“My friend told me it would look like a driveway but if I turned in on the hairpin by the mailbox & drove over the wooden bridge, I’d see a metal gate, and the acres owned by the state, managed by a couple brothers named “Orvis”. Well, I only found that out later, when it was getting dark, and we’d been walking, a bit lost, trying to round the lesser used side of the pond. He seemed to come out of nowhere, trudging up the mossy track, in thick conifer forest. “Do you know where this goes?” we said, pointing vaguely towards a doubtful goat path. He looked us over, not unkindly. His bearing held its own with the woods, & the coming darkness. “Both ways will get you there, but that one” he said, gesturing with his walking stick towards the goat path, “might not”. We chatted and swapped our names, with his shimmering up like Vermont trout out of the growing gloom. “Orvis”, he said, “not the famous ones”. Funny, what fame seems to be made of these days. Foundation grants, fly fishing gear, patrician good looks & a whiff of the ivy leagues. Now, clearly foundering as we were in an unfamiliar woods, his calm presence reassured: his solid temper, his obvious appreciation of anyone younger who appreciated his being older & wiser, the unspoken pact between us, that he’d be sure we were out of the woods before heading home himself. We set off again, with hearts returning to ease, buoyed and encouraged, on the spongy, hollow loam, the thick, pale green lichen and tangled roots underfoot. A heady mix of fall sending dark moist water smell up from the burbling glens beneath the pond, then apple fragrance, as we wound our way thru the old orchard. Relieved of fear, enough to peacefully wander & linger & reach for wild fruit, chomping and spitting, keeping the sweet, discarding the unreconciled sour. Stealing a few last glimpses upwards, to catch the alpine glow on an undistinguished, west facing slope, a forgotten piece of real estate, or so it seemed. Then, a chill, and the long slog down Stave Brook, a clumsy walk of tired legs waiting to receive the truck’s comfortable bench seat, and perhaps a quick blast of manufactured heat. Not quiet summer anymore, this. Not admittedly fall, but fast becoming, dishonestly a denial of the facts. Which ever way I leaned, however, in less than 24 hours, I’d be scrambling up the “Grand Canyon” between so-called Moose Mountain and some stately spruces teetering on a cliff, sweating ever so lightly, over the tenacity of my guide’s professed familiarity with the terrain & a known probability of meeting bears. I didn’t need to be nervous. Which is often the case, isn’t it? Maybe it was just a week of not knowing where my own feet were heading. Of wanting to be part of some newer, grander expedition. Of questioning my stamina & self confidence, and whether my cheerfulness was anchored still, to the good will I projected. Stabbing my pole into a cluster of ferns hiding ankle twisting crevices and holes, I nearly missed Matthew standing transfixed, before a huge boulder, impossibly balanced against another, equally monolithic one. His body language said “I’m at one with nature” while mine, as I slipped ungracefully onto my posterior and a few sharp rocks, said “I’m not”. That’s kind of how I roll, right now. Those of you who are acting better than me, and watching me like I’m an animal, well, you’re right. I am one. I feel it in my bones, when I come home late, to a cold hut, and have to find my matches, in the dark. I feel it, when I look for something clean to wear, and everything is musty and smells. My washer is broken, my kitchen dismantled, my outhouse may be the best thing I have going. Driving into town with a snarl, I still attempt to comb my hair into some kind of civilized look, as I saunter from truck door to post office entrance. I don’t want to look freakish. In fact, I’d rather not be noticed. Or then again, noticed only by those who’ve made it to my dream lodge, on route to the next, more better, expedition out of dodge.”
