My Life Behind Bars

 The Storm

  We are relaxing at the big window at the Lake Side Tavern watching the sky turn black and the wind whip up massive plumes of snow over the ice covered water. Most people, the smarter ones, have stayed home for the day in anticipation of the predicted nor' easter that is indeed starting to hit. The sun, never bright to begin with today, is now a grey ball slowly fading to the west.  We should just lock up and go home, schools have let out early and the GE plants along the river are telling the late shifts to stay home. From the window we can see the lights of the snowplows gathering across the lake on Route Seven.

  But I keep the bar open because the eight or nine customers all live in the neighborhood and can walk home if the roads remain unplowed until morning. And I can always sleep on the couch in the office, again. For the time being we are comfortable and warm and in no hurry to leave.

  The usual nonsense bar conversation ebbs and flows as we watch the news with the sound off. It's howling in Boston, the storm has crippled the city and is scheduled to hit us full on just after dark.

  Night comes fast and visibility is down to a few yards when the door opens and three guys come in, the've been x-country skiing along the shore and saw the light. They were cold and cheery, happy to find a drink and company. They are winter lovers having been out for a while and tell me they can ski back to their houses in a half an hour.  They are unfazed by the dire predictions of the storm of the year.

  A few more brave adventurers from the neighborhood wander in and it's beginning to look like a party for survivors of some sort of mishap on Everest.

  Outside the night is a swirl of white flakes and our view is only as far as the light from the room weakly penetrates into the blackness.

 Again the door opens and a couple whose car slid into a snowbank come in to use the phone, but the X-country boys say they can push the car out and onto the road and the whole room empties to watch, help push or offer sage advice, depending on their particular temperament.  The car is rescued in minutes and the bar fills back up and the couple decide to stay and buy a round of whiskeys for the whole crew of helpers.

  Again the door opens and it's my friend Bill from just down the street, he has a plow and just plowed out our lot and said if anyone wants to get away now is the time.  Nobody moves so Bill joins the gathering, orders a drink and fires up the juke box. The conversation turns to music, and favorite bands and concerts are debated with the seriousness the situation demands.  The stories are flying, fine stories worn smooth by repeated tellings. Everybody has a concert tale filled with wild escapades and the juke box plays uninterrupted.

  Another lakeshore dweller and friend appears in the doorway with three large thermoses of coffee. Pam lives a few houses away from the Tavern and was worried people may be stranded and came by to help if needed.  She has a Jeep and offers anyone a ride and or a coffee.  She's amazed at the crowd and seeing no one is ready to leave she decides to stay and with her infectious laugh and endless good energy she elevates the room to an even higher and more festive level. I add a touch of whiskey to her thermos.   It's now after nine and a rumbling of machines even louder than the wind comes up off the lake and on to our little patch of shoreline and then goes silent.

  Mark, another old pal and Tavern regular from across the lake has arrived with eight friends on their snow machines ready to warm up and have a drink after riding around in the night for a hour.  They had figured that they may be off work in the morning and the prospect of just sitting in front of the TV or premature shoveling was too boring and after a few phone calls all met in front of Mark's lakefront house and blasted off into the dark. After a few trips around the frozen water the pull of a nightcap was just too much and now the pack of snowmobiles sits parked on our beach accumulating snow, engines cooling rapidly.

   And, as the saying goes, the party raged on.  The next few hours slipped by with that unique kind of barroom time.  The random, curious mix of people all bouncing stories and ideas back and forth kept the atmosphere celebratory.  No one over indulged, knowing they still had to venture back out and deal with the monster in the sky.  But no one really held back either. There was more intoxication in the room than inebriation, the rare high that comes with a shared sense of adventure that has an unpredictable outcome.

  Music played, the storm images on the silent TV quickly lost our interest and friendships were solidified and plans for the future made.

  I didn't notice Pam slip out the door to go and get some fresh air and feel the wind on her face. The windows had become fogged-over hours ago and were more like mirrors.

 "Hey come see this." she said as she came back in. We all walked out into a world with no wind and not a cloud in the winter sky. The calm was stunning and the stars sharp as diamonds in the moonless night. Mars and Jupiter were bright beacons.  We stood in a bit of awe, our visible breath the only movement in the stillness.  It's sobering how quickly huge things can change. The next morning we would see that the storm shifted to the north and battered Vermont. But for now it seemed like we were the only people in the vastness of eternity. Then Mark says "Holy Shit it's two o'clock.." There wasn't a rush to leave but everyone had a final sip of their drinks and said goodbyes and then it was just me and Pam cleaning up.

 She said,  ''I love this world, you usually never really know what's going to happen. So much is unpredictable."  She gave me a beautiful goodnight kiss at the door and pulled her bright red hat low and was gone in an instant.  I dimmed the lights and poured an old rare whiskey and thought, I can't wait to see what happens next.

RIDGE AVENUE NOTES —VOLUME ONE

Spring and Summer Sketches 

  Early April and I’m slogging through five inches of wet snow on what is usually an easy stroll at the base of Mt Greylock. I haven’t even been out an hour and already my legs ache. My ancient Vasque leather boots feel heavier after each step. Hearty chickadees taunt me from the snow covered branches and they keep ten yards ahead as I grind my way up the trail. My thickest fleece jacket is now wrapped around my waist although the morning is neither sunny nor warm.  I am working up a good sweat. It doesn’t seem quite possible that less than a month ago I was sunning myself on a massive rock slab at The Grand Canyon’s south rim. But it’s true.

  The short loop is taking me longer than I remember, however I haven’t walked it in years. I cross the closed off Rockwell Road and leave the chickadees behind and the silence of the woods assures me in some primal essence that Nature is going about her mysterious ways. I lean against a tree, close my eyes and try to get in touch with whatever that might be. Am I successful? Time, I guess, will tell. I take my small satoris when I can. 

  The wind picks up and by the time I get to the Jeep it has started to snow again. The view down to Pontoosuc Lake is obscured by the passing tempest. Twenty minutes later I’m sitting in front of the pellet stove’s flame, sipping Japanese tea and watching out Fran’s picture window the scattering snowflakes. 

 On another trail coming down from Berry Pond. I’m wearing light boots. Wrong choice. I’m walking in a river. The day warmed fast and the path is now a stream. My feet are drenched. I kick up a couple of wary deer, smallish does. Later, closer to the parking lot several turkeys fly off at my approach. They make a tremendous noise as they hurl themselves through the still bare trees. The sky is clearing, and patches of blue grow bigger and bigger. The woods are on the verge of spring’s great awakening. I can sense it. The damp smells have changed over the past several days. The snow has been melting quickly which accounts for the water flowing down the trail. By the beaver dam green grasses are starting to shoot up through the detritus of last autumn’s fallen foliage. 

  

  Two dispatches from Half Dome this week. A young girl slipped to her death while navigating the cables. A terrible accident. Heartbreaking. The grieving father, who was climbing with her, called the wooden steps and bolted cables “unnecessarily dangerous.”  One can hardly blame him his anger. He is surely devastated. The story brought me to tears. 

  I have been on those cables twice. They are a bit tricky in spots and get more challenging when the rock is wet. Fair warnings are posted and anyone who decides to make the final climb to the summit should be aware of the risk. Both times when my group arrived at the base of the cables a few of our party looked up and chose not to go the rest of the way to the top. 

  There are terrible mishaps every year in our national parks. In most cases, as John Reilly, the sage of Fish Camp reminds us, people don’t grasp that “park” doesn’t mean Disney. Animals are wild, rivers are swift and cold, rocks are slick, storms and weather are unpredictable. 

  A week later a 92-year-old man completed the climb. A few months ago, I stood at Curry Village looking up at the granite face and doubted that I would ever make it to the summit again. But now, Everett Kalin, a retired theology professor has given me something to ponder. (I’m so bold sitting here on my deck, a very long way from California, on this sunny afternoon enjoying a glass of delicious red wine.) 

  Pak Wu and I have always figured that into our old age we would at least always be able to shuffle up Sentinel Dome even if the 1.1-mile stroll took us a couple of hours. Sore backs, tricky knees, hangovers and poorly healed ankles be cursed. 

 Always after these types of accidents there is talk of replacing the cables with something safer, easier to climb, more convenient for the inexperienced. I hope this doesn’t happen. Half Dome is already, by my opinion, too crowded, too busy. On summer weekends two hundred and fifty permits are issued. When a mountain becomes a trophy instead of an adventure something is lost. I did not climb Half Dome either time so I could have bragging rights. I wanted to see the rock up close. I wanted the views. I wanted to sit above 8000 feet and smell the air and look for falcons. I wanted to see from a different vantage point the other mountains I had climbed. I didn’t feel like I was running a race or adding another hike to my checklist. I wanted to learn something new about the park I love so much. 

  On that first time on the cables as we reached the top afternoon thunderheads were building up over Toloumne Meadow. Faster, we thought, than might be safe. We took a few pictures and did not tarry. The few other people who were on the summit that day started back down before us leaving our group of four alone as the sky grew darker. 

  The high Sierra weather in July and August is tricky. On this day the clouds dissipated almost as quickly as they gathered. On the long hike back down to Curry Village it did not rain. But those darkening few minutes exposed on that massive rock certainly added a sense of just how fragile and insignificant we truly are. Our transience was unmistakable. 

  The second time on top the sun was shining and we were able to linger longer. The summit was busy with hikers coming and going. The cables were crowded, and I feel some of the charm is stolen from the experience when shared with so many people. My desire for lonely places is nothing new. The mountains I have gone up alone or with one or two dear friends are the ones I remember with the most pleasure. Hoffman and Dana jump to mind. 

  Another national park fatality.  A kid, college student, slipped at one of the overlooks at the Grand Canyon’s south rim and fell 400 feet down the cliff. He was hiking off the trail and lost his footing. I’ve walked along the south rim and there are definitely tricky spots and there are plenty of warnings to stay on the trail. But again, the word “park” does not mean amusement park. 

  There have been three other deaths in Grand Canyon this summer, from heat stroke and dehydration. This is the park’s most common cause of yearly fatalities. My recent visit to the south rim was on a clear and cool high desert morning. The air was crisp and the trails uncrowded. I paused at many overlooks and rested often on large rock outcroppings. Hawks flew silently way below me, and the muddy and sluggish Colorado seemed not to be flowing at all. Such is the optical illusion given the distance to the canyon bottom. And of course, as always with me, the further away from the visitor center I got and the less people I saw the more relaxed I became. I have always been a man of the outskirts.  I sat, for I’m not sure how long, at the edge of the cliff under a fathomless blue sky and devoured the quiet and the solitude. The possibility of becoming a desert rat holds great appeal. I was later told by a lovely ranger that it’s never too late. A piece of advice that is truly tonic for my heart. 

  But back here in the semi wilds of Berkshire County I hike tame trails and survey some of the first blooms of the year. I find on one path red trillium and higher up the mountain the splotchy green and grey leaves and yellow blossoms of the trout lily. Ferns and wild leeks start to appear stream side. 

 At the edge of a field, I find a dead red tail hawk. It hasn’t been dead long. The feathers are clean, the talons sharp and the head intact. There are no flies or other bugs that easily find recent corpses. I flip it over, the wings spread beautifully. I look for a gun wound and find nothing. There is some damage to the neck but very little blood. Could this hawk have been hit by a larger bird? An owl or bald eagle? I’ve seen plenty of eagles around which slightly amazes me. Growing up around here they were nonexistent. The overuse of pesticides like DDT in the 50s and 60s simply wiped out all the large birds of prey. The accumulation of the poison in the birds cause their eggshells to become too thin to incubate. The parent bird would crush the shells when they sat on them to keep them warm. 

  DDT was banned in the early 70s. It wasn’t until almost fifty years later that osprey and eagles were again starting to be seen around the lakes of New England. 

  And now they are once again nesting in the Berkshires. This early summer I’ve watched them at Pontoosuc snatching fish from shallow coves. I see them flying around Ridge Ave with their dinner clutched tight in their massive claws. Crows harass and chase them around the neighborhood, and they’ve been taking refuge in the trees behind my house. They are magnificent to watch. One flew over the deck the other morning about fifteen feet above where I was reading. Its wingspan was easily six feet. I’m reminded of Melville’s “Catskill eagle” and imagine that while he was writing The Whale here in Pittsfield and often picnicking at Breezy Knoll, he had plenty of opportunities to watch eagles plucking fish from the blue water with Mount Greylock in the distance. Was Greylock a muse for Melville? Scholars seem to think so and from here on the south shore of Pontoosuc the outline of the mountain could easily remind an old sailor of a whale. Much more than the Grand Tetons looked like great tits to French explorers. They must have been rather worked up after so long on the trail to see breasts in the jagged peaks of Wyoming. When I passed that way I was not reminded of naked women when gazing in wonder at the daunting mountains. (That is not to say that there have been times when I have found real breasts both beautiful and daunting.) I guess us dwellers of the rolling and round Berkshire Hills should be thankful that the French didn’t explore hereabouts. Otherwise, I imagine the mountains Saddleball and Greylock would be known as the Great Tetons. But I digress…

  Another bird that has made a fabulous comeback here is the great blue heron. I see one somewhere almost every day; by the lake shores, along the Housatonic, roadside streams, flying over the yard in the morning and hunting the marshes near the Ashuwillticook trail.  Another sign that perhaps things are getting better, healthier and slightly wilder here in Western Massachusetts. 

  It has also been an emotional summer walking around this city that I was born and lived in until I was 24. As Neil sings, all my changes were there. Well, up until then. California brought on some massive changes that I’m still learning from. Or trying to anyways. 

  I have set up my office/study in my parents' bedroom. It has good energy. There has been speculation that I was conceived in this room. But I’m willing to entertain the theory that Fran and Tony being newlyweds, it could have easily been any of the other rooms. They had a long reputation for being a very affectionate couple. A few of dad’s love notes I found attest to this. Love notes, incidentally, that were written when I was in my teens. 

  

  This is the first summer in thirty years that I haven’t spent a few nights at the Wawona Hotel, sipping a martini and listening to Thomas Bobb play the piano and sing from the Great American Songbook and old Yosemite camp tunes. I try to make up for it and am not doing a bad job here on Ridge Ave listening to Cole Porter, Blossom Dearie, Jerome Kern and Hoagy Carmichael as I sit on my much smaller deck on warm July afternoons. It’s not quite the same and I do miss the hot and dry Sierra night air. The humidity here is heavy but only a fool complains about the weather. I make do with a cold Sierra Nevada pale ale in one of Dad’s vintage pilsner glasses that I keep in the freezer. 

  I get a text from Pak wistfully asking when will be climbing again. We’d both like to make it to the top of Mount Hoffman and Cloud’s Rest once more. Those days on both those peaks are very special to us. From here at the lake, I gaze at Greylock and plan on hiking up tomorrow.  I’ve spent a lot of time there these past months taking trails I haven’t walked in a very long time. 

 With Yosemite on my mind tonight I sit outside with Gary Snyder’s poetry until it’s too dark to read. It cools off and I think perhaps I feel the first hint of autumn on the breeze.

Lake Placid -- High Peaks Region

  This Was My Dream

   The traveler is the aggregate of the road.

In gardens by the quiet sea’s shore

the scent of sunburnt hay is with him still,

brought down from the highland meadows hours before.

   Wayfarer of a long day’s journeying,

he drew the reins in tight around his heart

and let hard lines of verse take shape within,

molded by depths of spirit into art.

   This was my dream. And that the slayer, time,

that leads us off to die or flows in vain,

was just a dream within a mortal mind.

   And then I saw a man hold up to view

in naked hands the glowing coal of life,

ashless the fire that Heraclitus knew.

            Antonio Machado

 I had an earlier start than I had planned on this morning. Pittsfield was foggy and damp but over the hill in New Lebanon it’s clear and sunny. A few clouds to the north, which is where I am heading on this lush, late July day. I cruise past Bolton Landing, reluctantly, I wanted for old time's sake to stop at The Sagamore for a martini, but it’s much too early. 

  I’m past Keene Valley and at the Adirondack Loj before 11:00 so I decide to, instead of strolling around Heart Lake, take the hike I had planned on doing tomorrow. An easy five miles out to Avalanche Lake. 

  I am amused to pay $18 to park at the Loj but not so amused to see how many cars the lot now holds. We used to leave a car here for a few days at a time while we hiked and camped often having no itinerary or set schedule once we left the trailhead. 

 The first time I was up here was to climb Mount Marcy, New York’s tallest peak. When I was offered to join the hike, I was just recently home from a nine-day trek on the Long Trail in Vermont. I was probably in the best shape of my life and there’s no doubt I would never be stronger. After lugging a sixty plus pound pack over the Green Mountains the twenty pounds I carried up Marcy felt like pillow on my back. I practically ran up the eight miles to the summit. It was glorious although not a glorious day weather wise. Views were limited but my excitement was undimmed. Up until then it was the highest peak I had climbed. 

  One of the guys in our group had spent some time in the Sierras and was chided by the rest of us for his lack of enthusiasm and jaded comments. Now that I’ve thirty years and hundreds of miles of Sierra trails behind me I found myself this morning gazing up at Marcy with no less awe than that wiry hungry kid from a lifetime ago. This morning, I don’t even try to fool myself by thinking I could make it to the top in a single day with my twice broken ankle. Someday maybe. 

  I make it to Marcy Dam pretty quick. It’s a pleasant two miles. Most of the dam has been removed in the past few years and only the side supports are left. There is a new small foot bridge downstream that crosses the now free flowing Marcy Brook. I’ve camped here several times and one memorable September first morning we woke up to four inches of snow on the tent. It was a lovely white walk back to the Loj.    

 Onward to Avalanche Lake. Some of the campsites are closed and I see very few people. The trail is as rocky as I remember it and I go gentle on my F-ed up ankle, only banging it two or three times. The day is warm and starts to get cloudy. There are random raindrops but no need for my jacket. At the lake I rest for a while and contemplate going on to Colden Lake which would add a several hours to the hike. It’s already two o’clock. I decide not to and find myself missing that invincible kid with the heroic stamina. He was something all right. 

  I look up to my left at the slick rock side of Mount Colden. The summit isn’t quite visible from here. I’ve climbed it twice. Once in the pouring rain and once in a thick soupy mist. Both days visibility was zero. Sadly, lingering at the top was not an option. On that rainy day we hustled down and found an unoccupied lean-to on the lake and enjoyed a dry comfortable night. We had a small fire that kept the bugs away. 

  I ramble back down toward the Loj taking my time and resting often to just enjoy the silence of the woods; bird song and a breeze through the thick forest are the only sounds until I continue my trudging. I meet a couple at the junction of the trail that leads to Marcy. Yesterday they climbed Colden, Wright and Algonquin. Whew! 

  I’ve climbed Algonquin as well, the second highest peak in the state. I don’t how it happened but somehow that day we got on a trail that was not maintained and was supposed to be closed to hikers. We found this out after talking to a ranger at the trailhead when we got down the other side. We told him about the difficulty of keeping on the trail and how we had to guess the path in some spots. He figured out our error and we all laughed about it. That was yet another overcast day with poor visibility but at least we had fair glimpses of Colden and Marcy. 

  Back at the Loj my ankle is pretty sore although after ten miles I’m not surprised. 

  I’m sitting on my balcony at The Devlin, formerly the Art Devlin Olympic Motor Inn, with a generous view of Mount Marcy. The famous Winter Olympic ski jump towers loom off to my left. As so often after a rigorous hike I find I can’t really sit still or relax so I walk the mile to downtown and look for something to eat. Main Street is busy with tourists, many foreign languages being spoken, and once again I find myself looking in the windows of junk stores. A shop of Tibetan imports seems the most out of place. I don’t go in. 

  I find a restaurant and have a cold beer as delicious as you would imagine after my long day. The menu, however, has nothing to entice me. Since my most recent drive across America this past spring I’m not overwhelmed by the generic fare encountered everywhere. And now that I think of it I haven’t seen a decent wine list since Santa Fe. And even that one needed some fine tuning.

  I walk back toward The Delvin and find a pizza joint that is doing a brisk takeout business, so I pick one up (mushroom and anchovy) and bring it to my room. I put on Going For The One, an album that was a big part of the soundtrack on the first trips I took up here. The song Turn of the Century gives me a jolt of emotion, and the memories of those trips overwhelm me. I have another beer while I eat and watch the clouds get lower and lower and thicker and thicker until it starts to pour. Marcy disappears and the flashing light on top of the ski jump dims until it is barely visible through the rain. 

  It’s still raining when I wake up early but looks like it’s starting to clear. Putting on my reading glasses I find I have lost a lens. I can’t find it anywhere, so I read some of Antonio Machado’s poems with one eye closed. The great poet Jim Harrison only had one eye, and he was an epic reader. So, I feel it would be bad form to complain. 

  In solidarity with my swollen ankle instead of hiking I decide to take the short drive to Saranac Lake where I have never been. It’s not as crowded as Placid but still busier than my home lake, Pontoosuc. How did Pittsfield escape the fate of this edge of the Adirondacks with the horde of tourists I’ve encountered? Bigger and more mountains perhaps. The historic Winter Olympic sights no doubt play a part. I hope when the day comes when there is a charge to park at the base of Mount Greylock I will be long gone. Compared to Saranac and Placid the Berkshires are still less busy and cheaper. Do we miss the tourist tax revenue? Well, we never had it to begin with. 

  I see a sign for the Trudeau Institute and take the road toward the lake and grounds. Much research was done here on tuberculosis and seeing Grandpa Ferdyn died of it and as a kid I had to get vaccine shots twice a year, I’ve always been curious and scared of the condition. The place looks very serene and seems like a fine place to rest and recuperate. Years ago, I read a book called Saranac about the work of Dr. Trudeau. 

  The rain has stopped although wispy clouds still hide the high peaks. I park back at the motel and walk downtown again and get a sandwich at a small deli. On the walk back I notice the menu at The Grand Adirondack Hotel and see that they serve duck wings. Well, I never…. I plan on coming back for the cocktail hour.

 I also see a brochure for the John Brown farmhouse. I didn’t know (or did I?) that the great abolitionist lived up here. I do know he was tried and hanged for his raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia. In college I read Thoreau’s A Plea for Captain John Brown, which is a good short biography of the man. 

  I drive out to the farmhouse, just a few miles from The Devlin, and find that Captain Brown is buried there as well. I stand in the mist near his grave for a few minutes pondering how here in the shadow of Mount Marcy did this brave man find his way to this little town.

  Marcy comes out of the clouds. Its native name, Mohawk I think, is Tahawus. It means Cloud Splitter.  This I learned from a plaque on the summit that I still have a photo of.

  I never knew (or did I?) until today that you can drive to the top of Whiteface Mountain and instead of further damaging my ankle this seems like a great idea. 

 Twenty bucks for the privilege at a toll stop at the base. Again, I feel grateful to have Mt Greylock in my backyard whose road, twice as long as that of Whiteface, is still free to drive. 

 At the almost top there is the obligatory gift shop and a small cafe. Also, there’s about a quarter mile trail with iron railings that follows a ridge to the summit. As I start up the steps the clouds move in. I slowly navigate the slick rock favoring my good ankle. A bit a vertigo, a new sensation for me when climbing, catches me by surprise when I put pressure on the bad foot while looking down at an old avalanche scar. 

  At the top, which I share with about twenty other people, we are in the mist. Every now and again the clouds lift enough to see Lake Placid and it’s a lovely sight. The mountains I have climbed, and drove up here to see; Marcy, Colden and Algonquin, are completely hidden. Which, truth be told, cheers me up. And not only because I’m fond of high cold places. It’s an excuse to make another trip to the high peaks region this year. I shuffle down to the Jeep and then back to The Delvin.  Late afternoon finds me on the balcony reading, one-eyed, Machado.

  I walked up to town after first being turned back by a swift and heavy downpour that soaked me, and I had to change into dry clothes. After all day of anticipating duck wings, I find that the bar at the Grand Adirondack Hotel is closed on Tuesdays. “No duck wings tonight.”, I’m told at the front desk. I don’t feel like wandering around town and I still have half a pizza in the mini fridge. Back on the balcony, cold pizza, cold beer and the mist hovering on the peaks. 

  

 A rainy morning. My plan is to go to Vermont and catch Route Seven at Middlebury and take it right to Pontoosuc Lake. 

 Seize the day, the poet Horace famously wrote. I feel I’m better than most at taking advantage of what random gifts are hurtled my way. Oddly enough I found that I have two copies of his book of odes. I’ve brought a beautiful translation with me because one of my projects is that any hotel I stay at if I find a Bible I like to slip an alternate book of wisdom next to it in the bedside drawer. You never know when someone seeking illumination would love the opportunity for some secular verses as opposed the nonsense that is found in the Old Testament. So now The Delvin, room 38, is equipped with a choice of reading material.  I am not fooling myself though. I’m sure not one person in a thousand sits in their hotel room and reads the Bible. Anyone who is that devout, I’m sure, carries their own copy on their travels. Worst case scenario is perhaps that over the years I have contributed, in a very small way, to the enlightenment, or entertainment, of a housekeeper or two.  It truly would be something if the break rooms of hotels I’ve stayed at have kept the books that have been gifted by me on my wanderings. Well, you never know.

 The complete quote is “Seize the day, and put the least possible trust in tomorrow.” And seeking a thought for the day before I put The Odes in the drawer and drive south, I read this; “Pale death, with impartial step, knocks at the hut of the poor and the towers of kings.”

  It’s a rural drive toward Lake Champlain. I pass small towns, corn fields, ride alongside rivers and streams until I come to the lake. At a stop light near the Crown Point Bridge, I read a sign that lists all the sightings of Champ, the Adirondack’s own Loch Ness Monster. The first on the list is Samuel de Champlain himself. In 1609 no less! The light turns green and now I’m anticipating the view from the bridge. I figure I’ve as good of a chance as anyone to see Champ. No luck, the waters are calm on this windless morning and Champ remains as elusive as all the other monsters and aliens who hover on the edge of our myths and imagination. 

  For the next two hours I drive in the rain, music turned up, until I am back near the shore of lovely and uncrowded Pontoosuc Lake.

Discography:

Yes — Going For The One, Close To The Edge & Tales Of Topographic Oceans

Genesis — Duke & And Then There Were Three

Renaissance — Live at Carnegie Hall

Van Morrison — No Guru, No Method, No Teacher — (Here Comes The Knight)

Bibliography:

The Adirondacks — Paul Schneider

The Collected Poems of Antonio Machado

The Odes of Horace

 

Travel Notes -- March 2024

 

 Santa Barbara, CA > Yosemite Flats, CA > Pinole, CA > Santa Barbara, CA > Kingman, AZ > Flagstaff, AZ > Santa Fe, NM > Colorado Springs, CO > Kearney, NE > Iowa City, IA > St Joseph, MI > Stowe, NY > 16 Ridge Ave, Pittsfield, MA

  It is March first. Johnny has already left with the U-Haul for Yosemite Flats while I wait for Lee so I can turn in the keys to the beach/bachelor apartment I’ve lived in for seventeen years. There is great excitement flavored with melancholy. I stand on my stoop with the slightest view of the Pacific through the neighborhood palms and pines. How much I will miss it all is total conjecture at this point. 

 Mary Pat comes down to say goodbye and I tear up for the first time today. She, and Chris, have been wonderful neighbors and I always enjoyed our short chats. 

  Todd H and Gerry show up to also say goodbye, a gesture that truly hits my core. We look through the empty apartment and Lee arrives. We are both emotional when I give her the keys. We hug and again I’m on the verge of crying. It feels good to be so appreciated. Who knew?

  A final moment with my two dear friends and I hop in the jeep. It is loaded for a month on the road. Route to be determined. 

  It’s a blur driving north until I pass by Refugio Beach and realize, after months of planing, that I am on my way.  The Jeep has been tuned-up and it’s a smooth ride past blooming almond orchards and swarms of spring bug hatches, the windshield is smeared with their guts and tiny flecks of wing and legs. Gruesome. It starts to rain and when I get to Johnny’s new house he is waiting with the U-Haul. Wisely we opt to wait until tomorrow to unload and instead head to the Snow Line Saloon for dinner at the bar. Big burgers and cold beer replenish our energy, not quite enough to get to work on unpacking, but enough for another beer. 

  We are both slightly emotional thinking about our changes, Johnny has been in Santa Barbara longer than I have, it’s a massive, but much needed, move. We are truly comfortable with our decisions and find it hard to contain our excitement. Lucky us.

  I’m up early and take a morning walk around Johnny’s new neighborhood. It rains on me and then turns to sleet and then back to rain. The forest is full of bird song. I see little grey birds, hawks, turkeys, ravens and a field of robins, my favorite sign that spring is eminent. 

 I’m happy for Johnny. He’s talked about living up here for a long time and now he has made it happen. He is thrilled.

  We unload the truck and drop it off after a lengthy hassle with with the U-Haul corporate assholes. They changed our drop-off destination to an unreasonable place so we ignored the change and left the truck at the spot where I made the original reservation.

  The next few days are spent building furniture; bed frames, tables, chairs, and after a reasonable amount of work we retire to either the Snow Line, the Oak Room or Bass Lake for a late lunch. Johnny has been up here a lot and by now he knows every bartender in the area. Not bad for a guy who drinks nonalcoholic beer. 

  I wake up to a beautiful scene of a storm clearing above the low mountains to the east. Snow has fallen overnight and I take a walk as the morning light reflects off the dispersing clouds. The birdsong is raucous, earth’s grand alarm clock. 

  It’s very comfortable and quiet here, and not for the first time I feel relief at leaving the chaos and hustle of Santa Barbara. The timing is right even though I never thought it would happen. I was suffering from stagnation, the worst stage of complacency, which takes away some of the joy and spark of everyday experience. 

  On a grey morning we head north to El Sobrante for a visit with the Kecheleys (Marcie, Max & Kevin)and Kampas (Larry & Darcy). In my motel room while waiting for our Uber to take us to Larry’s I note that I am really on the road with only the vaguest plan about which routes I will take. It’s not surprising that I’m more prone to slightly aimless wandering than to have a set itinerary. I’m at my best when I’m not beholden to schedule. It’s always been a strength of mine. 

  Larry takes us to a nice Italian restaurant and we have dinner at the relaxed bar. It’s great to see him and we have some hysterical reminisces about wilder times. Little did we know that we would be adding to our list of adventures this very evening. 

  Larry recommends a nightcap and as Johnny and I are still in a celebratory mood we dare not refuse.  Antlers Tavern is a big neighborhood bar with an enticing neon martini sign out front and tonight there’s an unmistakable energy in the place. We take a seat at the long bar and I look around and humorously notice it’s an older crowd. A normal Wednesday night?, I wonder.  There is a disproportionate number of greying men with berets and little round shades. Maybe not so unusual being so near Berkeley, a bastion and haven for old beatniks. 

  A band starts up and delivers great renditions of some blues and jazz standards.  The bass player has a strong resemblance to Phil Lesh. The musicianship is several flights higher than your average bar band. They play for a while, forty minutes or so, and then their set is over and another group takes the stage. More of the same kind of tunes played with talent and passion. Bass player number two also resembles Lesh, which, I muse, maybe also isn’t so unusual here on the East Bay. 

  For a while different musicians alternate, each playing a few songs before switching off again. Eventually every beret makes it to the stage. All the guitars look vintage and lovingly cared for. One guy plays the trombone like Curtis Fuller.  Then a tiny black woman comes to the stage with her baritone sax and digs at my heart with her joyous intensity. Joni is her name and I’m amazed at the size of the horn compared to her. She swings it with grace. She captivates me and I wish there was time to hear her story. Anyone who plays like that has a good one. She finishes a song and is out the door before the band kicks into its next number. A fascinating interlude. 

  Later in bed, with my ears still hearing the music, I am once again reminded that on any given night a nondescript barroom can be the scene of transcendence of a kind that gives us brief pause from our daily strifes and anxieties. An on this night, Antlers Tavern in Pinole, California was the place to be.  

   The next day we have lunch with Marcie and Larry and then spend the afternoon at the Kechley’s and when Kevin gets home from work we go to dinner at a neighborhood Mexican restaurant. Then back to the Kechley’s. It’s so good to finally get together. On the way to their house I notice I have a headlight out in the Jeep. Max, a recent Eagle Scout, gets home from work and has the bulb changed pretty quick. He then gives me a spin in his car, a very quick Lexus. We are back at the motel before nine, tired, both Johnny and I fighting head colds. I have a shitty night’s sleep. 

 After an early Lunch at Saul’s in Berkeley with Darcy and Larry we head to Santa Barbara. Another fine adventure with Kampa behind us.  We changed Johnny’s plan to fly down and me to head east on the 80. My schedule is flexible and I check and see if there are rooms at The Lemon Tree and there are. I get Johnny safely home and we make plans for me to be back in Yosemite Flats at the end of June. We agree to keep this to ourselves. 

 While checking in at about seven p.m. I can hear the loud bar from the lobby. Gerry is working so I know who is occupying the stools. I have parked around the back and get my room key as stealthily as possible. The last thing I want is to see the usual crew, who I have already said goodbye to once. In my room, a great value, I drink a beer and unwind from the drive. 

  I bought a giant map of the United States, my plan is not to use GPS on the entire trip. Of course my twenty-two year old Jeep has no navigation system so I would have to rely on my phone if I somehow get spun around. Which is always a possibility. As for music, my CD player having succumbed to the wear and tear (Entropy!) of over a hundred and eighty thousand miles has had a Ratdog disc jammed in it for years now, I am using an ancient iPod with over eight thousand songs on it. I hit random shuffle this morning and am interested to see if synchronicity will play any part on the drive.  

  Later, after the bar has emptied out, I go down and have a glass of wine with Gerry. He’s pleased by the surprise, which was my plan. I swear him to secrecy about my brief appearance. I’m in no mood to explain my reasoning, even to the people I love. Nobody gets this more than Gerry. 

March 8th — Kingman, AZ

  Eight hours on the road. Probably too much driving, I’m exhausted. Most of the day was exciting though. When I turned toward Needles I was on a new route for me. A part of the desert I’ve never seen. The vistas continued to expand the further southeast I drove. The sky all day was a wonderful inviting blue. When everything is fresh for me I try to grasp the small nuances of discovery. 

 There wasn’t much traffic and I cruised the lonely road with the occasional impossibly long freight train  moving slowly west. Dust lingered, a slightly lighter hue than the bronze colored desert. The openness deceiving in its vastness. I drove for hours and the far away mountains seemed not to change.   

 My motel on historic Route 66, by the time I arrived late, was indeed an oasis. The town is surrounded by austere mountains whose silhouettes are now dark against the sky as stars start to fade into view. The night air gets crisp early at 3300 feet. 

 I had a quick dinner in the quiet motel bar and now I’m back in my warm room pondering the map. I see how close I am to the south rim of the Grand Canyon and that’s my plan for tomorrow. I told myself that this journey, unlike, say Basho’s or Sandoka’s, would have a more directionless sense to it. Even though there is a ultimate arrival point, Western Massachusetts, the timeline will stay flexible.

Flagstaff — Aspen Suites 

  At the Jeep this morning is a large grey bird with a shapely curved beak. A type of thrasher I believe.

 Moments after getting on the road Journeyman by Jethro Tull comes on. An odd, disjointed song about a commute that gives a sense of restless movement.  Ian Anderson seems to be saying that even short trips can be full of apprehension and consequence.  

 For me however, it’s an easy and beautiful drive through the Kaibab Forest to Grand Canyon Village which on this late winter day is uncrowded. 

 I wander the rim path for a while seeing elk, red tails, and ravens. I stop often at secluded outcrops where I sit and gaze down at the river and across the seven mile expanse to the north rim. Again my sense of distance is out of whack. As I walk for an hour while looking down at Black Bridge, a suspension bridge across the Colorado, it appears no farther away then it was when I first viewed it. It seems a tiny black line on the muddy brown river. But according to my map it’s six miles away and almost 5000 feet below me. 

  I scramble down some rocks and find a large slab and loll in the sun contemplating the eternal processes that formed my vista. It’s too magnificent to photograph with my primitive iPhone. You have to be an Adams or a Porter or a Werling to capture the wonder. Feebly, I click a few pictures. 

  Sitting in the high desert at over 7000 feet on a day with a blue sky and a slight enchanting breeze that carries a scent that I am unfamiliar with I think of Ed Abbey. This was his territory. It is just after noon and the light is sharp and there are no shadows. The air is clean and the details of the cliffs are clearly defined. I feel a part of something ancient.

  Hunger (for exactly what though?) breaks my reverie and back near the village I find a picnic table hidden away in some short trees that provide no shade and have a snack; half a sandwich, granola and chocolate. 

 I drive the Desert View Road to the watchtower, a replica built in the 20s as a visitor center and was meant to resemble Native Pueblo structures. I could see it from a distance looking tiny against the walls of the canyon. Instead of waiting in line an hour to climb the seven stories to the top I walk the grounds and find another secluded spot to sit for a few minutes and gaze the distances; space and time. The afternoon air cools down and I make my leisurely way to Flagstaff where I find a delightful motel, The Hotel Aspen Inn and Suites. It’s buildings look modern with a grey and bright green front facing Route 66. My room is small but clean and artsy. I like the feel of the place, staff included.  

  Flagstaff, as my great friend Joanna agrees, is our kind of town. If I remember accurately, Ed Abbey got arrested here. Vagrancy.  A few short turns from vagrancy myself, I take a walk downtown, Mount Humphreys looming in the final light of the day. A beautiful mountain, (Joanna climbed it!) snowcapped and steep, I can’t help but stare. 

  I find a typical brewery, they are rather generic and everywhere these days, and have an unremarkable IPA then some lobster macaroni and cheese. Not exactly Abbeyesque. He would have no doubt tracked down a darker joint for a steak and whiskey. I feel my authenticity challenged as I survey the kids politely watching sports on the flatscreens. 

 I walk up Route 66 in the cold night air, it’s already in the thirties. Flagstaff is at almost 7000 feet, high country, Humphreys is well over 12,000 feet. The sky is clear and my fleece jacket no match for the wind, so it’s back to my warm room. Just to be safe, to prevent it from freezing, I bring in the wine from the Jeep that I ended up not giving away and am lugging to the Berkshires.  Before sleep while listening to a freight train I read some thousand year old Chinese poetry about the good reasons for staying away up in unpeopled mountains. 

  Autumn Thoughts, Sent Far Away

We share all these disappointments of failing

autumn a thousand miles apart. This is where

autumn wind easily plunders courtyard trees,

but the sorrows of distance never scatter away.

Swallow shadows shake out homeward wings.

Orchid scents thin, drifting from old thickets.

These lovely seasons and fragrant years falling

lonely away — we share such emptiness here.           Po Chü - i

Santa Fe, NM

  I was up early and stopped and visited the Meteor Crater near Winslow, AZ.  On the short drive from Flagstaff Mount Humphreys fills the rearview mirror on this bright morning. I’m best when I am an off-season tourist and the visitor center is uncrowded. I have the upper viewing platform to myself and spend a half hour trying to comprehend this 50,000 year old, mile wide and over five hundred foot deep crater. The hole and the austere high desert surroundings certainly make for an eerie landscape. Earth feels closer to space and the workings of the universe more real. 

  I visit the other viewing spots for different perspectives and once again take a few unremarkable pictures. It’s just too big and looks unimpressive on my small screen. I want to scramble down to the bottom for a different perspective but it’s forbidden for some reason. Standing on the edge of the crater in the middle of hundreds of miles of desert and billions of miles of space I feel what Abbey called “A sweet but awesome loneliness.” 

 The gift shop is full of alien trinkets, shirts, mugs, the usual junk. What possesses humans to equate something that should leave us in awe and humility about the cosmos with cartoon toys of little green men? For me it’s enough to feel connected to something just barely at the edge of my comprehension. I have an odd twinge of desire knowing something like this could happen again. The dynamics of existence are exhilarating. 

  The employees are in a conversation about Bigfoot. Apparently the creatures live in the surrounding scrub desert. They are convinced of this. Foolish me, I always thought that they dwelled in the Pacific Northwest. But I guess we take our myths where we can. 

 After a last look at Mount Humphreys, still impressive in the distance, I move along planing on getting to Santa Fe for dinner. I slow down and check out Gallup and then Albuquerque realizing that I might be moving too quickly. My old mantra that says there is simply too much to see couldn’t be more appropriate these days. The desert seems to grow larger as the miles pass. Long flat stretches full of haunting beauty. Enchanting indeed. I often pull to the side of the road and just take in the rocks, mountains, faraway high forests and the occasional million-car fright train. The dryness is … what? Strangely addictive.. 

  Santa Fe (is there a Saint Faith?) is bigger than I thought it would be and still not using my Google Maps I drive around on a few main streets until I find the hotel I booked last night. I’m amazed at how many homeless/panhandlers there are. I didn’t see anyone begging for money in Kingman or Flagstaff but here they’re on almost every intersection on a long street lined with hotels, restaurants and stores. Not unlike Santa Barbara. 

 My hotel is under construction which gives it an aura of shabbiness. But my room is clean and the price is right. And I am very close to downtown. The plaza is centered around old and narrow streets that wind crookedly in all directions. I walk up and down past stores selling all manor of western apparel. I admire with an air of indifference a $1000 cowboy hat knowing damn well I look out of place in my Carhartt jeans and twenty year old purple fleece jacket. Nonetheless I am as real as it gets. The author of my own story. Anyway, I have always looked foolish in a Stetson. The salesgirl gives me a sultry smile no doubt thinking never judge a book….

   I find a restaurant with an inviting upstairs bar, The Thunderbird. A single beer goes right to my head and I remember I’m still at seven thousand feet and haven’t had time to really acclimate. I have been too long at sea level. 

   I find yet another bland sports bar closer to my hotel and have a snack, then tired and sated I’m in bed before nine.

  Santa Fe

  This morning I go to the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum, long on my list of places to visit. She is an artist whose work has always made me emotional. The Santa Barbara Museum of Art have two of her canvases in their permanent collection.

 There’s no way to explain why her paintings touch my heart. I see one of my favorites, Winter Cottonwoods. I stare at it, walk around, come back and stare at it some more. I’m mesmerized. Other paintings captivate my imagination and I return several times to one of Stieglitz’s barn at Lake George and one of a starlit night. 

  There is a display with some of her many cookbooks that I wish I could flip through. 

  After two hours of immersing myself in the art of the great lady I need some air. The gallery begins to get crowded so I take a stroll around the plaza while trying to absorb what meanings I can from such a grand body of work. In those paintings are all the things (emotions) that have scratched my heart since I can remember; solitude, peace, Nature, loneliness, longing, serenity, desire, it’s all there in my imagination/heart/essence. Joseph Campbell writes, “One should not be afraid of one’s own interpretation of the symbol.” 

  Museums overwhelm me and Georgia’s was no exception. A few hours is not enough time to grasp it all. I will need several more visits and I vow to be back here again next year. This morning I already decided to spend another night in Santa Fe and kept my room. It’s still early, before noon, and seeing it’s a short drive I head up to Los Alamos. It’s a wonderful road with picturesque vistas and, like I do when I find someplace interesting, I wonder what it would be like to live here. 

  I find the small museum near the houses where Robert Oppenheimer and Hans Bethe lived. You can tour Bethe’s and it’s a very cool place and gives a good idea of what a modern home looked like in the 1940s. Big tiled bathroom and bright kitchen. The house is small but comfortable. Oppenheimer’s house isn’t open to the public yet but I peeked in the window to see what the library/living room of a genius looks like. Not very different from mine! 

  Coincidentally, last night Oppenheimer, the movie, won a slew of Oscars. I haven’t seen it yet but I read the brilliant book, American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin Sherwin. I recently gave it to AP who I text to tell him where I am. 

  I think of all the great scientists who lived and worked here and wallow in my own ignorance. To imagine Richard Feynman walking these paths at the beginning of his career gives me the chills. This little “town up the hill” changed the world. Humanity has never been the same. 

  I remember back to drinking an old Sherry bottled from the 1944 harvest, the last before nuclear fallout spread across the planet. The astute gourmand Steve Acronico pointed this out to me as we enjoyed our nightcap after closing up that dark warm bar. A lifetime ago….

  I drive back enjoying the scenery, the largeness of the snow on the peaks and the openness of the land and the sky. 

  Here in Santa Fe is the famous Coyote Cafe, Mark Miller’s restaurant. I ate at the one in Vegas several times, once with my friend Malamut, but tonight I’m not in the mood for southwest cuisine. I find a Asian joint called Jinga that reminds me of those hidden east coast gems or the long gone China Castle in Santa Barbara. Moody dim lighting, full bar, jazz playing. I sit at the bar, as I usually do, and order a much deserved (really?) manhattan and shrimp curry. Both delicious.

  My road weariness starts to catch up with me and I decline a second cocktail. I’m asleep early but now up late, restless and full of an anxiety that seems to come from everywhere. The ever looming question of what the fuck am I doing? I fell back asleep by four and now it’s nine. A later start than I hoped for. But once again I remind myself that I’m not in any hurry to be anywhere in particular. 

  “I’m frightened all the time. Scared to death. But I’ve never let it stop me.” Georgia O’Keeffe 

Colorado Springs, CO

  I take a quick look at Taos, smaller and more rustic (I think) than Santa Fe and I debate staying the night but seeing I’ve only been driving about an hour I keep going. 

 The iPod plays Ramblin’ Man and it feels damn good to be zipping along quiet roads and being reassured about my movement by Dickey Betts, that smooth easy voice.  

 I find myself along the Rio Grande del Norte and I stop to take some pictures of fly fisherman for Mark and see that I am off the grid. No Service! Which is always a slight thrill for me, being somewhere that is too far away to be connected to what is, let’s be honest, mostly nonsense. It makes the sound of the water, the birds and the wind all the more alluring as I watch downstream the long casts of the wading fisherman. I linger and woolgather.   

 Up into Colorado I pass through the towns of Antonio, Manassa, and the charming San Luis at 8000 feet. I am surrounded by mountains and rarely see another car on Route 160. Traffic becomes less sparse on the 25 as I head north. The Sangre de Christos are far off and seem to be pulling me toward them. I pass solitary houses and I imagine living out here where contemplation of the big questions just might drown a mind that already is susceptible to wild swings of melancholy. 

  The sky starts to darken and there are, on and off, big rain drops. Pike’s Peak disappears in the clouds as I approach Colorado Springs where I find another nice hotel, The Academy.  

  I didn’t know you could drive to the top of Pike’s Peak. I remember looking at pictures of it when I was in Boy Scouts (Troop 66) and really wanting to climb it. The forecast for tomorrow is 100% snow so I guess that a drive up is not an option as the news is already predicting road closures. It starts to rain harder so rather than explore the city I read for an hour and then have dinner in the lobby bar, The Falcon.  It’s early and not very crowded but I can hear kids playing in the pool across the courtyard. 

 A British guy at the bar asks if I’m a trucker and I wonder if he thinks I look the part with my flannel shirt, a black Carhartt I bought in Alaska, and a R. Crumb (Mr. Natural) hat. I tell him I’m more of a wanderer which is mostly true. I like to think of myself as only slightly disheveled but not without a noticeable touch of grace. An Enlightened Rouge as the Allman Brothers would say.  

Kearney, NE

 I meander east on little traveled backroads sating my peripatetic disposition. Near Limon, CO I pass a few thousand windmills. They fade at the horizon in all directions. Odd vistas. The landscape becomes more flat and I find the grasslands no less impressive than the desert. 

 My original plan today was to see Fort Robinson where Crazy Horse was killed but it is closed for the winter. I think this sordid piece of history shouldn’t be ignored. 

 I pull into Kearney just at dark. It is sandhill crane migration season and I book two nights at the Microtel Inn & Suites. It’s windy and damp out but my room is big and warm. I get a pizza, drink a beer, look at maps and, appropriately, read some of Jim Harrison’s poems. He loved Nebraska. 

  

 Today I drove on rutted dirt roads to the Rowe Sanctuary to see some cranes. I was too early and the docent recommended a viewing site a few miles away. He also said I should just park near any cornfield as that’s where the birds have been this week. I drive along the Platte River and see cranes in every field. Hundreds of them. I stop and get out of the jeep and the cries and calls are impressive coming from all directions. Birds are constantly taking off and landing. It looks chaotic in its picturesque randomness. The grandness gives me the same feeling I had when first seeing grizzly bears and blue whales. Nature going about Her majestic ways without care or notice of my speck-like existence. It’s reassuring to feel so minuscule. 

  I drive out to a boardwalk on the bank of the slow flowing Platte. Cold rain slaps my jacket and I see no birds on the river. I warm up in the Jeep and head back to the cornfields where the morning commotion has increased. It’s joyously raucous. I watch birds through binoculars until the sleet sends me back to the Jeep. I drive around more gravel roads seeing what I guess to be thousands of sandhill cranes. I’m later told that a million birds will fly across Nebraska in the next few weeks.  

  A brochure tells me I’m only a half hour from the Crane Trust Visitor Center so I check it out. They have lots of cool photos and exhibits. I find some instructions on making origami cranes and am too clumsy to fold the tiny pieces of paper with any amount of skill. I think of DF’s friends making him 1000 of the paper birds when he was dying. I remember the joy it brought him when he told me about it. I put the instructions in my pack, buy a few stickers and take the trail to an observation tower near the Platte. I see no cranes and am reminded of seeing Peter Matthiessen at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History read from his book about cranes, Birds of Heaven. He read a passage about a long trek in Asia only to have the guide repeat over and over to him, “No cranes!” I consider Matthiessen the greatest of writers and his elegance and erudition was powerful at that reading.

 There are a few bison in the distance and I take a footbridge over the river and follow a wide path to the west. The day stays cold with momentary squalls of rain or sleet. I’ve added a fleece under my heavy Carhartt so I’m warm enough if I keep moving. 

   On my return trip I take some roads that run parallel to the Platte, a river that here in Western Nebraska is slow moving, very serene, and somewhat muddy. At its widest it appears very shallow but I think this is deceiving. 

  Back at the Rowe Sanctuary I walk alone to a viewing shelter and enjoy my solitude and break from the wind and rain. I can’t believe there’s no one here. But I don’t see a single bird either. I hear Matthiessen’s voice, “No cranes!”

  I spend the rest of the afternoon at various cornfields watching countless grey birds pick at the leftovers from the fall harvest. They randomly take off and land with a grace that has evolved over eons. Every so often two birds will dance, hover briefly then continue eating. They are loud and the noise is continuous like storm waves hitting the shore.

  At one point a flock a birds a mile long flies over me and once again trying to process such majesty brings on thoughts about the enormity of all experience. The noise of the wingbeats is astonishing. The hundreds of silhouettes moving through the slate sky is a reassuring (although deceiving) reminder of the fecundity of Nature. It takes a minute to catch my breath. The fact that this million crane migration is oblivious to my presence just adds to the wonder. I shiver, and not from the cold. 

  I drive past a tall gravestone marking Boot Hill. Not, of course, the famous Boot Hill at Tombstone but a similar mass grave full of poor cowboys buried so hastily that they still had their boots on. It’s a gentle sloping hill and like the Custer Battlefield time has softened the gruesome reality. 

  It is raining harder when drive by Fort Kearney so I opt not to walk around. 

  Home at the Microtel reading and watching the rain with the songs of the cranes ringing in my skull. I treat myself to a half bottle of champagne from the wine stash in the back of the Jeep. Matthiessen says that the sandhill cranes are no doubt the most ancient of the cranes, and birds in general, noting that every other species has shared traits with them. Researchers have found 9 million year old fossils. Think about that!

  Whooping cranes also make the same migration here through Nebraska. I didn’t see any of these massive white birds as they are still rare. Not even 500 left in the wild.  Less than a hundred of them will fly by here compared to almost a million sandhills. They are on the verge of extinction and fiercely protected. A hard contrast with their cousins and a call that shows us that the wilder something is the more fragile. I think of grizzlies, condors and blue whales.

 The sky darkens as I walk over to a nearby steakhouse, The Coppermill, and have a salad and sirloin, and a single manhattan as a reward for a day out in the grey sleet and damp cold. 

  My room at the Microtel is the first one I’ve stayed in on the drive that has a Gideon bible in the drawer.   I feel like the majority of humanity has been poorly represented when it comes to travel reading material. In the back of the jeep I have a small canvas bag of miscellaneous books that for one reason or another did not make it on the moving truck. I select The Four Nobel Truths by HH The Dalai Llama. I open it at random and read; “In fact genuine love should first be directed at oneself.” And, “There is not so much difference between us all.” Perfect semi enlightened reasoning. I place the book under the Gideon in the slim, well intentioned hope of letting someone (a housekeeper?) know that other options for wisdom are available.

  I once attended a lecture by The Dalai Llama. Cher was in the audience that morning and I’m not ashamed to say that her aura was on a similar level as His Holiness. But that is another story…

Iowa City — 3/15/24

  I looked out the window this morning to see cranes flying past the hotel. An hour east of Kearney I was still seeing hundreds of birds in the cornfields and great flocks in the air. Wild magnificence. I reluctantly pass by Lincoln feeling I should put more miles behind me even though I had originally planed on staying at The Cornhusker, a favorite spot of Jim Harrison’s whose Essential Poems is beside me on the front seat as I drive. 

  Eastern Nebraska into Western Iowa is a ride over great rolling hills with calming vistas. Interstate 80 offers a peaceful reverie. I take piss break in Council Bluffs, lovely country. On a long side road it’s with sadness that I realize I’ve left the cranes behind. The world becomes less fascinating without them. 

  Music today; Lots of Charles Lloyd, Focus, and Rush. Neil Peart was another restless traveler and his writings are full of trying to come to an understanding about his case of wanderlust. An affliction I’ve dealt with my entire life.    

  Three days in a row the shuffle deals me a different version of Dylan singing Oh Sister with its curious line, “Time is an ocean but it ends at the shore.” The rendition from Budokon is particularly mournful. 

  The hotel, The Graduate, is downtown near the old capital building and close to the Iowa State campus. The lobby has the feel of a library complete with shelves of books that on closer inspection I notice are mostly props. My room is cleverly designed combining some old furnishings like a roll top desk, an antique ice box that holds the mini fridge and a black rotary phone. On one wall is a caricature of Kurt Vonnegut and on another is a poster of men’s wrestling holds. I text the picture of Kurt to AP and the wrestlers to Todd E. 

  I walk around the city near the Iowa River and streets crowed with restaurants, coffee shops and many Irish bars, which tempt me but I don’t go in. All are quiet and I’m told it’s spring break so all the students are gone to warm destinations. 

 I have some wings in the lobby bar and for a while I’m the only customer. I offer to buy the staff a round, they seem bored and shyly decline my offer. I assure them I am not embarrassed to drink alone. 

  I am back in my room early. The floor I’m on has a reading room but the chair in my own room is perfect tonight. I look up at Vonnegut with his wild hair, large inquisitive eyes, cigarette in one hand, Slaughter House Five in the other. In another book, Mother Night, he wrote, “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” A line that has stuck with me for forty years. I’ve always tried to be good at what I’ve pretended to be. And now, sitting under the gaze of the great writer, I wonder exactly what I’m going to pretend to be during the next few years of my life. I honestly think I’ve exhausted the possibilities of my older acts. Time, of course, will tell.

  The Graduate has not provided a Bible and I feel no need to leave one of my books seeing the opening sentences to Slaughter House Five are there on the poster. I imagine this might jolt the occasional hotel guest to pick up the book. Incidentally, I read it every couple of years, usually when I’m searching for something I discovered when I was very young. It refreshes my thinking. 

  3 a.m. Wide awake reading Harrison. This is from a poem called Cabbage;

    It’s after midnight in Montana.

    I test the thickness of the universe, its resilience

    to carry us further than any of us wish to go.

    We shed our shapes slowly like moving water,

    which ends up as it will so utterly far from home.

 Before I fall asleep again I decide to skip Chicago. Iowa City was big enough for me.

 St Joseph, MI — Silver Beach Hotel

  I pass out of Iowa over the Mississippi and into Ohio. I stop at an overlook on the eastern bank and watch the river’s gentle flow south to the gulf. Rain keeps me from lingering longer and wishing I had a brighter day to contemplate the storied waters. 

  It’s cold, the wind blowing hard off of Lake Michigan. My first view of a Great Lake. Big waves and sand squalls are whipping up the wide beach. Tall stately houses overlook the water and I stand in the parking lot as it slowly starts to become dunes. Tiny flurries flutter past and even bundled in heavy jackets, the purple fleece and the Carhartt Pak & Johnny gave me, I’m chilled.  

  The hotel is a few blocks from the lake. Another place under construction and it’s loud with workers stomping around. My room has been renovated already so it’s new and clean. At a restaurant by a marina I have a very mediocre fried perch sandwich. My disappointment is somewhat tempered when the bartender offers me a complimentary blended Brandy Alexander, complete with whipped cream and nutmeg.  An odd yet satisfying gift. 

  After dark I walk the small downtown vacillating between a nightcap or not and I decide the freezing air will be a strong enough tonic to put me to sleep early.  

 Stow, OH — Saint Patrick’s Day — Marriott Courtyard

  Another restless night and then a drive through rain and snow.  

 And now I’m sitting at the window of my room making these notes and looking at the snow pile up on the Jeep. It turns to hard hail and clangs on the air conditioner and bounces off the parking lot pavement. 

  In the lobby I have a shrimp Caesar and a fine glass of red wine that the waitress overfills and then tops off at no extra cost. I realized a long time ago that this is a gift I have and I don’t question it. Something in my cheery demeanor and buoyant disposition that compels bartenders and waitresses to worry that I might suffer from dehydration. (Although it could also be that I look, and am, rather road worn) I’m always grateful for the attention. I take a piece of cheesecake back upstairs.

 Kampa texts and when I tell him where I am he insists I go to The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. So that’s the plan for tomorrow. I thought about hiking out to Cuyahoga Falls but the weather report is calling for more sleet and snow. 

  My Room here has both a bible and a koran. I add to the bedside drawer Emerson on Transcendentalism. Good ole Ralph Waldo. He is never inappropriate. In Nature he writes; “All science has one aim, namely, to find a theory of Nature.”  And asks in The Transcendentalist; “Where are the old idealists?” There is a lifetime of ponderable wisdom in his books, the lapsed preacher always a stick in the eye of more conservative and less adventurous thinkers. 

Elmira (Mira), NY

  The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame building was designed by I.M. Pei and sits on the shore of Lake Erie right next to Cleveland Browns Stadium and The Great Lakes Science Center. 

 I find the bottom floor most fascinating with displays of all the old blues and R & B artists who started it all. Memories of The Long Beach Blues Festival where I saw so many of these long gone masters. John Lee, Pine Top, Johnny Shines, Albert Collins, Big Daddy Kinsey, Willie Dixon, Lowell Fulson, Etta James, Pops Staples. 

  Lots of guitars and clothes. Aretha’s dress!!  Johnny Otis’ guitar and Pigpen’s banjo. Great stuff for an old DJ like me.

  Upstairs I watch a video about John Cippolina and then walk the wall of inductee plaques. I’m cheered to see my old buddy Ansley Dunbar there, inducted as a member of Journey. One night we were having a drink and some kid sitting next to us was going on about what a great musician he, the kid, was. When he finally came up for air he asked Ansley what he did. “I play a bit myself.” Said the humble drum wizard and smiled conspiratorially at me.       

     I revisit the downstairs for one more look at John Lennon’s Mellotron, John Prine’s suit, Fats Domino’s autograph, and Jerry Garcia’s guitar. 

   Today, a day late, the shuffle offers Van Morrison, Luke Kelly and Ronnie Drew. Luke sings Raglan Road, the Patrick Kavanagh poem set to music. Also, curiously, more Focus, Live From The Rainbow. But overall I feel like a true Irish Rover. Solitary, melancholy, craving something slightly intangible.

  Finally! A day of driving left until I get to Massachusetts and Truckin comes up on the iPod. The Europe 72 rendition. I give the volume a boost.  This is a song that should be on every travel playlist. And a reminder that we are not only driving down the road but also are passing through life. I sing along very appropriately, LATELY IT OCCURS TO ME WHAT A LONG STRANGE TRIP IT’S BEEN!  Even though there is some amount of resignation in that refrain you can’t help at the same time to be joyous at the simple reality that we somehow made it this far! 

  Another snowy day and I drove nonstop into upstate New York. If I really pushed I suppose I could’ve made it to Pittsfield. But, I mused, one more hotel, one more road dinner, one more day with my own thoughts, well, what could it hurt?

 I find a Radisson with warm cookies in the lobby. There is only a mediocre chain steak house nearby so I brave the rain and walk across the street. Blah.

  My bible project continues, in the drawer I leave Henry Thoreau’s Essays. Although never an ordained minister Henry sure did more than his share of preaching. In Life Without Principle he tells us;

“The ways by which you may get money almost without exception lead downward. To have done anything by which you earned money merely is to have been truly idle or worse. If the laborer gets no more than the wages which his employer pays him, he is cheated, he cheats himself.”   

  That resonates fine with this unemployed (and possibly unemployable) sufferer with a disposition afflicted  with wanderlust.  

 As I get closer to Albany and the Hudson River the vistas become familiar. I am in my old range. For the first time in almost a month I don’t need to look at the map. The clouds are low but dreariness is often only a state of mind. And only a fool lets the weather dictate mood. When I merge onto Route Twenty I couldn’t be more excited. 

 I turn onto Ridge Ave, where the sky appears less grey, and click the trip odometer that I set to zero as I left for Yosemite Flats. It reads 4566.1 miles. I will have enough time later to reflect of what home really means but now I’m hungry, slightly road fatigued and thrilled to be here in the Berkshires. Snow flurries whirl through the neighborhood yet the air has an unmistakable scent of Spring. I am truly where I’m supposed to be for now. 

Bibliography

The Essential Poems — Jim Harrison

Birds of Heaven — Peter Matthiessen

Mountain Home - The Wilderness Poetry of Ancient China — Translated by David Hinton 

The Journey Home — Edward Abbey

Discography

Europe 72 — The Grateful Dead

Travels — Pat Metheny Group 

Live at the Rainbow — Focus

Heavy Horses — Jethro Tull

Test For Echo — Rush 

Bob Dylan — At Budokan

Wipe The Windows, Check The Oil, Dollar Gas — Allman Brothers Band