John Muir, naturalist and founder of the Sierra Club, once wrote:
“Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves.”
I went into the wood this day feeling down and packing a lot of cares. I’m afraid I did not have access to the tall windswept mountains of Yosemite like Muir did. Instead I came to the rolling hills and thick trees of a wood near my home.
I’ve walked here many times through the years – spring, summer, fall, and winter. Maybe we know each other too well. No winds blew and no storms energized the atmosphere – every stone, branch, and trickle of water seemed to match my mood exactly.
Among the trees the silence was so thick that I could feel it like a weight. Only the slightest breeze stirred and that was in the tree tops; not down with me. The light whispering sound of the gently shifting leaves only punctuated the silence around me by providing a sort of “white noise” background that muffled everything under it.
No birds sang – hardly any were about. The few that I actually saw just hopped here and there through the tree branches without uttering a word. Even the ever present and always effervescent chipmunks and squirrels were nowhere to be seen or heard. I saw no deer – nothing.
The water in the streams has mostly run away from the long dry summer. What remains slips furtively through the stones in hopes it won’t be noticed. Where forced into the open by some straight drop, it pours gently onto the stones below and buries itself again as soon as possible.
I wandered slowly all day in somber union with the wood pressing close around me.
Only once was the mood broken – I sat staring at a small stream of water pouring over the edge of a stone shelf. Although my body was still, my mind continued walking in dark daydreams. A single crow flew past unseen (since my eyes were turned inward at the time). Just as it came over my head, it let out a deep throated cry. Amid the silence it sounded as if it were screaming right in my ear. I nearly jumped out of my skin. Then it flew on by as quickly as it had come.
The sound of its call rippled through the wood like rings around a stone tossed into a pond, but it was doomed. It fell quickly away. There was no answer to be had here today. The woods and I went back to our brooding.
Time passed. Soon, or maybe not so soon, I don’t know which, it was time to leave. Any other day I would be loath to leave the woods and return to the hustle and bustle of modern life, but today it was almost a relief. The woods were running deep today and getting deeper. I was in over my head.
MDW
The word for today’s hike is “Steamy”. The only exceptions in the hot dry summer here in western NY are the days that I go hiking. I check the national weather service reports all week leading up to my day off. Invariably the little icons show a string of clear blue rectangles with big yellow suns beaming down from the corner, but as the day approaches, clouds with little tiny lightning bolts build into the two boxes representing the night before and the day of my little excursions.
Looking across the valley a mist of water vapor obscures the view. This isn’t the good kind of mist that you might see on a chilly autumn morning - a mist that gently wafts through the valleys and over lakes making them seem mysterious and other worldly. This one is just a wet blanket that drapes a smothering pall over everything.
In the afternoon the sun, aided by a rising breeze, finally did clear things out. The sky turned from smeary grey to clear blue and the shadows came out of hiding. The leaves, brought to life by the sun and the wind, threw off their stupor with a shake and a hiss. A pair of hawks wheeled overhead calling to each other with piercing cries. The world was just having a bit of a lie in after a stormy night and didn’t get up until late.
I can never stay on the edge of a forest. The trees stand here and there alone or in small groups leaving tantalizing spaces that draw my eye in and around them straining to see what might be just beyond. There are dark shaded areas in the thickets – maybe there is a ravine down there. There are bright spots where the sunlight streams down – maybe there is an open meadow through there with deer grazing. Sometimes the trees just seem to go on forever – shelves full of books to read as you walk.
One time I was sitting on a rock next to a laughing waterfall when I was startled by something rushing down the ravine at me. I saw it first out the corner of my eye and just as I looked up a hawk flew right past my face. Then it was gone. The whole thing took just seconds, but the image of that great bird streaking past is frozen in my mind.
I’ve come across beaver working on their dams and bear running through the trees -coyotes, fox, and giant pileated woodpeckers. All from trying to see what’s just through those trees over there.
