Field Program

Wind yesterday. A mad dash out of the forest. Tales of no small danger that we would rather not tell our mothers. Distant rumble and mortal crash of timber. Reminders that the world might not care for our small bodies after all, or maybe that’s how it reminds us it does - we can’t decide. Split decision and hung jury. Beyond the fright of fallen trees, we found much peace in the endless meadows of long-forgotten homesteads and in boiling heat; heat of the conflagration of the rearing catastrophe.

We troubled over our roles as stewards. How does one find that interminable and delicate, intermediate position between ripping open earth and tree on a trail which no souls save ours walked, and ensuring safe travels for whoever might choose a few moments of solitude for themselves? Whatever way one could toe that line, it is abundantly clear that the trail, the 421 East Moose Trail in the Selway, has no intentions of staying clear. Nor does the 442, which we only maybe found.

There were radio whispers of an active fire - an unattended campfire - in the valley of Moose Creek. We never saw the smoke. The forest has a way of lulling you into complacency and in your most secure moment it shifts orientation. Shadows shift poles, east becomes west, and you find yourself in a place you’ve never been before but which you could've sworn you walked but a day ago. Small trifles with a being you can’t quite grasp but that enfolds you so wholly. Our compass lesson said something about our place and time here, but a few prescribed hours can only offer us so much, and I think that may be the point. God willing, we all have many years left to settle our feet and sink our hands into an Earth we could Call home.