I Am a Pilgrim

Something Juancho wrote on his Big Ring Circus blog a day or two ago got me thinking about pilgrims and how we're all on a kind of pilgrimage through this life. In fact, while it can mean a journey to a shrine or to a sacred place, it also means, according to Webster, "the course of life on earth." So each one of us is a pilgrim, whether we feel a sense of purpose and direction or we just take life as it comes.

See, whenever I read something Juancho has written, it stays with me and works like yeast to expand my mind -- one of the marks of a great writer, which he is. The next thing I knew, I was humming an old, familiar country hymn that sent me scurrying to Youtube to listen to the whole thing. Surprisingly, the best version I found is this one by The Byrds, what Wiki calls "one of the most influential bands of the 1960s." Yep, it's right here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omLysJCkP8E&list=RD18omLysJCkP8E  There were the same haunting lyrics I remembered: 
                     I am a pilgrim and a stranger 
                     Travelling through this wearisome land 

                     I've got a home in that yonder city, good Lord 
                     And it's not not made by hand.

Ajax Rock was both a pilgrimage and a destination. For a time, we celebrated births, buried our dead, remembered our pasts, shared our stories and triumphs, and walked with each other on the journey. I miss that and don't know where else to find it. In the past few days, I've read the entirety of ajaxrock.blogspot.com. I've laughed and cried, felt wistful and loved, relived milestones in our lives, and found nobody home. Then I made a decision to do what Juancho and some of you advised when I asked, "To rock or not to rock?" I'm going to carry on, so whether anyone else joins me or I continue the pilgrimage alone to my final destination, I'm planning to do it on Ajax Rock. I may ramble, tell stories, play games or music, scrub the old rock down, be mundane or rise to some semblance of eloquence if visited by my muse, but I can't think of a better place to do it. After all, it's the place Loie and I sat on as little girls, planning our next adventure or resting up from one we'd just had. It's the place we began our pilgrimage, and y'all can come or stay. But I bet our paths will cross somewhere along the way.

So here I am, back to the rock, still trying to fathom the mysteries of life, the twists and turns in our separate journeys that will end in the same place. We have all grown older, some of us wiser, though I can't claim that for myself. No, I've been on a long and circular search for a home for Zach and me after we both lost our houses two years ago. We've been to the mountain top, living in the wilds of Tucker County, moved back to a house in the 'hood in the next county over, and now we're back where we started from -- back in Shepherdstown again.

The reason I can't claim to have grown any wiser is that I'm pretty sure there was one big lesson I was supposed to learn from all that moving, all of that upheaval fraught with worry and disappointment, all of that fear and sense of futility that just left me thirsty and hungry for something I couldn't name. It plumb wore me out.

But now that we're in safe harbor again, I've begun to see that the lesson was there all along, right in front of me. I just couldn't see a big enough picture, because it's hard to get a good view when you're face down on the pavement. When I packed for that leg of my pilgrimage, throwing out most of my possessions and stripping down to the necessities, I forgot to bring something really important -- the thing I seem to have left behind in the rubble and ashes of our old lives. I forgot to bring faith, the very thing that is for me as necessary as the air I breathe and the water I drink. What is it in my DNA that makes me as stubborn and hard-headed as the dickens -- that makes me think I'm smart enough to head off on the journey without my compass or my GPS? When will I learn to walk by faith and not by sight?

The answer to that might come to me as I sit here on the rock again, the best place I've found to ponder and rest for the next leg of the journey. I am a pilgrim and a stranger -- even to myself. C'mon over if you need a place to rest and regroup. There's room for more.   

How green is my valley

It wasn't so long ago, on a hot spring day up here on the mountaintop, that the old-timers were worried about a water shortage and problems for the farmers because the past winter's snowfall was so far below average. April passed without much rainfall, but the rains came.
Although spring unfolds slowly up here, the valley is now green and there is talk of flooding in the towns at lower elevations. Now, when I look outside where snow recently covered the ski slopes, I see green, even on that big, old tree outside my kitchen window.

The rains are welcome, keeping the air chilly and the nights good for sleeping. The wildlife refuge looks different, too, reminding me once again that water is life-giving. Nature is back in balance again.

Appalachian spring

After some wild thunderstorms and heavy rain last night, I woke up to a sparkling, cool, and sunny day, with the sounds of birds mating and nesting outside my window. Church didn't seem nearly so appealing as a walk in the "Sods" again, this time to check out the shy approach of spring on the mountaintop. Although Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring really had nothing to do with Appalachia, it was taken from a Hart Crane poem about springtime in the Adirondacks. His ballet score won the Pulitzer Prize for Music not long before I was born, in 1945, and I've always loved the music, much of it taken from Shaker melodies, the most recognizable of which is Simple Gifts. That seemed exactly the right soundtrack for my trek into the wilderness this morning, just six days after snow covered the mountains and the valley. No iPod for me, because I like to listen to the stillness, broken occasionally by a sound of something moving in the forest or overhead.

Among my finds this morning were several large vernal pools containing hundreds and hundreds of tiny tadpoles. See them in there, all scrambling to survive as the "fittest" and grow into frogs before the pools dry up? It was fascinating to watch -- some aggressive and propelling themselves through the water like Olympic swimmers and others taking the "slow traffic" lane as they languished in the cold water. Suddenly I could hear Daddy pronounce the word "pollywog" and felt his presence there in that hushed place. That happens to me a lot, sensing that Momma or Daddy is there with me in my alone times. What a comfort it is!

I also found lots of mosses in the boggy places, including the reindeer moss, which is really a lichen and is that same grayish green in color. It's one of those plants not found south of northern Canada, with the exception of in the Dolly Sods. It was growing in large clumps that showed new growth.
I looked carefully under leaves for any of the many species of salamanders and newts that are so numerous here that zoologists who study them hold most of their scholarly conferences here and elsewhere in the Appalachians, but I didn't find any.

Just as I turned to make my way back, I heard human voices that seemed out of place in my sanctuary and soon passed two hikers from Virginia who seemed to be oblivious to their surroundings. My morning worship service was over, and I turned to take a photograph of the road as yet untaken before I descended the mountain, still humming 'Tis a gift to be simple, 'tis a gift to be free.... Whether Copland intended it or not, his music is a perfect score for the slow unfolding of spring in the Appalachians.

Peck's Place

This is one of the views from the window of the little house I'm hoping to buy. See that little building down below? It used to be a drive-through bank, part of the beautiful stone bank across the street, now home to the post office, a little shop, and apartments upstairs.

Now Loie and Don got Daddy's business sense, leaving me with very little ability and even less interest in having a little business. There's Eye Spy, of course, but it's not brick-and-mortar, and it doesn't make much money. But I remember when Daddy, even while in the dementia unit of First Community Village, got restless and wondered what kind of business he could get going so he'd have something to do -- and that kind of can-do spirit must be a recessive gene that has been lying dormant. Because when I look at that little building standing empty -- right on the the main street of Davis -- what I see is a little business, one that offers office-away-from-home services to all of the vacationers who come to the mountains without their scanners and fax machines and copiers and shipping and mailing supplies. There's not even a reliable FedEx drop box or UPS shipping site here or in the valley.

And the name for that little business could only be "Peck's Place." Peck's place for ... copies. Peck's place for ... small print jobs. Peck's Place for ... faxing, for mailing, for computer use and wi-fi. Even Peck's place for mail delivery -- for "General Delivery" for people who don't need a six-month post office box but who need a delivery address while they're here. And of course we'd have to have Peck's place for editing and proofreading, right?


So, once I get my life settled down a bit and, hopefully, live right across the street, I'm going to sleuth around the resorts, property management offices, and local businesses to do my homework before writing a business plan. 


This little place speaks to me. Drive-through service. Main street location. There's even a vault and a night depository. It's a natural. And it even has a tiny bathroom. The wheels are turning in this head. Daddy would be proud, I think.

Getting my feet wet as a novice naturalist

So after 22 hours of instruction at the Canaan Valley Wildlife Refuge, I realize that becoming a Master Naturalist is an awesome responsibility. Not only does it involve a lot of study, both the book kind and the field kind, but I need to find the right niche for volunteering. There are enough opportunities to keep me busy day in and day out, but I don't think that trail-blazing is my speed, and I balk at the idea of working with kids, though why that is, I don't really know.
I could catalogue specimens or write for the newsletter or do presentations or plant trees, even make up my own volunteer activity, as long as it's approved and is something that allows me to give back the knowledge I gain to others in West Virginia. Already I've signed up for the refuge "block party" in June and to help with a group of sixth-graders from another county who are visiting Blackwater Falls State Park in May, as well as to make some contributions to the refuge newsletter.

The week-end was tiring and inspiring, both at once. But getting out in the field this morning, donning the muck boots and venturing into the wetlands under the experienced hand of a young, female biologist who is a walking encyclopedia about everything wetlands, was the highlight of the week-end. Just being in the presence of several species of plants that are making their last stand right here in the Canaan Valley was an almost sacred experience. Seeing evidence of the earth healing itself is exhilarating, but its got its work cut out for it after centuries of disturbances from both man and insects. And the deer damage is evident everywhere.

Fortunately for all of us, there are incredibly talented people working every day to save our planet. Some are being paid, and some are volunteers, but their dedication is inspiring. I just hope that I make the grade. When I am in doubt, I look at photographs like the one below -- done by a professional photographer, to be sure -- called "Glory." That's the sun setting in this beautiful valley. I just hope that the sun hasn't set on the delicate ecosystems and amazing biodiversity that's still hanging on here. I just want to do a small part in keeping it around a while longer. As I said, it's an awesome responsibility.

Gratitude

It may seem a bit unusual to use a quotation from the Buddha to illustrate the quality of gratitude during Christians' Holy Week. But all of the world's great religions -- and even those who practice no religion -- wouldn't survive without giving gratitude a central place. Without it, we can't begin to practice humility, and without humility, we can't begin to recognize the work and daily presence of God. Practicing gratitude daily, even hourly, will open our hearts and minds and often heal our many heartaches.


At the beginning of Lent, while at my Methodist Church, we were invited to pick up an ordinary stone from a pile of them in front of the sanctuary. While we couldn't see what had been written on the bottom of each one, we were also invited to use comtemplative prayer, centered on the word written on whatever stone we chose. Mine said, "forgiveness," and I thought, "Wow. God really knows what I need." Holding a grudge is a lot like carrying a large stone or an albatross around our necks. So I've carried that small forgiveness stone through my court hearing and all of the other flotsam and jetsam I've been wading through. 

Now I'm mentally carrying another smooth stone called "blessings," and it is a constant reminder to practice gratitude -- for getting Zach into safe harbor, for not being homeless, for my family, for my dear friends, for my church and church family, for the strangers who have befriended me and lightened my load, and mostly for God's grace and the way She has been at work in my life. 

This week began with a walk in Cathedral Park on Sunday morning, where I stood in a "cloister" of hemlocks and observed the beauty of the earth; then on Monday attended a reverent and inspiring funeral service for Mary Ellen's father at the Catholic Church in Athens, where memories are in every brick in that town and around every corner; spent some time with Rita and Don who always take me in so lovingly; last night attended a Baptist Church dinner at the invitation of my new neighbor downstairs and was surprised to find a re-creation of a Jewish Seder for Passover; and now am leaving for Shepherdstown where I will go to Maundy Thursday services at my beloved church there tonight; then attend an interdenominational Good Friday service tomorrow; hopefully see Beth the next day; and rejoice on Easter morning with both a sunrise and mid-morning service at New Street Methodist, among my dear friends there.


Gratitude comes easily for me this week. And those of you who read this are a big part of what I have to be grateful for. Happy Easter -- a time for new life and for resurrection. May your hearts be glad and rejoice with mine.

Blackwater Falls and other delights

After a heavy rain last night, the Blackwater River was gushing over the falls, drowning out human voices and pretty much everything else around. I was there in March about 10 years ago, when Loie and Momma and Daddy and Zach and I got a cabin and stayed there for a few days, celebrating (as I recall) Zach's release from his long detention and hospitalization at G.W. University Hospital. I never dreamed then that this winding path called life would bring me back this way, close enough to Blackwater Falls State Park to drive about 10 miles for a spring hike on a mostly cloudy last day of March.
The peculiar thing about the Blackwater River, something I've just learned, is that it doesn't end down here in the wetlands of the valley, as it appears to; but it actually begins here, rising on Canaan Mountain at an elevation of over 3,500 feet, going NNE and then turning WSW before it drops 62' over the falls in dramatic fashion and enters an 8-mile long canyon where it creates Class IV-V rapids and whitewater. Eventually, it finds its way to the Mississippi by way of the Ohio River. 

What makes it appear black is tannin in the water, leached from eastern hemlock, red spruce, rhododendron, and mountain laurel, and it's more tea-colored than black, actually.

West Virginia has an amazing array of state parks, and Blackwater is one of its crown jewels. But I discovered a new one last Saturday when driving to Aurora for the fine dinner and music Zach and I enjoyed; and tomorrow morning, on my way to Ohio, I plan to stop and take a short hike in Cathedral State Park, so-named for it's towering stand of hemlock trees.

In fact, it is "an ancient hemlock forest of majestic proportions and one of the last living commemorations of the vast virgin hemlock forest that once flourished in the Appalachian Highlands." Since I had such an excellent church service in the great outdoors last Sunday, I figure that a walk in Cathedral State Park is an appropriate thing to do on Palm Sunday morning. It may not be the giant redwoods, but from looking at this photo, I'd say it's going to be pretty spectacular! The trees are as high as 90' and over 20' in circumference, and they form "cloisters" in the park. Guess I'll pack my Bible and my walking sticks! I'm learning why this beautiful state is often called West "By God" Virginia.

Church in the wildwood

Yesterday morning, finding that the church I'd planned to visit was heavy on the concepts of "rapture" and the "Antichrist," as well as the belief that the Holy Spirit is an actual person, I decided to hold my own church service out of gratitude for ending up in a place that only God could have formed and reformed into a kind of sacred space. I headed out to hike into "the Sods" (the Dolly Sods on top of the mountain I can see from my window). It's that place often described as "a little piece of (northern) Canada, gone astray," a boreal forest with reindeer moss and other sub-Arctic flora.

Now, I'm in really lousy shape from too much sitting, eating, driving, eating -- you know what I'm talking about, most of you, so it was a real challenge to get up the steep forest road that is flanked by refuge land to the top of the mountain where the refuge ends and the Dolly Sods begin. These photos are proof that I did it -- quite a feat for an out-of-shape, elderly woman like me.
 And it was worth it to get to the top where the
sun was shining to beat the band, the birds twittering, and the path narrowing to a sort of secret passage into the Sods. I stopped to rest on a large rock before my descent, which took me under the clouds where a few raindrops plopped down, but I was rewarded by the sight of a large bobcat, walking languidly across the old forest road.


Knowing that there are black bears atop the mountains and that it might be near birthing time for cubs, I got out my keys and jangled them loudly to let any Mama Bear know that a visitor was in the area.


It was just what this lumpy body needed -- an hour and 15 minute walk in the woods. And it's as though that walk dislodged all kinds of stuff in my head that had been stuck up there for weeks. Mostly the debris of worry and anxiety, it was dumped out of the cobwebby gray matter. It didn't yield any real pearls of wisdom except for this one: Sometimes the "rapture" you need is found in a strenuous hike to the top of a mountain God made billions of years ago. And a walk in the woods is a simple thing that can rejuvenate the body and the mind.


I was glad to find my Tweetymobile waiting part-way down that steep road and thankful for the bottle of water inside.

Tree as metaphor

This old, gnarled tree is right outside my kitchen window, just a few yards from the side of the building. Its branches turn this way and that, many of them broken or missing from one side, and there are hollows inside the trunk and light brown, rough bark that looks weather-beaten and somehow worn out. It's beautiful to me, because even though it appears to be dead, it isn't. It's getting tiny bits of new growth here and there, and it is an incubator for owlets and a pit stop for countless birds.


Somehow, when I look out the window at this unsightly, old tree, it's like looking at myself in a mirror and seeing an exterior that is aging and graying and gaining new unpleasantries almost daily -- yet inside, there is still some sap of new ideas, new dreams, and that all-important sense of hope and purpose rising. That tree seems to be a reflection of me.


Not only do I watch for birds to gather in the branches and enjoy the birdsong that forms a chorus, but I know that an owl (and maybe its babies) are sheltered inside. It's a tree that should grow a tongue to tell its history -- all of the stories it has collected over the long years it has stood sentry here.


The very fact that I cannot tell you what kind of tree it is was a big contributor to my desire to enroll in the master naturalist class that starts next month. I feel an urgent need to start to put names and characteristics to all of the wondrous bits of nature I see all around me, for if I can't identify what it is and where it fits into the jigsaw puzzle of nature all around me, then I can't write about it -- can't make you see it except by taking a photograph of it. And a person can't write about what she doesn't know.


So, in many ways, I owe this tree already -- for opening my eyes and ears, for nudging my curiosity, for reawakening my latent love for the natural world.


And if it should fall, that tree, and there is nobody to hear it, I know that it will still make a noise. It has already spoken to me.

Remembering where the journey started: The nation's 500th National Wildlife Refuge

This morning I thought it would be good to remember how I wound up here in the Canaan Valley in the first place. It was October of last year, and I stopped to walk this boardwalk around a small part of the national wildlife refuge, where the mighty Blackwater River that gushes at Blackwater Falls and cuts a deep gorge through the mountains sort of fans out and creates the largest wetland east of the Mississippi. There are countless trails to explore by foot, X-country skis, bicycle, horse or what have you; but I started here. Somehow it was reminiscent of the tidal flats on parts of the Cape.
This morning I could see raptors soaring, heard a sound that may have been spring peepers, and felt the first stirrings of spring down in the valley.

I looked up at the mountains, then down into the little streams and pools of water where new life is teeming and pondered my new life here, in this wondrous place where nature still dominates, where we are under no illusion that man is in charge. And I felt that old, familiar urge to learn more about every bit of flora and fauna here so that I can figure out my place in the master jigsaw puzzle of life.


On my way out, I looked over at White Grass, now devoid of any snow, waiting for next winter and for the earth to turn once more. Then I stopped to look at the notices on the bulletin board and saw that the refuge is offering a "master naturalist" program, beginning mid-April. Seems like the perfect place to start, doesn't it? For how can I write about nature if I don't know how what I see is connected, what it is, and how each piece fits to make a whole? It felt as though the refuge was taking me in like a tired stranger and inviting me to sit and stay a while.