The Most of It

We went camping as a family this weekend in the Bighorn Mountains, next to beautiful pine-covered West Ten Sleep Lake. It drizzled a bit in the evening and then got quite cold at night.

Fortunately (or unfortunately), all four of us slept in one little tent. Fortunately, because it actually remained quite toasty with all of the body heat. Unfortunately, because one little man who shall remain nameless (Grant) is a piggly wiggly who squirmed and kicked and whimpered all night long, keeping the rest of us from sleeping hardly at all.

At about 3 a.m., Elizabeth and I were still awake due to Grant's antics, crammed together with Joy into the left third of the tent, with Grant himself comfortably sprawled across the other two-thirds of it. While having a whispered discussion of our sad plight, we broke into a muffled hysterical laughter, acknowledging the power of one little man to make three other people so miserable, and to look so cute doing it. We christened him, "The Ultimate Bed Hog," and laughed for a good while before reverting to our prior state of sleepless misery.

At about 4:30 a.m, I had had enough of lying with my face crammed against the wet tent wall, so I thought I would just get up, restart the fire, and think for a bit. After blowing the buried embers back into a warm blaze, I took a short hike down to the lake. The skies had cleared and there was no moon; the unfiltered starlight bathed the whole scene in a surreal hue of pale violet. Across the lake, a granite rock face spilled down into the water, surrounded on every side by towering pines. Not a single man-made light or structure could be seen polluting the wilderness beyond.

I was suddenly struck with a triple epiphany (not a melancholic one). Number one: the pure joyous beauty of a pre-dawn mountain lake for its own sake. Here was nature, devoid of any hidden metaphor or attached meaning; it was what it was, and probably appeared the same way it did a thousand years ago. That I happened to be there at this moment to enjoy it was a happy accident . . . but its essential being was unaffected and would continue on unaltered (hopefully) for another thousand years.

Epiphany number two: the striking resemblance of the scene to the mountain lodge where we stayed on Grand Mesa last year, while working in Cedaredge. (Only ten months ago???) Our hearts broke with the rapid, unexplained dissolution of what had seemed to be the perfect opportunity, not so much because of the job, but because of the location. We felt that in the Grand Mesa, we had found one of the hidden jewels of Colorado, and then it was uncerimoniously stripped away from us. So now, to be five hundred miles away and peering out over a pine-carpeted mountain lake every bit its equal in sublime beauty, I felt somewhat of a prayerful vindication: thank you for our new perfect opportunity.

And number three: the setting from a favorite Robert Frost poem, "The Most of It," seemed to vividly materialize before my drowsy eyes. I first read this poem in a frenzied rush while composing a response essay for my AP English exam. I have since returned to it many times, savoring its powerful, somewhat dispassionate imagery.

It narrates the story of man shouting across a stony, wooded lake, pleading with the cold universe for some sign of love or validation. Instead, he hears only his echo, and then a crash into the water across the lake. Eventually, a large buck reveals itself, pushing through the water before emerging onto the rocky shore right in front of him, then crashing off into the woods, and "that was all." Here it is in its entirety:

The Most of It

by Robert Frost

He thought he kept the universe alone;

For all the voice in answer he could wake

Was but the mocking echo of his own

From some tree-hidden cliff across the lake.

Some morning from the boulder-broken beach

He would cry out on life, that what it wants

Is not its own love back in copy speech,

But counter-love, original response.

And nothing ever came of what he cried

Unless it was the embodiment that crashed

In the cliff's talus on the other side,

And then in the far-distant water splashed,

But after a time allowed for it to swim,

Instead of proving human when it neared

And someone else additional to him,

As a great buck it powerfully appeared,

Pushing the crumpled water up ahead,

And landed pouring like a waterfall,

And stumbled through the rocks with horny tread,

And forced the underbrush--and that was all.

While meditating on these three epiphanies, the eastern sky began to pale with the first inkling of dawn, and a deep tiredness crept over me anew. I stumbled back to the campground, threw a few more logs on the smoldering fire, and lay down on the dirt next to it. An hour later, I awoke to the crisp, salmon-colored skies with my left arm totally numb from having slept at an odd angle.

As my family slept peacefully a dozen yards away, I arose, shook out my hand, and stoked the fire to life again. From neighboring camps, the rustlings of morning creaked and yawned to life.

Life is many things, I thought: beautiful, uncomfortable, tiring, inspirational--human interpretations of what it should mean. But this mountain morning did not reveal itself to me with any secret meaning. It simply was. And that was all.

Melancholic Epiphanies

Sometimes, when life has beaten you down, a wry voice enters the mind, and in laconic prose declares an incontrovertible truth: the melancholic epiphany.
Tonight was not at all melancholic. On the contrary, after a difficult day at work, Elizabeth and the kids threw a great 32nd birthday party for me. We played games, opened gifts, wrestled, danced, laughed, and then had my perennial "Funfetti" cake: multi-colored cake, white icing, and Cookies & Cream. Mmmm . . . delicious.
And oh-so-rich. So rich that approximately thirty minutes after devouring the sweet morsel, a profound lethargy crept upon the entire family--a post-prandial, hyperglycemia-induced, glucagon-mediated stupor. We lay prostrate on the bed. The kids needed to brush their teeth, the dishes need to be done, this blog post needed to be written, but our listless bodies lacked the vitality necessary to overcome the birthday cake inertia. At this point, my lovely wife sighed, looked at me, and stated, "I guess we ate a little too much cake."

When a birthday cake takes down an entire family, when the much anticipated big-game ends in a humiliating rout, when the opportunity to express your truest self ends instead with your foot firmly inside your mouth, when your chance to display your technical prowess results in a convincing display of ineptitude that winds up in the local paper, when you're the new family in church and were asked to say the opening prayer on Sunday (but forgot) and so you arrived five minutes late to hear your name echoing through the empty foyer, when you venture to the local retail store to buy your son a much anticipated new trike as a reward for his improved behavior only to have him throw a spectacular eardrum-shattering tatrum in front of thirty of the local citizens, when your best efforts to care for a patient end in a tirade against you by a confused mother, when you loan your brother a truck that's never caused you a single problem and within three weeks it needs $1,000 worth of repairs . . . well, then, you're ripe for a melancholic epiphany. :)

If you're having trouble formulating these feelings of betrayal, humiliation and despair into coherent thoughts, then visit www.despair.com. They will formulate your thoughts very well for you, and give you ample cause for a sardonic belly-laugh.

In all reality, life is good for us. Very, very good, in fact. I feel more at ease and healthier and more content than I can remember in a long time. I love Worland, I love my wife and kids, I love my job. But the past week has provided some potent reminders (see above) that life is a constant battle to stay between the shores of pridefulness and humiliation.

So be thou humble, or be thou humiliated.

(Hey, that's a good one . . .)

What recent melancholic epiphanies has the cement mixer of life blessed you with? Share them with the world (or at least with the five or six other people that read my blog) by commenting below.

Wonderful Wyoming

The Grand Teton Range

I have spent many years ridiculing the barren desolation of southern Wyoming, but now I feel I must publicly admit the error of my ways.

The Wind River Range

(Picture taken by yours truly)

Make no mistake: the stretch of southern Wyoming along I-80 is pure desolation. But as Wyoming folks are fond of saying, they're glad it's so ugly down there because it keeps outsiders from discovering the awesome grandeur of the state up here.

One of the things that makes Wyoming so great is that it is so sparsely populated: ranked 9th in size but 50th in population. You can go for miles and miles and not see any people or dwellings.

Ten Sleep Canyon

(30 miles east of Worland)

Last weekend, we drove back from Utah over Teton pass and then down along the Wind River Range, through the Wind River Canyon to Worland. Though I'll always be partial to Mt. Sneffels and the Colorado Rockies, they've got nothing on the Wyoming Tetons when it comes to sheer majestic power. In fact, between the Tetons, Yellowstone, the Wind Rivers, and the Big Horns, Wyoming holds some of the most beautiful terrain not just in the USA, but in the world.

Worland itself, while a great small town, is not particularly scenic. However, there are two gorgeous canyons less than half an hour away; the Big Horn mountains are only forty minutes away; the Wind Rivers and Yellowstone are only two hours away; and the Tetons are only four hours away. In other words, a spectacular array of wilderness beckons within a short drive, and there's hardly anyone else you have to share it with.

The Wind River Canyon

(30 miles south of Worland)

So Wyoming, I apologize. You're more beautiful than I ever imagined. I hope to make it up to you by exploring and relishing your wilderness for many years to come!

And to any friends or family who may be reading this, you will always be welcome to come visit us and explore our new beautiful state.

(But shhhhh . . . don't tell anyone else about it!)

The Wind River Range (again)

Every Dog Has His Day

You know it's a small town when you move in and they throw a parade in your honor . . .

Just kidding. Yesterday was the Parade for the Washakie County Fair, and my welcome section was just one of 40 or so "floats," right behind the (annoying) Shriners. (Question: Why the silly hats?)

It was, all things considered, quite the experience. Joybear rode her bike the whole mile of the parade route while Elizabeth trotted behind. Grant Guy and I cruised on a four wheeler alongside my two partners, who also rode with their sons. (That was the gimmick, all the docs with the cool rides.) All three of us watched as two pregnant employees (including my nurse) walked down the parade route, drenched in sweat. (We offered the four wheelers, but they refused. Honest!)It was a hundred degrees, and we tossed flaccid Otter Pops to the adoring throngs, as well as to the cranky old dude who yelled at me from the street corner, "How long 'til they run ya outa town?"

It was fun and hot and silly, but a memorable experience.

I'm reminded of some Dave Matthews' lyrics:

"Every dog has its day,
and every day has its way
of being forgotten.
Mom, it's my birthday!
What would you say?"

A Paradoxical Summer

Sometimes life moves at a snail's pace, sometimes at breakneck speed. And rarely, paradoxically, it does both at the same time. This last month was just such a paradox for us.

But first, allow me to digress.

In the short-term retrospect of American historians, 1969 was a pivotal, earth-shaking year--a year that everything changed for our nation politically, culturally, economically and socially. (Even Bryan Adams wrote a rock anthem to the effect.) To be sure, that year did not suddenly exist de novo as a social fulcrum, but rather it was the culmination and climax of a number of swelling, surging cultural movements; it was the year the crescendoing wave crested, broke and scattered foam far up onto the distant beaches of society, its debris still being collected, categorized and understood to this day.

To be quite overly melodramatic, I believe that Elizabeth and I will view the Summer of 2006 in a similar way in our personal lives. Up until June 23rd, we had been cruising along in somewhat of a holding pattern--quiescent if not entirely content. Life was good, could have been better, but there was no particularly dramatic frameshifts in motion. However, a whole new weather pattern was hovering just over the horizon, tantalizing close but still remote enough to be neither disturbing or distracting.

Then the storm broke in its enthralling and terrifying glory. A raucous graduation, a paradisiacal romantic getaway to Costa Rica, a furious flurry of high intensity entanglements in red tape as we struggled to get licensed in Wyoming and secure our loan repayment, a miraculous sale of our home in a stagnant realty market, a frantic purchase of our Worland home, a joyous reunion at the Ranch, a torrid move to Wyoming, a new city, home, job, church, lifestyle . . .

At times the last month was as gentle as a sea breeze blowing on a shimmering Pacific beach, at times as tempestuous as a summer lightning storm in the Rockies. Certainly it's too soon to make sense of all that's happened. I guess this is a feeble effort to process it all to some degree. All I know for sure is that life looks entirely different than it did one month ago.

And yet the more things change, the more they stay the same. I still have Elizabeth and Joy and Grant. I have my family and my faith. I have my career, my interests, my weaknesses . . . my blog? (They can't ever take that away from me!:) To quote Bono and the Boys: "The only baggage you can bring is all that you can't leave behind."

Now that the dust is settling into a semblance of routine, I hope to renew my weekly postings here.

Yes, yes. I know. The burden of my absence has been too much for you to bear. There, there. It's going to be alright. Markie's back.