Cabin Journal

Out of the Darkness

My favorite holiday story seems even more relevant and poignant during this  pandemic. It took place in a far different time—around 1919—when life was much more difficult than now—colder and snowier winters, hard, physical work and less food—a time when seeing a friend for Christmas meant an eight-mile journey on snowshoes.

Katherine Garetson had a cabin, from which she ran a teahouse in summer, not far from where my cabin is today. She and her friend, Esther, who lived near Estes Park, 16 miles away, agreed one summer to meet the following Christmas at a half-way spot between their two homes. Because there was no way for them to confirm their engagement—no phones nor mail service—each had to set out on Dec. 25 hoping the other would be there.

Writing about her life in Meeker Park (later published as “Homesteading Big Owl”), Katherine said the short and cold days had made her depressed enough to take the chance that Esther would be there. The snow was likely deep, unlike today, where climate change has brought little snow, and I imagine her struggling through deep snowdrifts.

Amazingly, Esther showed up, and the two greeted each other with tears,  cleared out a place in a snowbank, built a fire and sat on newspapers while they dined on soup, coffee and bacon sandwiches. They had only an hour to catch up on each other’s lives—and to curb the loneliness of winter—before they had to trudge back through the cold and snow to their respective homes.

In this time of social isolation, their story reverberates even more. While we have the technological tools—Zoom, phones, email and social media—to keep in touch, we’re missing the human contact. That Esther and Katherine would endure the hardships of snow and cold, even possible death if a snowstorm overtook them, speaks to our innate need for human connection and warmth.

Out of the darkness of this winter, may our hearts keep lit the flame that connects us all, even when apart.

Sitting Still, Standing Still

In the summer, it’s warm enough at the cabin to sit outside and meditate in the morning. I sit in the back yard, my back to the shed, and watch life unfold from all around me. My feet planted solidly on the bare ground, I become just another tree, part of this quivering, breathing mass of life: from the small bits of vegetation on the ground to the white-barked aspens surrounding me and the tall pine trees that cause me to lift my eyes to the heavens.

Breathing in and out softly, I hold still enough that the small forest animals get close; unless I move, they are hardly aware of my existence. As the young rabbit gets within a foot, so close I want to lean over and pet its soft fur, I watch it pull shoots from the ground, with the grass disappearing into its mouth. Chipmunks run over my shoes, while a woodrat nervously pops out from the shed and grabs a piece of grass, close enough for me to see its long gray tail, its knobby dark eyes and large ears. A hummingbirds buzzes me, staring me in the face, before it decides I’m not a flower. On the ground a family of juncos peck through the dirt, looking for some choice morsel—a bug?—to feed their young one.

A gray squirrel jumps on the picnic table in front of me, eyeing me with curiosity, while another squirrel emerges from underneath the cabin bearing wads of pink cotton—insulation, I realize, that it’s carrying to its nest in my neighbor’s shed. Already, the chickaree is preparing for its winter home.

Last week, I was at the family cabin in Wisconsin. My sister and I kayaked to one of the few undeveloped spots on the lake, where I swam along the shoreline of birch and pine trees. Afterward my sister and I stood knee deep in the water, wrapped in our beach towels, enjoying the feel of soft sand beneath our feet and the breezes that ruffled the lake’s surface.  As we stood there, a bald eagle that roosts on top of the hill behind us swooped down to the lake, alarming a pair of loons that screamed a warning and then dived into the lake.

Meanwhile, taking a cruise around the lake on the pontoon boat, my sister’s husband came by on his second loop. Seeing us still standing in the same place, he yelled, “Are you two stuck in the sand—or what?”

Yes, we were stuck, maybe even awestruck. While we stood still, the world revolved around us—the lake, the birds, the sky, the clouds. Sometimes the only thing to do is stand still and keep quiet.

Touching In

Often when I come up to the cabin for my weekly visit, I have big plans: like going up to Rocky Mountain National Park to snowshoe or to Wild Basin to cross-country ski. But, just as often, when I arrive, I realize I want to stay right here, don’t want to go anyplace else but around Meeker Park and the cabin.

Especially if I’ve had a rough week—done too much and overstretched myself—what I really want is to touch in with all my landmarks—places that have accrued meaning for me in the more than 11 years I’ve been here. These are small scenes—like the line of aspen trees, an impressive ponderosa pine or a place that opens a new view—places where, every time I walk by, I stop to take a longer look. Something about these intimate views touches me, for reasons I can’t quite articulate.

I have my familiar walking circuit, which I alter a bit in winter to avoid deep snow or shade. My walk takes me past Sharon’s wood cabin, almost hidden, even in winter, in a thick grove of aspen. Around the corner and next to Bob and Bonnie’s house, I always pause to admire the pattern of shadows in a small aspen grove along the creek. On the bridge over Cabin Creek, where in summer I watch the small fish dart away from me, now in winter I look for changing ice formations on the creek (left). Past Candace’s small house, the valley opens up, and I can see Cabin Rock to the north, Mount Meeker (top) to the west and the hills coming together to the east.

In the open field, I often see the two shaggy Highland cattle, always together, or sometimes coyotes; in the spring I'll see bluebirds. On the road to the pond, I pause to enjoy the embracing branches of the large ponderosa and, on the other side, the thicket of aspens (right). Beyond the aspens is an open meadow to the south, dotted with the tall, white angelica flowers in the summer but now covered with tufts of bleached grasses emerging from mounds of snow.

I always linger at the pond itself (below), now smothered in snow and dotted with  animal tracks. In warmer times, the water is fringed with tall grasses, and I might see dragonflies darting among the reeds or mallards roosting on the small island in the pond.

Each landmark touches something in my heart, reaches down deep and grabs me, wakes me up to the world, more so because they are familiar and have garnered meaning over the years. At the same time, these touchstones settle my mind in this place, where peace reigns, especially in winter.

I’ve taken this walk (or some variation) every week, so over the past decade I’ve taken this path hundreds of times. Yet I’m never bored. In fact, each walk is precious because it’s different in every season, in every time of the day, in every type of light. So each scene is layered with all the other times I’ve taken in these views of the grasses in the open meadow, Mount Meeker in all seasons or the white bark of the aspens.

They say familiarity breeds contempt, but if I can keep my heart open every time I walk this path, familiarity instead breeds a deep love.

Listen to the Wind

I come to the cabin to clear my head but also to ground myself. After a hard week of getting my parents moved, hiring and training caregivers, dealing with different drug plans, and consulting with doctors and nurses, my brain felt over-stimulated, constantly on high alert, trying to figure out the next step in a plan of action to make my aging parents comfortable. I couldn’t turn it off.

When I left Boulder for the mountains this week, it was a beautiful spring morning, daffodils pushing up, robins and meadowlarks singing, the fields brushed with a faint green. But when I got to the cabin, it was winter once again, snow squalls followed by brief periods of sun, and with strong winds that bent the trees and made the whole cabin creak. Across the valley, the winds created a curtain of snow that partially hid the opposite hillside.

Rare for me, I didn’t want to go out into it, even after three hours of sitting in front of my computer. Instead I wanted to curl up in the chair, wrap myself in a blanket and watch the wintry assault from safely and warmly inside the cabin. But I needed to move, couldn’t sit still anymore.

April is an ugly month up here. Remnants of snow are crusted over and covered with pine needles and dirt. Everything is raw; last year’s grasses have been beaten into submission by the wind, tangled and matted in the dirt. There’s nothing pretty now, nothing pleasant and hardly anything that would give one hope for spring except the rushing of the creek.

I hurried on the road, and through piles of slush, trying to avoid getting blasted by the wind, keeping my head down. My usual sources of inspiration were unavailable. Mount Meeker was hidden in gray clouds, and my favorite pond (above) was colorless, covered with sheets of melting ice.

But there was something insistent in the air, something tugging at me, something else beyond my jumbled thoughts: listen, it said, be aware, pay attention. And when I let go of my obsessive thoughts, I could hear it. It was in the wind (that sounded sometimes like a jet roar), but also in the small chirps of the juncos feeding on the ground (right) and in the blackbirds’ raucous calls as they circled above the pines. It was in the creek, free now from the ice and tumbling joyfully and playfully down the valley.

It was the voice of another world, another reality from the one I had been locked in for a week. It was spacious and open, not bound by the rules of the human world but of another dimension. You could call it the natural world. Whatever it was, it pulled me out of my small, constricted life and propelled me into something else, something unconcerned with Medicare, wheelchairs, even old age, sickness and death, because the sky, the earth and the winds felt eternal, never-ending.  Whatever this life force is, it heals me and makes me whole again, sets me back on the ground that I must trod.

Melting Our Hearts

Yesterday morning, arriving at the cabin, the temperature outside was 15 below and inside it was 10. But as soon as the sun came over the top of the hills, flooding the valley with light, the outside temperature soared to 0. As I was meditating, I saw what looked like glistening drops floating in the air, appearing and disappearing so quickly I almost thought I was hallucinating. But more appeared, blowing down seemingly from the trees. Were they frozen bits of ice that had been lodged in the ponderosas, or had the air been so cold that, as the sun warmed it, the air itself was thawing, winking briefly in the sun before melting and dropping to the earth?

When I went for a walk, the earth creaked in the cold beneath my feet, and the creek was smothered in snow, completely frozen over. Yet I could hear the water underneath, still alive, full of energy and intent on its journey.

On this beginning of a new year, I think of all the fear, suspicion and even hatred in the world. I think of friends who are going through difficult times. All I can do is wish for the peace and tranquility of this place to descend like warmth from the sun, melting the most troubled of hearts, knowing that the life force somehow continues, still surges, underneath it all.

Be Here Now

A couple of weeks ago I came close to being in a bad car accident. It’s the kind of thing that I can brood about: Did I make an error in judgment by stopping too suddenly? What would have happened if I had been rear-ended, as appeared so likely? I imagined a crumpled car, injuries, the hospital—and worse.

The next day, driving the same route, I couldn’t get my mind off what nearly happened. Then I realized that I needed to be present to that moment to watch for any new traffic conditions—a car drifting into my lane, a deer bounding across the road. Even beyond that, I wanted to be aware of the shifting pink light on the mountains, the new views that opened up with every passing moment and turn in the road.

Last week at the cabin, meditating one morning, I watched the light go from complete darkness to gray to seeing the first rosy light on Mount Meeker. Soon the sunlight was brushing the tops of the green pine trees on the hill across the valley, then burrowing its way into the bottom of the valley, warming up the grasses and several small pine trees and willow bushes. It was a tender, yearning light that slowly crept up the valley sides, bathing the trunks of the ponderosas.

And then my mind wandered off to something else, the work I was doing, and when I came back, the day had changed already: clouds were moving in, streaming across the sky, and the wind had picked up, shaking the trees. Again my mind wandered off, onto some pleasant tangent of meeting a friend for dinner later, and when I came back, the day had moved on without me being aware of it, the sun higher, hitting the face of Mount Meeker. It wasn’t just that the physical conditions had changed, but already the day had a different feeling.

Every second the world changes, and yet how often do I get stuck in holding on to one moment. While I’m fixated on that perfect picture—the first light of morning—the world moves on, and I’m left behind. How wonderful it would be to be present for every moment, to be carried along in life’s stream, aware of every precious breath of life.

Silence, at Last

Home to the cabin after being gone for 10 days, and the first thing I notice is the delicious sense of quiet. It’s a rare commodity in this overly civilized world, even places where it shouldn’t be.

I was at the family cabin in the north woods of Wisconsin, a place far removed from the noise of city life (the closest big city is 50 miles away). Yet Thunder Lake (below) has become a beehive of modern pleasures. Most of the old summer cabins are gone, replaced by 3,000- to 5,000-square foot suburban houses. It seems like people don’t want to escape to the woods as much as bring their creature comforts with them.

On the weekends, the lake is full of jet skis, power boats pulling water skiers, and pontoon boats cruising around the lake. Further blocking out the cries of the loons or bald eagles is the loud music played on the boats or coming from speakers set up on docks. Even on weekdays, when most people depart for cities and jobs, the angry buzz of a lawnmower or weed trimmer blasts across the lake, as the landscape crews arrive to make sure lawns are clipped and neat. Near the lake the roads are loud with truck and motorcycle traffic.

There was a time on this lake, back when I was young, when the lake was wilder. People had small log cabins; if you had indoor toilets you were living a life of luxury. No one gave a thought to keeping a lawn; this was the north woods, covered with pine trees, birches, blueberry and blackberry bushes. Why would you spend your precious time up here mowing when you could be out on the lake fishing or swimming? Although my family had a powerboat for pulling skiers, my siblings and I were just as happy to paddle around the lake in our rowboat and canoe.

At my Colorado cabin, most people are sensible enough to not maintain lawns on this rocky soil, so the quiet is mainly interrupted by chainsaws or construction. But today sitting outside all I hear are the gray squirrel’s claws as it runs across the top fence, the piercing cry of the red-tail hawk, the tiny but insistent chirp of the chipmunk and a soft wind through the aspens, now turning gold.

The silence seems immense. I feel wrapped in stillness.

 

Chaos Descends

It’s been at least a year now since I started discussing a septic system with Dan, the local contractor. There were many hurdles to cross: an engineering report, Dan’s own backlog of work, the county taking its time to approve a permit. Somewhere in there I let myself forget about it, lulled into thinking it would happen in some distant future, when it wouldn’t affect me.

But Dan came by last week to tell me they were starting up the next day. I tried to get him to hold off, at least until summer was over, when the thistles in the side yard had stopped flowering and the pine siskins weren’t pulling out shreds of seeds, when the hummingbirds were gone and wouldn’t be disturbed by all the noise, when autumn had reclaimed the land from the grasses and flowers, when I wouldn’t be up here at much, enjoying these last few days of summer.

But schedules are meant to be kept. I was slotted into the county’s and Dan’s time frame. The best I could do would be to disappear during parts of the day when activity was greatest: to Lily Lake for kayaking; dinner with friends; a long hike in the park. But every time I returned, I was greeted with chaos: my serene cabin life literally uprooted—aspen trees pulled out, grasses and flowers smashed by the larger-than-life bulldozer, the thistles run over and the pine siskins retreating to the back yard, looking and sounding a bit lost.

I think of the cabin as my fortress, the place where I can barricade myself in peace and quiet, but I had been invaded. Even when the bulldozer wasn’t digging 10 feet away from the window where I like to gaze out while working, there were people constantly underfoot: Dan, the engineer, the electrician, people looking for Dan.

In the first few days I wanted to block the whole mess from my vision, which isn’t easy when the bulldozer is almost bigger than the cabin. But my meditation practice teaches me to enfold everything into my practice, to not leave out the ugly, the disturbing, what I don’t want to see. So gradually I included into my reality this now barren side yard, the concrete underground tank and the very large hole. I let it be there.

When the bulldozer was quiet, I watched the animals explore this new being. A rabbit found shelter in the shade of its wheels, while juncos and sparrows poked through the furrowed blades looking for insects, and hummingbirds perched on its large yellow arm.  Yesterday there was a field of grass and flowers; today there’s a large new hulking structure; that’s life.

When we had first talked about the project I had asked Dan to try to save the aspens  that acted as a visual barrier between me and my neighbors. By the last day, when he came to cover up the hole, I had accepted the process enough that I had to smile as I watched him carefully avoid knocking down the trees, the huge treads just inches from one small aspen.

Today, the bulldozer is gone, and quiet has once again descended. Outside my window is a huge vacant patch of land that I need to heal. Fortunately, it’s the time of year when many of the grasses and flowers have gone to seed. I’ll go out in the meadows around Meeker Park, collect the seeds and lovingly scatter them across the barren dirt. In a few months, the snow will cover this wound. Maybe next spring some of the grasses will come up; in two years I may have a full lush, small meadow. Everything grows slowly here. I will learn to be patient and accepting.

Ireland Old and New

Travel, almost more than anything else, forces me to confront my illusions.

When I went to Ireland I wanted to see an ancient way of life, something authentic: monasteries where monks chanted hundreds of years ago, romantic castles and stone walls that still enclose green fields full of baa-ing sheep—sheep that historically have produced Ireland’s famous woolen sweaters. I wanted to sit in an Irish pub, drink a glass of Guinness and listen to a fiddler while the locals danced and convinced me to join them.

Everything that wasn’t part of my vision I tried to edit out—at least from my photos: the surfer in lovely St. Finan’s Bay, the cars that jammed the picturesque village of Kinsale (right), or the modern lime green tractor and bales of hay wrapped in black plastic in front of an old gray stubbled stone barn, The photo above is for me the quintessential Ireland: the omnipresent sheep, a farmer’s cottage and the green pastures rolling down to the steely blue sea. But what you don’t see is the huge tour buses roaming the countryside, all the modern homes or the tropical palm trees and agave plants that shouldn’t be growing in such a northerly climate.

For the first few days, I tried to ignore all the modern stuff that didn’t belong in my vision of Ireland and sought out the  ancient places like the Gallarus Oratory, an 8th century place of worship so perfectly constructed of stones that, more than 10 centuries later, not a drop of rain penetrates; the remains of a 6th century monastery; castles dating back to the 12th century; and stone forts (left) used for protection and shelter dating from the 9th or 10th century. But 80 percent of the buildings on Dingle Peninsula are vacation homes, the Irish version of a U.S. ranch house—squat, plain houses, many of which are rented out to tourists.

At some point, I was forced to see the reality underneath the beautiful Irish landscape. The hillsides are covered in yellow gorse, and in my imagination these were similar to the heather in the moors of Scotland and England, long celebrated in song and verse by poets. However, the gorse—just like the scarlet fuschia that borders the lanes, and the palm trees (right) and agave plants—is a non-native species, introduced relatively recently.

I loved the small towns with their brightly colored buildings, but when I asked our tour guide if this was an ancient Irish tradition, I was disappointed to hear that towns painted their buildings in a competition for “Tidy Town”— some ploy apparently by the country’s tourism board to dress up the otherwise drab buildings for tourists.

We stopped at a churchyard on Ventry Harbor where gravestones were marked with the old Celtic crosses. My first thought was that this would be a perfect photo op, until I saw the men wearing fluorescent orange vests and heard the weed whackers. I was able to edit out the invasive signs of modernity but when I look at the picture, it doesn’t mean anything. It isn’t totally true.

In every town, the pubs advertise “Irish music,” and some version of traditional Irish music is played for tourists who want the Irish experience, but most of the time you’re aware that you’re being dished up something that’s not totally authentic. I never found a pub where I inadvertently stumbled in on the locals dancing and fiddling, never got the chance to kick up my heels.

As for the sheep, they’re not much used for woolens anymore; it doesn’t pay, so instead they become someone’s meal.

So Ireland is not the authentic place I wanted. Instead it’s a mixture of new and old,  abiding side by side. It’s messy, just like life. But it's all beautiful.

 

 

 

The Utter Necessity of Solitude

I never found a companion that was so companionable as solitude.

— Henry David Thoreau

Last winter my tax accountant asked me what I did at night at the cabin. He knew I worked during the day but how did I entertain myself at night? I told him I read and keep the fire tended and that I like being alone. At first, he looked dubious but then realized that his favorite time of the day was when he went home after work and settled on the couch with his cats and watched TV. He enjoyed the solitude, he admitted.

A friend of mine reminded me that when I first bought the cabin, I felt some anxiety about what I was doing. I knew that spending so much time alone was different from what most people want, that it was a strange thing, for a woman, especially, to do. Most people seek out the company of others. But I knew I wasn’t the only one who craved solitude. There was my hero, Thoreau, who spent time alone at Walden Pond. And I have a kindred spirit in the man who inhabited the cabin adjoining mine, who lived there alone for 40 years.

Bill Waite was never totally isolated; especially in summer he had neighbors and friends nearby and even in winter he could drive down to Estes Park anytime and get groceries and interact with people. Yet, from what old timers tell me, he spent a lot of time alone, especially in the winter. I know he liked to read; he had a dog for companionship; and he would have kept busy with all the usual cabin chores: chopping wood, getting a fire going, hauling water from the creek.  But I think people are still puzzled: what did he do with himself all day?

Those of us who spend time alone, especially in a beautiful setting, know that nothing needs to be done. At the cabin, during the day I work on my computer, but even when I’m not working, I never feel bereft or bored, like I need some distraction. Time slows down and you realize there’s no need to do anything. All you need is to be there, absorb everything that happens: the snow slowly falling, the flash of the blue wing of the jay, the wind that hums through the pines. Soon you’re in sync with the world, breathing in as it breathes in, breathing out together. How many people get to experience that?

My solitude, often broken by visits with neighbors and friends, lasts two or three days and then I’m back in Boulder and in the thick of the world. But I recently read an article about a man who disappeared into the mountains of the Northeast and lived without human contact for 15 years or so. His story only became known after he was arrested for breaking into summer cabins looking for food. When a reporter interviewed him, trying to figure out how someone could be so isolated for so long, his story was not one of loss or even loneliness but of experiencing a different reality than most of us do. For him, time wasn’t measured out but expanded to fit the day, and his perceptions of the world were so subtle that he was aware of everything. He existed in an almost kind of ecstasy, a deep and rich sense of the world.

As the world gets increasingly over-connected, so we need never spend time alone if we are plugged into our electronic devices, I can’t help but think that time away from that over-stimulated world will become a necessity. We need a way and time to connect with ourselves, which gets distanced with the busyness of our daily lives.

There’s a place you can go, and it’s right here. You don’t have to travel miles to the mountains or a faraway island.  You can shut out the world, turn off your device, just for an hour or a day, and go deep into yourself, deeper than you could ever imagine.