorter, the air cooler, and the last of the harvest has begun. And yet we’re still in a pandemic, just as we were in the heat of summer and the early spring days when it all seemed uncertain. And many of us are still working from home day-by-day, chipping away at our jobs in the new normal, never quite feeling that way. My daughter began her senior year of college in the basement where she used to play with legos and costumes. I know she’d rather be amongst her peers on campus, and want it for her.

      Reading about the Battle of Britain in Erik Larson’s book helps me appreciate the relative ease with which we live through a global crisis compared to our grandparents and great-grandparents. We’re asked to work from home and wear a mask to avoid getting sick? Perhaps a moment of inconvenience in “living your best life”? Think about the souls being bombed from above night-after-night, wondering if this was the bombing that launched the expected German invasion. Looking at the full moon not in wonder but with dread for the illumination it offered to the enemy. No, wearing a mask doesn’t seem all that controversial in the big scheme of things.

      “History never repeats itself, but it rhymes.” – Mark Twain

      The funny thing about reading about fascists is seeing traits inherent in some world leaders of today. Critical errors made because of a character flaw changed the course of history then, and do so today as well. We just haven’t lived that history yet. But you can see the ripples that are building into waves in extremism and with climate change. Will we check the progress of the ripples or let them build into waves that wash over all of us? Appeasement didn’t work out well for Europe in the 1930’s. What are we tolerating now that will come back to bite us if unchecked?

      I suppose I should stick with the original themes of this blog, but seeing the same things over and over again gets frustrating. Sometimes you need to raise your voice and lend a hand to advance what is right. There will be moments of enlightened observation to come, but it ought to be balanced with a willingness to stand up and be counted. We can’t let the chorus of the ignorant drown out the voices of the informed. If that sounds like arrogance and elitism, well, let’s talk through our differences. There isn’t as large a gap as some might lead you to believe.

    • Every Day A New Fancy

      “We are carried along by our thoughts, “now gently, now violently, according as the water is angry or calm … every day a new fancy, and our humors shift with the shifts in the weather.” It is no wonder that the mind is like this, since even the apparently solid physical world exists in endless slow turmoil.“ – Sarah Bakewell, quoting Montaigne, who was quoting Heraclitus

      I’ve had the Montagnie’s Essays for some time now, but keep pushing it aside for other reading material. So when Bakewell’s book How To Live or A Life Of Montaigne was recommended by an author I follow closely I decided to dive in. While also reading the excellent Erik Larson book The Splendid And The Vile and Tristan Gooley’s How To Read Water and a business book recommended by the company President. So five books in various stages of completion, and a desire to complete them all. This happens now and then: every day a new fancy. I’m treating the business book like a homework assignment and read it for an hour then put it down for the day. But what of the others? You can’t read everything at once.

      The answer is you put aside the books that aren’t capturing your imagination at the moment. Get out and live, return and see where the mind settles. At the moment I’m settled on The Battle of Britain with Larson’s book. There’s only so much time for reading, just as there’s only so much time for anything else meaningful. We prioritize and complete what we can in this tumultuous world, and accept the day as it is when it ends.

      Being carried along by our thoughts is a very human condition. We all have the tendency to get distracted by the buzz around us, which has grown exponentially since Montaigne’s time. We do a disservice to ourselves having so much to consume, for we can’t possibly consume it all. Instead I’m trying to raise the bar. Consume, but make it nutrient-rich consumption. What are you getting out of this book? is as fair a question to ask as What are you getting following this person’s Twitter account? The price you pay to read it is time you’ll never get back and attention you could have spent on something else. So by all means make it worthwhile.

      In all the madness that is 2020 I forgot that this was a Leap Year. There are 366 days in 2020 – as if we needed another day added to this crazy year. Looking back on the last 250 days that have passed, I’ve managed to read 13 books so far, fewer than anticipated but overall a higher level of reading. I’m barely skating by on learning French and Portuguese, doing just enough to keep the streak alive. And of course I’ve recommitted to hiking and local travel. 2020 will go down as the most unusual year in my lifetime, but it won’t be a lost cause.

      “If you understand everything you consume, you’re probably going to be the same person 6 months from now.” – George Mack

      So there’s the challenge: stretch your limitations and grow. To turn Mack’s quote and look back six months ago when this pandemic really started locking things down, I can say I’ve accomplished a lot in spite of the pandemic (or because?). The time hasn’t been lost at all: filled with learning and family time and local travel I might have otherwise put aside in favor of the faraway. And so to turn that quote back around as a challenge to myself and look out six months from now, what will I have accomplished? When you ask this question of yourself and take it seriously it stills the tumult of the mind and lends focus to the march we’re on. Sure the stack of distractions remain, but the path becomes more defined. A tumultuous river and a still river both arrive at the same sea eventually. Which has the better journey?

    • Benchmarks

      “For any GNSS survey campaign, a proper benchmark is essential to preserve measurement location and elevation. Historically, leveling field operations for second and third order geodetic leveling, provided in the topographic instructions of the USGS, distinguished survey benchmarks as either monumented or non-monumented benchmarks. Monumented benchmarks have a tablet consisting of identifying information surrounding a stamped center point. These marks are represented as a standard metal tablet, disk, cap, or steel rod used to describe the elevation. These tablets are commonly set in concrete, stone posts, firm rock outcroppings, masonry structures, and buildings (U.S. Geological Survey, 1966).” – USGS, Methods of Practice and Guidelines for Using Survey-Grade Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) to Establish Vertical Datum in the United States Geological Survey

      If you get out in the middle of things enough you come across plenty of USGS benchmarks. And lately I’ve been coming across plenty, which is a good sign that I’m getting out there I suppose. Over the last couple of months I’ve come across benchmarks on islands, graveyards (revisiting Thoreau) and on mountain summits. And I’m always thrilled to see them. Benchmarks bear silent witness to facts. You are here, and this is where “here” is. It will remain there, stoic and frozen in time, informing whomever seeks it out.

      Many of the summits of New Hampshire feature USGS benchmarks that inform. These metal disk are stamped with the location name, the date of survey and either a triangle or an arrow. The arrows, as you might expect, point you towards the actual benchmark. The triangle lets you know you’ve arrived. Below are pictures of each from Mount Moriah yesterday.

      Summit benchmark, with triangle, date of survey and location name
      Benchmark used in triangulation. Note two dates of survey and the arrow pointing to summit location

      Survey benchmarks let you know you’ve arrived at a place that coincides with the squiggly lines and numbers on a topographic map. Those lines didn’t just write themselves, someone hiked up the mountain and surveyed that land. In the case of the summit of Mount Moriah, it was surveyed at least twice, in 1878 and again in 1958. Another New Hampshire mountain, Mount Tecumseh, was also surveyed at least twice. Like Pluto it suffered the indignity of being knocked down in status. Tecumseh went from just barely a 4000 footer to not quite a 4000 footer. Pluto went from a planet to not a planet to whatever they’ve settled on now. But I don’t believe either cares what we label them. If only humans would learn not to worry about labels as well.

      Benchmarks are typical in Civil Engineering, but of course the term has permeated other human activity as well. I suppose I could spend a few paragraphs writing about business-speak terms like benchmarking, but why ruin a perfectly good blog post about the outdoors with business-speak? Get out there and find your way, and celebrate the arrival. Thoreau was a surveyor himself, and like those benchmarks his words silently inform forever for those who would go out and find them. Seek adventure.

    • Hiking Mount Moriah

      “The goal of life is to make your heartbeat match the beat of the universe, to match your nature with Nature.” – Joseph Campbell

      The last 4000 foot peak on the Appalachian Trail in New Hampshire before entering Maine is 4049 foot Mount Moriah. Hiking it as a single day out and back, it became a 9 mile round trip that felt just a little bit longer because the ankle objected to the angle of descent, which in warmer months means walking down exposed granite slabs with feet flat, toes down and weight distributed as evenly as possible, but slightly back on the heels. With good footwear this serves to spread the load across the sole of the boot or trail running shoe (for those who choose to endure a higher level of pain). This creates enough friction to keep you upright and in a controlled descent. But it also beats the crap out of your knees and ankles.

      But all that complaining doesn’t change the fact that I sat above treeline eating lunch with the White Mountains clearly visible all around me, and feeding Gray Jays who are well-known opportunists on this particular summit. I didn’t mind offering up a bit of my trail mix for the jays – there’s a certain thrill in interacting with wild animals, and a few almonds, peanuts and raisons were a small price to pay. And my heartbeat matched the universe a bit more today than it might have had I stayed home doing yard work. Aches and pains fade over time, but summiting Moriah remains a forever check mark and a step closer to matching my nature to Nature.

      The first half of the hike from the trailhead is very easy, with a gradual incline and minimal erosion compared to what you see in other parts of the White Mountains. Unfortunately the loggers have been busy on the lower hills, clearing much of the forest away. This is what happens when the land isn’t preserved, it becomes a “land of many uses”, including logging everything except a strip of land on either side of the trail. The logging served to preview the views that we’d see later, though it was marred by the clearing.

      The first wow moments come on the granite ledges of Mount Surprise, a 2194 foot gem that lives up to its name. Views of the Presidential Range were glorious, and served as a nice appetizer for the views we’d see later from the summit of Mount Moriah. They say on a clear day you can see forever from the summit, and it seemed we could. If there’s a drawback to the summit its the very small footprint that many people want to enjoy, and in a time of social distancing I was disappointed in the unmasked proximity of several people from a group of twenty-somethings. But lingering on the summit meant you were going to have that kind of company, so we made a point of wrapping up lunch and clearing the way for others.

      Mount Moriah is not a hike to do on a wet day, which is why I hiked it today instead of last week. But its a worthwhile hike to complete on a beautiful day. I look forward to doing it sometime when it has a heavy snow blanket to cushion the unforgiving granite. I’ll be sore tomorrow in the usual places, but it’s the price you pay for dancing in the clouds. Another 4000 footer checked off the list and a few memories worth celebrating.