Let us live in the land of the whispering trees, Alder and aspen and poplar and birch, Singing our prayers in a pale, sea-green breeze, With star-flower rosaries and moss banks for church. All of our dreams will be clearer than glass, Clad in the water or sun, as you wish, We will watch the white feet of the young morning pass And dine upon honey and small shiny fish. — Elizabeth Bishop, Let Us Live (With nod to The Book Binder’s Daughter)
I was describing the trails through nearby conservation land to a neighbor who sticks to running on pavement. She is reluctant to stray into the woods, blaming everything from the possibility of getting lost to hunting season. There are surely risks in the woods, but aren’t there also risks in never venturing into them? How do you find magic on pavement? Its only purpose is speed. Isn’t life fast enough already?
Humans have chosen to be bound to the clock and calendar where speed is valued more than meandering. More than lingering. More than reverence. We ought to put aside our schedules and listen more. The trees in the forest live in a timeless world, rooted to their ancestral home and holding things together for future generations.
We humans are rapidly closing out another year on the calendar. Did we meet our goals and realize our dreams? Are we making progress or slowly sliding backwards? Human lives are filled with such questions. We fill our lives with so much noise that it becomes hard to hear the answers.
A forest is a choir, singing to the universe. We’d be wise to listen. They suggest that we might choose a different life, free from such human constraints as clocks and calendars, yet sustained and rooted just the same. The forest, timeless as it is, whispers only one question: Just what do we dream of anyway?
Sunsets must be earned in winter. There are no casual seaside deck conversations with a few pictures between sips of rum. No, you must seek out December sunsets by going to where it falls into the bay while bracing against biting cold winds galloping towards you in a stampede of frothy fury. Still, it makes a pretty picture and another memory.
Micro-adventures and stolen moments of dancing with life count just the same as big trips and scheduled events. Life is our collection of all such experiences. We ought to sprinkle a bit more salt on our days to make them savory. For our best days are savored, aren’t they?
A visit to Walden Pond can be immersive, if you go at the right time. Many people go in summer to swim and enjoy the pristine water. Many fish for large mouth bass and other prizes. But the pilgrims go to visit Henry David Thoreau’s famous pond and the woods surrounding it. I’ve watched the place change over the years, but the pond and woods remain largely as Thoreau would recognize.
You must treat a brief visit to Walden as you would a visit to a nightclub with a cover charge. There’s a flat fee of $30 USD to park. That applies for an hour or the entire day. There’s a lower fee, apparently, for Massachusetts residents. I suppose you can also opt for other ways to get to Walden Pond, but this was the simplest way to spend time at a place. The area surrounding Walden Pond is a mix of highway, commuter railroad (as it was in Thoreau’s time), capped landfill and houses increasingly further out of reach for someone choosing the lifestyle of the person who made this place famous.
Early December is considered late autumn, but my visit felt more mid-autumn, with temperatures warmer than they should be this time of year. Henry David Thoreau would have shaken his head, I think, at some of the same behavior he observed in his day leading to the climate change we’re experiencing today but generally sitting on our hands about. But it made for a lovely day to walk around the pond.
There is a well-defined path around the pond. It’s maintained and easy for most walkers to navigate. They make you feel like you’re in a cattle chute for much of it, with wire strung on each side of the path to keep wanderers from straying off the path. Signage explains this as erosion control measures. As a hiker of the White Mountains in New Hampshire, I’m all too familiar with the impact of popularity on trails and the surrounding landscape. I stay to the path, liberated from the freedom to wander, I instead focused on the environment around me.
You can hear the world encroach on you at Walden. Distant highway sounds, construction, sirens, airplanes flying overhead and the commuter train all remind you that you’re in a suburb of Boston. It’s best to acknowledge this, but let it go as Thoreau let the train go as it went past in his time. The landscape is largely preserved, the water clear, awaiting those who would linger.
When I was younger, there was no visitor center, but there was a bath house. At some point well before I came into this world some well-meaning people decided that the best way to save Walden Pond was to make it a recreation center. So a bath house was built, beach sand extended and you had a destination for family recreation. Thoreau’s cabin is on the opposite shore from the bath house, but it’s the first thing you see when you walk down the visitor parking lot. You’re either at peace with it or not, but it’s relatively benign in the off-season.
Walden Woods extend well beyond the perimeter of the pond, and we can thank people like Don Henley for their commitment to preservation. Generations of developers find a way to squeeze as much money as they can from resources, and there are plenty of people who would turn the place inside out and up. There’s a place for development in this world, but there ought to be a place for preservation too.
I’d brought a water bottle with me on the walk, warm day that it was, and decided in a moment of inspiration to fill it with water from Walden Pond. Thoreau drank straight from the pond in his day, I’m not inclined to do that without a filter. Instead, I brought the water with me for another pilgrimage. Just across that highway is the center of Concord, where Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson lived. Just beyond the center is the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, site of Author’s Ridge, where Thoreau, Emerson, Alcott and others are buried. I stopped for a brief visit on Author’s Ridge, told of my visit to his old cabin site, and poured Henry a sip of Walden Pond. Cheers Henry.
Walden PondA view of the pond just down the hill from Thoreau’s cabin site. This is similar to the view he would have had.Pile of stones next to the cabin site. I’m not loving it, but cairns are how people seem to express themselves. The site to me feels like a construction site, cleared and ready to build.The cabin site is surrounded by granite pillars to denote the position and size of the cabin.Creative cairn art rising out of Walden Pond.
“The millions are awake enough for physical labor; but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion, only one in a hundred millions to a poetic or divine life. To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face? We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor.” — Henry David Thoreau, Walden
How rare is the poetic or divine life today? It’s hard to say. In talking to people, there is a distinct lack of engagement in the workforce. A lack of inspiration for putting yourself into things, no passion for the work, a going through of the motions that must be reconciled. If one in a hundred million souls were sparked by the poetic or divine in Thoreau’s time, I wonder what the ratio is now?
Do we linger in a post-pandemic stupor? Is it a generational change as the kids raised with iPhones and social media and gaming become the primary fuel that powers economic and cultural life? Is it older generations, churned and manipulated, poked and prodded, finally having enough? Is it the relentlessly obvious climate change impacting everything while seemingly nothing is done about it? It makes you want to sail away sometimes, especially when you see how much fun those who did are having. But there’s inspired work to be done still, and clearly a need for more of us to lift others.
We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake. We each have purpose in this lifetime that must be fulfilled. To do otherwise is to live in quiet desperation, as Henry would point out. But how do we keep ourselves awake in such a noisy, conflicted and demanding world? He showed the way, didn’t he? Walk away from the noise, find a quiet place to contemplate your place in the world and pay attention to what happens to you. He didn’t travel very far himself (his friends would take the short walk to visit him, and he them). Mostly, solitude is turning off the electronic babysitter and the insistent chatter of the uninspired and listening to yourself. Writing it all down surely helps.
Thoreau has always been my grounding rod. When I become disenchanted or feel that quiet desperation stirring inside or have simply had enough of the loud talkers in my world I return to Thoreau’s work, or visit his grave, or take a pilgrimage to Walden. He remains a voice of reason in an unreasonable world, speaking universal truths like so many time travelers. Their spark forever awake, forever informing, forever a beacon to light the way even as their physical selves forever rest.
From where do we derive hope and an infinite expectation of the dawn? Answers are inclined to find us. Don’t let its whisper be drowned out in the noise.
One wading a Fall meadow finds on all sides The Queen Anne’s Lace lying like lilies On water; it glides So from the walker, it turns Dry grass to a lake, as the slightest shade of you Valleys my mind in fabulous blue Lucernes.
The beautiful changes as a forest is changed By a chameleon’s tuning his skin to it; As a mantis, arranged On a green leaf, grows Into it, makes the leaf leafier, and proves Any greenness is deeper than anyone knows.
Your hands hold roses always in a way that says They are not only yours; the beautiful changes In such kind ways, Wishing ever to sunder Things and things’ selves for a second finding, to lose For a moment all that it touches back to wonder. — Richard Wilbur, The Beautiful Changes
Emotionally, logically even, I’ve come back to my home recently. I never left, really, but it feels more like home as we’ve spruced up the place during the pandemic. We strayed in our minds a few times, seeking more adventurous living, yet we always return to this place. That blanket of familiar is comforting, even as it acts as a foundation for more adventurous acts. Blankets might feel suffocating at times, if we feel that our whole life is encumbered beneath. But isn’t that blanket simply our identity? We are what we surround ourselves with. That in turn and time either feels right or it doesn’t. The choice was ours all along. And so it will be.
We each enter into long relationships that evolve over time. Live with someone for a few decades and you join the club of understanding. The same can be said for the very place we live as well. The landscape changes as the community changes. The very homes we live in change too, as things and people and pets come and go from our lives, and as we ourselves grow older. Life is change. Change can be untenable or wonderful, sometimes at the very same time.
We each write our stories, choosing what to add or edit out of that hero’s journey. Characters come and go, the scenes change, so too does the author. Everything changes over time, and we live with these changes or reject them. To think we can control anything but our reaction to change is folly. But we can wrap ourselves in our identity, and let this be our guide as we face whatever comes next. Sometimes that next is beautiful.
“Dale Hollow Dam and Lake was authorized by the Flood Control Act of 1938 and the River and Harbor Act of 1946. The project was completed for flood control in 1943. Power generating units were added in 1948, 1949 and 1953. The project was designed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and built by private contractors under the supervision of the Corps…. The dam impounds a length of 61 miles of the Obey River creating Dale Hollow Lake with 620 miles of shoreline, 27,700 acres of water, and 24,842 acres of land for recreational opportunities. ” — US Army Corps of Engineers, Nashville District
Dale Hollow Lake is named after William Dale, a government surveyor who came to the region to survey the border between Tennessee and Kentucky. He settled in the region and later drowned in a boating accident while taking part in the War of 1812. That drowning would prove prescient. The land was originally the region of the Cherokee tribe, and retains its natural beauty, though the Cherokee and William Dale would hardly recognize the place now, hundreds of feet underwater in places they once walked.
The shoreline is controlled by the Army Corps of Engineers and protected from development, largely preserving the area as a pristine natural environment. Beyond the shoreline, development is grabbing hold of the region, but the lake remains a beautiful statement for preservation, even as it conceals what it stole away. There’s a town named Willow Creek under this lake, built before the Revolutionary War, a ghost lingering below the water hinting at times past. We forget sometimes, living in our moment of now, that there was so much we don’t know about what was here before us. The region whispers its Cherokee and early settler history when you stop and listen.
Being out on a boat on a raw Late October day, it was easy to listen. The hundreds of houseboats, pontoon boats and fishing boats were largely dormant at marinas. I imagine in summer the area is a bit “Ozark” crazy, but we couldn’t have seen more than a half dozen other boats out on the water with us, all of them fishermen. Off-season has it’s perks.
Turning off the engine, you quickly drift past slate and limestone beaches created when they lower the lake for the winter. The shoreline is composed of countless bits of broken slate, brittle and pliable underfoot. This doesn’t seem a great place for walking barefoot, but as with anywhere, when you dress for the environment it makes all the difference. Walking on those broken sleet beaches was fascinating and wonderful.
And I do wonder at this place. The region is going through an identity crisis of sorts. On the one hand, you have the people who have always been here: farmers and hunters and people scraping together a living in an area desolately beautiful. On the other hand you have land speculators scooping up property at ridiculously low prices (for a New Englander) and building vacation and retirement communities. Just as the lake swallowed up Willow Creek, there’s an entire community here that is slowly drowning in change, and reacting to it as you might expect. Trump and “Let’s Go Brandon” signs are everywhere, crime is rising as some misfit locals break into vacant houses packed with luxury goods. There’s friction in change, and the changes here are accelerating. Like the lake, some will drown in it, and others will find opportunity to flourish.
Hilltop turned islandPillars of slate exposed when lake is lowered in winterDale Hollow Lake is split between Kentucky and TennesseeWhen the lake is lowered it exposes a slate and limestone “beach” worth exploring
I’d contemplated kayaking out into the middle of the bay to capture the sunrise this morning. That plan blew away in the breeze as the chop and chill nixed the very thought of bobbing along waiting out the first glimpse of the new day. Visions of me paddling back to shore with my tail between my legs and my phone resting on the bottom of the bay made me a land creature instead.
Then a glimpse of the giant October full moon sinking towards the horizon spurred me up and out the door. I cursed myself for not bringing a better camera than an iPhone, and then checked myself and swung over to gratitude for at least having an iPhone to attempt to capture the moment. We forget, sometimes, just how lucky we are to have so much technology at our fingertips. It wasn’t so long ago that sharing an image of the moon setting with the world a few minutes after taking the picture would have been completely out of reach. Modern life is miraculous when we stop to think about it.
I never forget how lucky I am to be in a place where I can take such pictures at all. To capture the sunrise 38 minutes after witnessing the moon setting over restless water is itself a blessing. I can’t believe people choose to sleep in instead. In the span of 38 minutes the universe revealed so much of itself, and I found myself the enchanted witness.
Thanks for your company this beautiful morning.
Moonlight surfing on waves as the moon set over Buzzards BayMoon setting, 9 October 2022 (forgive the blurry iPhone picture)Sunrise, 9 October 2022
There’s something about a coastal island, surrounded by water yet firmly locked to the earth, that is deeply compelling. It offers tangible isolation from the madness of the mainland, yet is close enough to feel its gravitational pull. Some combination of luck and inclination brings me to islands occasionally, where my gut tells me it’s not nearly enough.
Maine has over 4600 coastal islands, big and small. Some are barren rock knobs, others are quite large, and covered in forest and diverse landscape. Visiting each is nearly impossible, property rights being what they are, but if you visit enough of them you might just realize you aren’t really seeing them at all. The right island soothes a restless soul, and like a soulmate, you’ll know it when you find it. Isn’t it far better to linger with a favorite or two than to endlessly collect names on a list? Islands, as with all such things, ought to be savored.
Would an island offer enough of the world to satisfy a vagabonding soul? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But I hear their whispers, and wonder if I ought to pay more attention.
A monk sips morning tea, it’s quiet, the chrysanthemum’s flowering. — Matsuo Bashō
The mornings are chilly again, and unlike Bashō’s poem, full of the sounds of squirrels gathering food and bickering about who gets what. The water is warmer than the air, for the sun is reluctant to stick around so long nowadays. The seasons are flipping, just as surely as the hickory nuts are falling.
I think about the fall cleanup and shudder. Is it the chill in the air or the thought of forced labor to come? We dream of autumn for all its beauty, for the crisp air and the scent of fallen leaves. We forget about the work. We pay penance for the pleasure.
I promised myself I’d drink more tea this summer. I planned to use more of the mint spilling out of its terra cotta pot in an attempt to displace the basil in the neighboring pot. Yet the drink of choice is most often coffee. Does coffee nullify my monk inclinations, or does the ritual matter more? Ask the flowers—for they’ve quietly observed all summer.
“We are the sum total of our experiences. Those experiences – be they positive or negative – make us the person we are, at any given point in our lives. And, like a flowing river, those same experiences, and those yet to come, continue to influence and reshape the person we are, and the person we become. None of us are the same as we were yesterday, nor will be tomorrow.“ — B.J. Neblett
On a beautifully still morning I watched the fish in the bay react as a seal hunted for its breakfast. Perfect stillness broken by panicked splashes. The seal must eat and the fish must leap to survive. The story evolves around me, yet I have no meaningful role in it but to bear witness.
There’s no denying the last few years brought plenty of negative experiences, and each shaped us in ways we might eagerly trade for an alternative outcome. But life isn’t gingerly holding our hand for this ride, it grudgingly allows us a seat on this train. The rest is up to us as the hits and highs come at us. What we make of our lives depends on how the sum of our experiences shapes us.
The stakes aren’t always so dire, but in life we’re either breakfast or having breakfast. Our story will play out one way or the other, and based on how we react, in subsequent choices made in the balance of our days. We must fight for what we believe in yet accept what we can’t control.
