I'll never cease to be amazed where following this little dog takes me. I'm told Publishers Marketplace called our book deal for 'Following Atticus' with William Morrow their 'Deal of the Day'.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Saturday, September 26, 2009
A Good Start to the Day
My father woke me up this morning. It was 4:00 a.m. and the world was still. He was talking to me, wanting me to get out of bed.
Typically, if I’m ever awake that early, Atticus cocks an eyebrow in my direction, realizes the sun isn’t up yet and he’s not about to get up either. He then rolls over and goes back to sleep. But not this morning. This morning he sat next to my head and looked down at me, willing me to get moving.
The ghost of my father and my dog both couldn’t have been wrong so I was up and getting dressed. I stepped outside and stars prickled the night sky, a few planets were even brighter as we walked down the road. I put on my headlamp and we walked and walked until my body warmed under my heavier clothes. We made our way up the rutted road to the base of Iron Mountain where the trail crosses a field and enters the brush.
It was still dark but the hint of predawn was making its way along the eastern horizon. But in the woods it was dark and deep and the beam from my headlamp cast shadows. When we moved, they moved; swaying at first in front of us and then falling behind until we came to the next set of shadows. We moved further into the woods, up the eroded trail and into rich scent of autumn. Occasionally I grabbed a tree branch or an exposed root to pull myself up to where Atticus was waiting patiently for me.
As is nearly always the case, the confluence of my body working, my mind clearing out everything, and the simple desire to put one foot in front of the other and climb, I hit that wonderful Zen-like rhythm and there was my father again. He was moving with us, silently, save for the same grunts I had, the same pursed breathing.
When my father was still alive and I dedicated that first summer of doing the 4,000-footers to him, he often appeared in my dreams. He never looked old or broken in body or spirit like he was in the end. Instead he was my age and we walked through the forest together sharing a like mind, heart and passion. It was the best he had to offer and I had a glimpse of what his life must have been like before all went wrong. But while he appeared in my dreams back then, he rarely was as close to me as he was this morning.
Eventually we reached our destination – a ledge with a view towards Mount Washington. Atticus sat down and looked at the silhouette of the great peak in the distance. When I sat with him I had to zip up my jacket to keep from getting chilled. And then we just sat there and waited for the sun to rise.
The darkness filtered away. Slowly the season revealed herself in the rolling quilt of early autumn colors: soft greens and yellows, an occasional red, some orange here and there. When the trees get like this, even before the peak of foliage, they pulse, and the rolling landscape before us looked like it was rising and falling as if the mountains themselves were alive and breathing.
The rock were on was cold and Atticus snugged his body next to mine. When that didn’t work he nudged me with his paw and I picked him up and sat him on my lap. He leaned back into me and we watched the birth of a new day.
The sky turned blue, the clouds were white and bobbing along, and shadows deepened the hollows of the forest spreading out below and away from us. We watched together as this living painting came to life: my dog on my lap, my father in my heart and seemingly right next to me. I turned as if Jack Ryan was actually there and I said, “Well, we did it, Dad.”
In my mind he smiled. It was warm and content and the way a man would smile in heaven even though he didn’t smile much in life.
One of my favorite memories of my father was when we were kids and he took us to the White Mountains. We’d set up camp next to a river or pull over so my brothers and I could swim or rock hop. Dad would sit at a picnic table above us and let words spill from his pen across a pad of paper. He was happy, peaceful and content. So were we. We’d do this for hours and never get restless.
The only place my father’s writing appeared was in the letters to the editor in the local daily paper or in letters to friends and family. But when he wrote in the mountains I could tell he was writing something else. None of us ever knew what my father wrote in his pad of paper on those days. He never shared it with us. But it was clear the mountains moved him to write and allowed him to touch things he hadn’t glimpsed since he was young and full of promise.
A father leaves many things to a son. Some are good, some aren’t. The best things my father left me were his love of the written word and his reverence for the mountains. As the years passed we were not always close but we always shared these things.
This morning, while the White Mountains came to life I held my father in my heart, I told him what happened this week and tears formed in his eyes. His dream had become my dream. You see, I thought of him a lot this week when William Morrow, a publishing imprint of Harper Collins, outbid three other publishers for ‘Following Atticus’.
A father found peace, magic and inspiration in these grand and wondrous mountains. He passed it onto his son. Now the father who wondered where his dreams went as he got old and eventually died will have those dreams celebrated in a book that will see to it that he and those dreams shall live forever.
And so our morning started with Atticus sitting on my lap on the side of Iron Mountain while my father sat next to us. In my head I heard that last verse from Harry Chapin’s song, “Cats in the Cradle”...
I've long since retired and my son's moved away.
I called him up just the other day.
I said, "I'd like to see you if you don't mind."
He said, "I'd love to, dad, if I could find the time.
You see, my new job's a hassle,
and the kid's got the flu,
But it's sure nice talking to you, dad.
It's been sure nice talking to you."
And as I hung up the phone, it occurred to me,
He'd grown up just like me.
My boy was just like me.
Typically, if I’m ever awake that early, Atticus cocks an eyebrow in my direction, realizes the sun isn’t up yet and he’s not about to get up either. He then rolls over and goes back to sleep. But not this morning. This morning he sat next to my head and looked down at me, willing me to get moving.
The ghost of my father and my dog both couldn’t have been wrong so I was up and getting dressed. I stepped outside and stars prickled the night sky, a few planets were even brighter as we walked down the road. I put on my headlamp and we walked and walked until my body warmed under my heavier clothes. We made our way up the rutted road to the base of Iron Mountain where the trail crosses a field and enters the brush.
It was still dark but the hint of predawn was making its way along the eastern horizon. But in the woods it was dark and deep and the beam from my headlamp cast shadows. When we moved, they moved; swaying at first in front of us and then falling behind until we came to the next set of shadows. We moved further into the woods, up the eroded trail and into rich scent of autumn. Occasionally I grabbed a tree branch or an exposed root to pull myself up to where Atticus was waiting patiently for me.
As is nearly always the case, the confluence of my body working, my mind clearing out everything, and the simple desire to put one foot in front of the other and climb, I hit that wonderful Zen-like rhythm and there was my father again. He was moving with us, silently, save for the same grunts I had, the same pursed breathing.
When my father was still alive and I dedicated that first summer of doing the 4,000-footers to him, he often appeared in my dreams. He never looked old or broken in body or spirit like he was in the end. Instead he was my age and we walked through the forest together sharing a like mind, heart and passion. It was the best he had to offer and I had a glimpse of what his life must have been like before all went wrong. But while he appeared in my dreams back then, he rarely was as close to me as he was this morning.
Eventually we reached our destination – a ledge with a view towards Mount Washington. Atticus sat down and looked at the silhouette of the great peak in the distance. When I sat with him I had to zip up my jacket to keep from getting chilled. And then we just sat there and waited for the sun to rise.
The darkness filtered away. Slowly the season revealed herself in the rolling quilt of early autumn colors: soft greens and yellows, an occasional red, some orange here and there. When the trees get like this, even before the peak of foliage, they pulse, and the rolling landscape before us looked like it was rising and falling as if the mountains themselves were alive and breathing.
The rock were on was cold and Atticus snugged his body next to mine. When that didn’t work he nudged me with his paw and I picked him up and sat him on my lap. He leaned back into me and we watched the birth of a new day.
The sky turned blue, the clouds were white and bobbing along, and shadows deepened the hollows of the forest spreading out below and away from us. We watched together as this living painting came to life: my dog on my lap, my father in my heart and seemingly right next to me. I turned as if Jack Ryan was actually there and I said, “Well, we did it, Dad.”
In my mind he smiled. It was warm and content and the way a man would smile in heaven even though he didn’t smile much in life.
One of my favorite memories of my father was when we were kids and he took us to the White Mountains. We’d set up camp next to a river or pull over so my brothers and I could swim or rock hop. Dad would sit at a picnic table above us and let words spill from his pen across a pad of paper. He was happy, peaceful and content. So were we. We’d do this for hours and never get restless.
The only place my father’s writing appeared was in the letters to the editor in the local daily paper or in letters to friends and family. But when he wrote in the mountains I could tell he was writing something else. None of us ever knew what my father wrote in his pad of paper on those days. He never shared it with us. But it was clear the mountains moved him to write and allowed him to touch things he hadn’t glimpsed since he was young and full of promise.
A father leaves many things to a son. Some are good, some aren’t. The best things my father left me were his love of the written word and his reverence for the mountains. As the years passed we were not always close but we always shared these things.
This morning, while the White Mountains came to life I held my father in my heart, I told him what happened this week and tears formed in his eyes. His dream had become my dream. You see, I thought of him a lot this week when William Morrow, a publishing imprint of Harper Collins, outbid three other publishers for ‘Following Atticus’.
A father found peace, magic and inspiration in these grand and wondrous mountains. He passed it onto his son. Now the father who wondered where his dreams went as he got old and eventually died will have those dreams celebrated in a book that will see to it that he and those dreams shall live forever.
And so our morning started with Atticus sitting on my lap on the side of Iron Mountain while my father sat next to us. In my head I heard that last verse from Harry Chapin’s song, “Cats in the Cradle”...
I've long since retired and my son's moved away.
I called him up just the other day.
I said, "I'd like to see you if you don't mind."
He said, "I'd love to, dad, if I could find the time.
You see, my new job's a hassle,
and the kid's got the flu,
But it's sure nice talking to you, dad.
It's been sure nice talking to you."
And as I hung up the phone, it occurred to me,
He'd grown up just like me.
My boy was just like me.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Beating the Crowds: Our Latest Tom & Atticus Column for the Northcountry News
Bryan and Sue Flagg, the ma and pa of this wonderful ‘mom and pop’ newspaper, have been busy lately. In a short period of time they climbed Mount Washington, Mount Monroe, North Hancock, South Hancock and took in sunset and moonrise on the Sugarloaves over in Twin Mountain. When I asked Bryan if he was hiking this weekend he responded: “No – we decided to sit this one out. Too many people in the mountains for me!”Amen, Bryan.
My friends sometimes think me a misanthrope, but the truth is while I love mankind, I can do without people – especially in the mountains. (Besides, I put in my time. I lived in the heart of Newburyport for a dozen years, ran a paper and even took out papers to run for mayor. Is it any wonder I not only headed to the hills, but actually ran to them?)
The Abenaki Indians considered the Whites a sacred place. Imagine if they were here on a busy weekend and saw the conga line moving along any of the trails up Mount Washington or along the Lafayette-Lincoln loop.
Don't get me wrong. I believe the popularity of the White Mountains is a good thing. It’s one of the reasons people had the foresight to save them after the lumber barons had raped and pillaged them to their bank accounts content. Back then, even if people hadn’t been to the mountains, they felt like they’d been because of writers like Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Thomas Starr King; poets Lucy Larcom and John Greenleaf Whittier; and the amazing White Mountain artists, who other than Benjamin Champney and Thomas Cole are simply too numerous to name, brought the White Mountains to the civilization. It was a shining moment in history when preservation was spurred by environmentalists and fueled so by the romantic vision of the writer, poet and artist.
But the knife cuts both ways. These mountains are stunning, soul-awakening and spirit lifting. Once you discover them, they don’t let you go. It’s one of the reasons Atticus and I found our way up here. When first I stood atop Mount Garfield I could not believe such a place existed. And it was only two hours from the hectic hustle and bustle of the upscale boutiques and the yuppie shoppers in Newburyport. So, being an outsider myself, who am I to complain about the crowds that flock to the mountaintops each stunning weekend, or the pizza, hot dogs and coffee served atop Washington, the most sacred of all the Abenakis mountains? They Abenakis called Washington Agiocochook, the Home of the Great Spirit. Today, they’d probably call it Visa.
Just what is a person who lives in the mountains and loves them supposed to do when it comes to hiking? If possible, head out for a hike in midweek, as Bryan and Sue did, and Atticus and I typically do. Alas, Bryan and Sue didn’t beat the crowds on top of Washington that day, but at least they reached Monroe, the Hancocks and Sugarloaves and it didn’t feel like it was Grand Central Station at rush hour; or worse – North Conway on a busy weekend.
As for Atticus and me? We’ve been sticking to smaller, less crowded peaks. When Ruth gets here we’ll be doing the 4,000-footers again but for now I’m pleased with avoiding them. However, we did hike Mount Moriah, starting about an hour before sunset and by the time we reached the ledges of the Carter Moriah trail for the last mile and a half, we were joined by the delightful full moon that was so bright I didn’t need my headlamp. But my favorite hike as of late was one that went into the woods and not above them.
We parked at the end of Zealand Road and took the Zealand Trail through the mostly flat woods, across the spider web of tree roots along the trail and the wood bridges spanning the moose and beaver ponds. When we arrived at the place we’d normally turn right to head towards Zealand Hut, Zeacliff and the Bonds beyond, we went straight. This took us into the heart of Zealand Notch where we walked along the tumble down remains of Whitewall Mountain and looked up at the giants around us that we have often stood on top of. Eventually, this gentle meander took us to Thoreau Falls. After a while at the falls we continued to Shoal Pond. There are few more isolated places in the Whites than where we were sitting on the floor of the Pemigewasset Wilderness. All-in-all, it was a perfect day to be out in the woods. Better yet, we didn’t see another person all day.
A fellow hiker who made the same hike a few weeks ago warned, “Beware, there’s no cell phone coverage out there.” All the more reason to make the 12 mile out and back journey, which is very easy, but does wonders for whatever it is that ails you.
Our next hike? You don't actually think I'm going to tell you, do you?
(On a personal note, Bryan and Sue, if you want to see Washington at her best, we’ll take you up there in winter. I can assure you the crowds will be gone and the museum, gift shop and cafeteria will be closed. And for a second personal note, I’m told Animal Planet will be airing their footage of Atticus on their second Dogs 101 show of the new season on October 10th.)
Saturday, September 05, 2009
Want To Know More About Atticus?
We've only been in Jackson for four months but I can’t imagine ever wanting to leave. Atticus and I continue to get to know the nooks and crannies of this remarkable place and the more we see, the more attached we become to it. And yet as special as the mountains, rivers and pastoral settings are, the people of Jackson are pretty special themselves. I’ve never been to a friendlier community. On our thrice daily walks we are greeted as if we’ve lived here our entire lives.In Jackson, nature will always get top billing and from what I’ve seen most of those who live here understand that and appreciate it and hope to keep Jackson the way it is. There is sense of reverence in putting the community first, whether from the newcomer or the native. I like that.
Many we meet here want to know more about Atticus, so I’ve made it a bit easier. In the right hand margin of this blog you will see a section that reads: “Get to Know Us through Some of Our More Popular Posts”. This will help you navigate around these pages and find the meat between the bones. Simply click on any of these and you will be linked immediately to that story. Of course there are many other posts I think you'll like, too, but these will give you a shortcut in getting to know this little dog I am lucky enough to call my friend.
The bottom two posts show a list of the mountains hiked during our two winters of fundraising, first for the Jimmy Fund and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, then for Angell Animal Medical Center. Click on those and you will see a the people and animals those peaks were hiked for. Above that are highlighted trip reports from our hikes and other stories. You will see why we set out to hike the 48 4,000-footers twice in the 90 days of winter in the fight against cancer and then again for MSPCA Angell. You will read about how Atticus lost his eye sight, and then had it returned through the goodness of friends. How he was savagely attacked by another dog and we feared he'd lose his life, only to be honored at the JFK Presidential Library six nights later as one of the MSPCA's heroes of the year. But more than anything you will read about the relationship he and I share and the part the White Mountains have played in that.
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Hey Booboo, He's Not Your Average Bear!
On Sunday night, a report was filed about a hungry bear at the Osgood tent site, which is just a few miles down the road from us. I'm suppose I should feel sorry for the hikers, but considering the boldness of the bear, I found myself liking his chutzpa. Yes, it's a different world up here compared to quaint, comfortable Newburyport, where the only thing I ever had to worry about as the editor and publisher of The Undertoad, was my trash going missing when the police had the urge to search it. Below is a report that showed up on the popular northeast hiking forum Views From The Top (http://www.viewsfromthetop.com/). The motto of the story is quite clear: you can yell, cuss, stomp your feet at Mother Nature all you want and she's still going to do whatever she wants to do."We were at Osgood Tentsite 3 nights this week. Two of the three nights, other campers reported food taken by a bear. In the second case, they had their food up, and had taken it down in the early morning and sitting in front of their tent as they were striking camp. Bear came in and grabbed one of their bags. They yelled at him and he took off - with their next three nights' dinners. [TRIP ABORT]. Not Good."
Friday, August 28, 2009
Traffic Jams, Jackson Style
“I went to call you yesterday morning but I don't have your number in my phone. Must have lost it somehow. I was stuck in traffic. There was a fatal accident on 495 and it took me 2 hours to go 5 miles. Frustrating. Total commute time was 3 hours. Then going home last night someone drove off the road into the woods south of the Pike. That turned into a 90 minute commute. So in all I spent 4 and a half hours on the road.” ~ An email from my brother David
During a lecture the late mythologist Joseph Campbell shared the following...
A bit of advice given to a young Native American at the time of his initiation: “As you go the way of life, you will see a great chasm. Jump. It’s not as far as you think.”
A few years ago, upon first getting to feel these mountains under my feet, I knew right away I needed to live in them no matter what the cost. At the time such a move seemed impossible to make. I was comfortable and in Newburyport I’d found the kind of community I always wanted to live in and found my calling as a writer. But the power of the mountains is both strong and mysterious and when the time came I didn’t hesitate – I jumped. One of the reasons I did so was because of the exact scenario brother David emailed me about. But it wasn’t just because of traffic. Traffic was only a symptom of the greater stresses of the world I knew. I longed for a simpler, less cluttered life; one not twisted up in the vortex of a society in constant competitive hyper-drive or the mania of owning things.
On the day my brother spent four and a half hours on the road, I spent four and a half hours on North and South Doublehead – twin peaks here in Jackson. It was the day summer relaxed its grip and the high temperatures and smothering humidity broke. Even the maddening bugs disappeared for the first time in months.
What a difference: my brother in stuck in traffic, me following Atticus up the steep Old Path to the col between the two peaks. While he was bumper to bumper, inhaling exhaust fumes, surrounded by angry commuters, Atticus and I were surrounded by dense forest primeval, so thick and tangled it was hard to imagine another human being there at any time in the past several weeks. I can’t say the same for moose. There were signs of them everywhere. I kept waiting for one of them to come lumbering through the woods. While David sat in traffic and drummed his fingers on his steering wheel, I sat on a cool, mossy rock feeling like I had stumbled upon a lost world. At about the time he was just beginning to creep along on his journey home, Atticus and I stood on the first ledges of South Doublehead. Below us the hills and fields of Jackson glowed in the late afternoon sun and rolled happily along. A breeze swirled around us playing with my hair and Atticus’ floppy ears. Its refreshing chill was a hint of things to come – the first taste of autumn’s crisp, clean air.
South Doublehead is a remarkable summit. It offers unique views towards the Presidential Range and even more so towards the Moats. North Moat stands out particularly, much like the prow of a great ship cutting through an undulating green sea. Had the artists who flocked to the White Mountains in the 1800s ever stood on top of the South peak I don’t think they would have ever left. That’s how captivating it is, especially in the glow of the end of the day when light is softer and more beguiling and the green of the valley invites you to sit back and put your feet up and take a deep breath. From this angle the view to the south plays tricks on your eyes. It is as if you are seeing North Conway long before the outlets or big box stores arrived, long before even the first house was built. There’s nothing to be seen but the rugged edifices of Cathedral and White Horse ledges and the pulsing mountains and valleys.
North Doublehead is not so special, at least when it comes to views. But on the way over we traveled through that great moose hall of twisted trees and could just imagine how many of the great beasts had made their way to that col through the years. The climb up North is a little steep in places but the cool air made it easier than it would have been just a day before. The lone view is from behind the cabin, on a little rock porch down a ways, and it looks out towards Maine. Were it not for what we’d seen on South Doublehead, it would have been much more impressive. Still, it was a fine place to stop and sit and drink in the cool of the shadows.
I didn’t have the heart to tell my brother David that the closest thing I’ve seen to a traffic jam around these parts as of late occurred when we were on our way back home after coming off of the Doubleheads. We stopped at a small, out of the way pond we’ve grown fond of, and in a 10 minute span we saw a Great Blue Heron, a beaver, a moose and two ducks. That’s about as cluttered as it gets here in Jackson during the summer, unless you count the line at the J-Town Deli on weekend mornings or when the mail arrives at 10:30 at the Jackson Post Office.
During a lecture the late mythologist Joseph Campbell shared the following...
A bit of advice given to a young Native American at the time of his initiation: “As you go the way of life, you will see a great chasm. Jump. It’s not as far as you think.”
A few years ago, upon first getting to feel these mountains under my feet, I knew right away I needed to live in them no matter what the cost. At the time such a move seemed impossible to make. I was comfortable and in Newburyport I’d found the kind of community I always wanted to live in and found my calling as a writer. But the power of the mountains is both strong and mysterious and when the time came I didn’t hesitate – I jumped. One of the reasons I did so was because of the exact scenario brother David emailed me about. But it wasn’t just because of traffic. Traffic was only a symptom of the greater stresses of the world I knew. I longed for a simpler, less cluttered life; one not twisted up in the vortex of a society in constant competitive hyper-drive or the mania of owning things.
On the day my brother spent four and a half hours on the road, I spent four and a half hours on North and South Doublehead – twin peaks here in Jackson. It was the day summer relaxed its grip and the high temperatures and smothering humidity broke. Even the maddening bugs disappeared for the first time in months.
What a difference: my brother in stuck in traffic, me following Atticus up the steep Old Path to the col between the two peaks. While he was bumper to bumper, inhaling exhaust fumes, surrounded by angry commuters, Atticus and I were surrounded by dense forest primeval, so thick and tangled it was hard to imagine another human being there at any time in the past several weeks. I can’t say the same for moose. There were signs of them everywhere. I kept waiting for one of them to come lumbering through the woods. While David sat in traffic and drummed his fingers on his steering wheel, I sat on a cool, mossy rock feeling like I had stumbled upon a lost world. At about the time he was just beginning to creep along on his journey home, Atticus and I stood on the first ledges of South Doublehead. Below us the hills and fields of Jackson glowed in the late afternoon sun and rolled happily along. A breeze swirled around us playing with my hair and Atticus’ floppy ears. Its refreshing chill was a hint of things to come – the first taste of autumn’s crisp, clean air.
South Doublehead is a remarkable summit. It offers unique views towards the Presidential Range and even more so towards the Moats. North Moat stands out particularly, much like the prow of a great ship cutting through an undulating green sea. Had the artists who flocked to the White Mountains in the 1800s ever stood on top of the South peak I don’t think they would have ever left. That’s how captivating it is, especially in the glow of the end of the day when light is softer and more beguiling and the green of the valley invites you to sit back and put your feet up and take a deep breath. From this angle the view to the south plays tricks on your eyes. It is as if you are seeing North Conway long before the outlets or big box stores arrived, long before even the first house was built. There’s nothing to be seen but the rugged edifices of Cathedral and White Horse ledges and the pulsing mountains and valleys.
North Doublehead is not so special, at least when it comes to views. But on the way over we traveled through that great moose hall of twisted trees and could just imagine how many of the great beasts had made their way to that col through the years. The climb up North is a little steep in places but the cool air made it easier than it would have been just a day before. The lone view is from behind the cabin, on a little rock porch down a ways, and it looks out towards Maine. Were it not for what we’d seen on South Doublehead, it would have been much more impressive. Still, it was a fine place to stop and sit and drink in the cool of the shadows.
I didn’t have the heart to tell my brother David that the closest thing I’ve seen to a traffic jam around these parts as of late occurred when we were on our way back home after coming off of the Doubleheads. We stopped at a small, out of the way pond we’ve grown fond of, and in a 10 minute span we saw a Great Blue Heron, a beaver, a moose and two ducks. That’s about as cluttered as it gets here in Jackson during the summer, unless you count the line at the J-Town Deli on weekend mornings or when the mail arrives at 10:30 at the Jackson Post Office.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Hedgehog At Sunset
Think back to the fairy tales of your childhood and how the rich, dark woods were as textured as the characters themselves. I have felt like I’ve stumbled into such an enchanted forest whenever entering the woods to climb Mount Hedgehog. They evoke a feeling of other worldliness and each step into nature and up the mountain is a step into a realm where mystery and magic meet and society is left behind. The child within me half expects to come face to face with a gnome or dwarf. And no matter how often I trod the familiar path and never see such a creature, I never doubt I could actually see one around the next bend in the trail.I get to Hedgehog as often as I can because before too long many of the trees in the area will be wiped out by the lumber industry. I fear that not unlike the children who would be the kings in queens in C.S. Lewis’ Narnia, there will come a time when I’ll never reach it again and all I’ll see will be the stubbled remains of where a forest used to stand and where magic used to live.
Oh, I know there are plenty of special places here in the mountains, but there’s something about this particular area that has always resonated with me. Why? I cannot say, other than to say it’s like love – you know it when you feel it and it is nearly impossible to describe in words. And while the Forest Service has always allowed logging in the White Mountains, there’s never been a time in recent years where they will level nature so close to a trail.
Last Saturday I was in the mood to visit those woods again but I didn’t want to deal with the crowds or the heat of August so we didn’t arrive at the trailhead until 5:00 p.m. and the only people we saw were those getting ready to leave. I had planned it right and Atticus and I had the mountain to ourselves. Whenever that happens, I enter the woods with a childlike trill running through my body, my senses tingling with excitement.
In the first mile and a half of the nearly five mile loop I saw numerous trees marked by tape revealing where the destruction will take place. It’s incredible when you consider how many will be removed and the generations that will pass until a person can stand where I was and see such mature trees again. As we passed these areas I felt like I was saying goodbye to old friends I’d gotten to know these last few years.
Hedgehog is only 2500 feet high, but like all mountains it makes you work. There are easy parts and there are parts where you have to push yourself. The discomfort takes over – shortness of breath, racing heart, sweating, low back pain – but it brings a gift with it. You cannot think of anything but what you are doing and where you are. Distractions evaporate. The mind becomes clear. It’s here in the stripping away that the senses become even more alive and on Hedgehog this happens just before you reach the breathtaking open Eastern Ledge. You leave the woods and yourself behind and scramble up large shelves of rock and suddenly you stand on the edge of the mountain. Far below the green carpet of the valley sweeps away and up towards Chocorua, Paugus, and Passaconaway – mountains even grander than the great Indian chiefs they were named for.
This is our favorite place on the loop and when we arrived we spent a great deal of time sitting and looking out at the views while growing shadows brought a welcomed coolness. Even in the shadows though, the scene in front of us was amazingly bright while the sinking sun cast everything in a golden hue.
After a lengthy visit we left the ledges and entered the woods for the climb up to the summit. Here the forest grew so dark I could barely see and I had to let my eyes adjust but where my sight failed my sense of smell grew strong. The musky smell of earth, pine and decaying wood entered me. The deeper we went the more we were enveloped by shadows so dark it felt like night. Then, on the western edge of the mountain the setting sun splashed through the trees like a breaking wave and the forest was flooded with that same golden light. We were bathed in it as we walked the twisting trail until we were face to face with Passaconaway. The name itself translates to ‘Son of the Bear’ and I could almost imagine it coming to life and looming above us like a giant bear.
The climb was done and we settled in for some more views before heading down to finish off the loop. But there was still one more stop to make. Just before night completely fell, we reached Allen’s Ledge. Here we sat for the third time and watched the night roll across the sky until the stars pin-pricked their way through the blue-black sea overhead. Here you really could count the stars, although I fear once you started you’d never finish.
Amazing, isn’t it, how the various facets of a journey come together like patches on a quilt? Each area of the mountain shared something different with us. And although night had fallen we still had one more to experience. The final pages of our journey came in the last mile when the mountain came to life even more with its mysterious smells and sounds. Trees creaked and groaned, beasts both big and small moved just out of sight – a scampering here, a crashing through brush there. That’s when we reached the place Antoine de Saint-Exupery wrote about: “Night, the beloved. Night, when words fade and things come alive. When the destructive analysis of day is done, and all that is truly important becomes whole and sound again. When man reassembles his fragmentary self and grows with the calm of a tree.”
There were times in that last mile when we stopped and I turned off my headlamp and we just enjoyed that ‘beloved’ night on this beloved mountain. I pledged that I would return again as often as I can before the forest is stripped bare and with it much of the magic. Perhaps each subsequent visit will allow me to build a replica of this world in my imagination so that this doomed forest will live on if only in my memory.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Hedgehog for Sunset
Late in the day Saturday, Atticus and I headed over to the Kancamagus Highway, a relatively short distance from Jackson if you utilize Bear Notch Road, for a sunset hike along the Hedgehog loop. This is one of my favorite small mountains. The summit elevation is 2,520 feet and the loop is 4.8 miles. It's perfect for the end of the day. We dallied on the breathtaking East Ledge, the summit, and Allen's Ledge and made the loop in 3 hours.In photo #1 Atticus is looking out towards Chocorua. In the next he's on the natural stone couch on the East Ledge while Mount Passaconaway (one of the 4,000-footers) looms behind him. In the third photo he's looking out over the sweeping valley that leads up to Square Ledge. Photo #4 is a shot of Passaconaway, named for one of the great Indian chiefs in the area. The name translates to 'Son of the Bear'. Legend has it that when Passaconway died, a sleigh pulled by wolves brought him to the be with the Great Spirits on top of Mount Washington. The last photo is a study in light and shade with Atticus in the foreground and Chocorua in the background both shaded, while nearly everything in between is lit by the late sun.
Thursday, August 06, 2009
Starting the Day on Black Cap
Summer’s waning. It hit me this morning when I got out of bed at 5:15 and beat the sun up by nearly 30 minutes. In the past six weeks we’ve lost daylight. Funny to think of it that way with August just under way, but it is true. Time flies. It always has; it always will.Soon after I got up, Atticus and I were making our way through the sun-dappled forest. The air was cool, the path gentle, the woods greener than I’ve ever seen them in August. We moved over rock and root and smooth earth, deeper into nature, higher up the small mountain, into my prayers. Heart and lungs started to wake, then legs. The tightness in my low back eased. So did my shoulders. The forest enveloped us. Birds settled on branches and watched us pass, occasionally filling the air with song. The only other sounds were my steps and breath. Sweat ran down my face, rivulets flowed down my spine. In the quietude with a body in motion, I reached that release that comes with the Zen moment that is born when I’m not pushing too hard or in too much of a hurry to get up the mountain. Thoughts mingle with breath, both are inhaled, both expelled. The tide comes in and then goes out again. Freedom.
From time to time people ask me if I miss Newburyport. This question is never asked of me up here, it’s always asked by Newburyporters. In the mountains people understand how special this area is. Folks from Newburyport, however, can’t imagine wanting to live elsewhere but where they live. I couldn’t at one time either. Such was the draw of that little city where the Merrimac flows into the Atlantic. But times change, people do too. Or at least people can change. That’s what happened to me. I loved the intrigue, the tempest in a teapot world of Newburyport politics and couldn’t imagine wanting to ever go anywhere else. I was in the middle of everything that happened. There was even a six year period – the first six years of running The Undertoad – where I only spent two nights out of town. Imagine that. In six years I spent only one weekend away. It was all Newburyport all the time.
The shift started when Atticus and I climbed Mount Garfield with my brothers. I couldn’t believe such places actually existed in the world. I stood on that rocky summit with views over a seemingly endless ocean of mountains and I felt God’s rapture. Over the next two years I returned often. I didn’t realize it at that time, but I began to understand that I no longer belonged in Newburyport. Here in the mountains I found the peace I’d always sought.
Then came that winter when Atticus and I tried to complete two rounds of the 48 in 90 days. It was at times a brutal but magnificent challenge. We ended up four hikes shy of our goal. But it was during that quest when the final shift took place. Atticus and I were walking along the sweeping snowfields between Mount Washington and Mount Monroe. We were alone on that ethereal February day and the wind howled and the clouds rose like ghosts out of the ravines and flew by. Halfway down the cone of Washington Atticus stopped and waited for me. Just as I reached him a curtain of clouds rose and revealed the summits of Monroe, Eisenhower and Pierce under a sky so blue my eyes ached. They were caked in ice and snow and we were wrapped in winter, this little dog and I. By the time we reached Pierce we’d be on our 65th peak of the winter.
Atticus put his front paws on my leg and asked me to pick him up. He settled into the crook of my arm and together we looked out at those mountains below us and before us. There was no sign of civilization, or of life itself, just an astonishing, vast wasteland of white. Alone on that mountainside with Atticus, that’s when it hit me – we’d come too far.
I had literally walked out of Newburyport and my life there and into my new one. I had unintentionally left my life behind and there and then I understood that there would be no going back for us. It was a lonely and horrifying, but at the same time, liberating sensation.
When I returned to Newburyport the two of us were thrown back into small city life and brought back to earth, especially when Atticus went blind and the cancer scare surfaced. I would at first fight the change by trying to stay with the familiar. I even entered the race for mayor. But it was not to be. I would end up dropping out before the election. I was being called home. Joseph Campbell, the mythologist, said it best, “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”
I wasn’t the only one who saw it. On her Newburyport Blog Mary Eaton would later write:
“I remember watching Tom at a Newburyport City Council meeting after that experience was over, and thinking to myself, ‘The mountains have captured him.’ And they had. And there was the ultimate, ‘Shall I stay in Newburyport, or not stay in Newburyport’ question, when Mr. Ryan threw his hat into the ring as a mayoral candidate this fall. It sounded as if when it came to Newburyport, MA, that in the end, ‘all passions were spent.’ And Mr. Ryan left Newburyport, MA on October 1, 2007 for the White Mountains of New Hampshire.”Mary was right, my Newburyport ‘passions were spent’. But there were other passions that took hold.
In Newburyport I not only wrote about politics, I planted myself in the middle of them. I literally inhaled them. Far too often that translates into writing about how mankind fails and what is wrong with the world. That’s especially true in a place once known as ‘Cannibal City’ because of its politics. On the other hand, the mountains revealed to me what was right with the world. It brought me back in time to a place where I wasn’t so jaded or dubious and I believed in magic and was filled with awe and wonder.
So do I miss Newburyport? Well, let me answer it this way. Yesterday we began the morning with a walk to Diana’s Baths. We were early enough to have it to ourselves and we sat on a rock slab at the top of the majestic falls where I said my prayers while Atticus watched the water flowing, spinning and churning past us. Today we started the day by climbing Black Cap, a short peak with stunning views. One day a waterfall. The next a mountaintop.
Interestingly enough I inherited my love of both politics and the mountains from my father. I thought of him this morning when we reached the top of Black Cap and the rays of the morning sun. He would have loved this life. There was something, however, in Jack Ryan’s life that refused to allow him to reach for his dreams. It was as if he believed they would always be just out of reach for him.
Towards the end of his life he told me about a dream he had the night before. He had died and was approaching the gates of heaven. Inside he could hear Mozart playing. Not just the music of Mozart, but Mozart himself. He could also hear the crack of a bat and the cheer of the crowd. His brother-in-law Bill Shea was already in Heaven and he spoke to my father.
“Jack, the Sox need you to pitch. Hurry up and get inside here!”
Then he saw my mother, his beloved Isabel, and her mother and father and they all told him how much they loved him and how much they’d missed him.
He hurried to the gates with a young boy’s bursting exuberance. When he reached it, the angel standing guard said, “I’m sorry. You are not allowed.”
When my father told me that dream he had tears in his eyes. Without saying it, he’d summed up much of how he saw his life.
So here I sit, not just writing a book, but also chasing after my dreams, after starting the day on a mountaintop with Atticus, and I know – I just know – that Jack Ryan would have loved this journey and this life.
My father, in his younger years, loved poetry. One of his favorites was Tennyson. He’s also one of my favorites. Today would have been Tennyson’s 200th birthday. One of the only poems I ever memorized is his “Break, Break, Break” and I recited it this morning while we stood surrounded by mountaintops. It goes like this:
Break, break, break,
On thy cold gray stones, O Sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.
O, well for the fisherman's boy,
That he shouts with his sister at play!
O, well for the sailor lad,
That he sings in his boat on the bay!
And the stately ships go on
To their haven under the hill;
But O for the touch of a vanished hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!
Break, break, break,
At the foot of thy crags, O Sea!
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me.
Here’s to dreams and the willingness to chase after them. Life is, after all, fleeting.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Getting Stretched Out On Black Mountain
In baseball, when a relief pitcher is converted into a starter, it cannot be done overnight. The team takes time in stretching out the pitcher, making him stronger, giving him more endurance. Recently, while working on my book proposal for ‘Following Atticus’, my agent, Brian DeFiore, has been doing the exact same thing to my writing. He’s making me think more, open my mind and my heart and tap into the creative spirit. It’s not easy, nor is it painless, but the results are fulfilling and can even be astounding.
My proposal about life with Atticus goes out on Labor Day – when the collective U.S. publishing industry ends its long summer vacation – and publishers will see something different than what I originally set out to write. Much of the transformation has come of late and it has to do with the ability of Brian to ‘stretch me out’. He recognized my book for what it was and it’s no longer just about mountains, a little dog and a middle aged, overweight writer with a fear of heights. But it took my agent to recognize that and get me to embrace it. I was thinking about all this the other day on Black Mountain - the one here in Jackson, not the one close to Moosilauke.
When we reached the summit there wasn’t much of a view. The forest has grown up around the summit rocks and the only way to see Washington, the Wildcats or Carter Dome is to look through and over the lush July foliage. Without much of a view I sat down and opened up my backpack and Atticus and I shared peanut butter crackers. We then both drank some water and after a bit I got up and started walking.
I noticed I was missing something. I looked back to the summit rocks and Atticus was still standing there, looking at me as if I’d forgotten to do something.
I knew immediately what he wanted. I walked back and picked him up as I always do on a summit and he sat in the crook of my arm. He looked out through the trees at Carter Dome. After a minute he turned his gaze to the Wildcats, eventually swiveling his head to see Washington. And there it was – his heavy sigh. And his body relaxed into mine.
I’ve always said that the mountains are my church: the climb is where I confess my sins; the summit is where I take communion. Communion – it’s a wonderful word, isn’t it? The first two definitions from American Heritage are as follows: “the act or an instance of sharing, as of thoughts or feelings; religious or spiritual fellowship.”
That’s the beauty of my little companion. He’s not only good company, there are times he makes me see things in a different way. Holding him in my arm with the setting sun in his eyes, the man-made lenses inserted during cataract surgery were easy to see. I cannot imagine a dog who could possibly appreciate modern technology that allowed him to see again more than he does. Up high, looking out together like that, it’s our own little ‘spiritual fellowship’. Whenever we have this communion between us I cannot help but think of that Saint-Exupery quote: “Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward in the same direction.”
And there we stood ‘looking out in the same direction’ for a long while.
Who would have thought we’d be here now, when seven years ago all I wanted was a dog to replace the one I’d lost? But now we are on a threshold to a very exciting time. Between then and now we’ve been through so much together. Back then I made a living writing a political journal in Newburyport and if you know anything about small town New England politics you’ll understand it was mostly about where man had gone wrong. But because I picked up a little dog, then started following through the woods, we eventually made it to the mountains. One look around from the top of Mount Garfield, our very first peak on September of 2004, and our lives were transformed. I began to see what was right with the world. Politics went out with the trash and we moved north.
Looking back on the confluence of experiences leading us here, I suppose it was all fated to work out this way. As Einstein said, “I refuse to believe that God plays dice with the Universe.” There have been too many things conspiring to bring us to this point in our lives.
And now you can see how just as my agent has recently ‘stretched me out’, that it only took place after a little dog and these great mountains had done the exact same thing.
My proposal about life with Atticus goes out on Labor Day – when the collective U.S. publishing industry ends its long summer vacation – and publishers will see something different than what I originally set out to write. Much of the transformation has come of late and it has to do with the ability of Brian to ‘stretch me out’. He recognized my book for what it was and it’s no longer just about mountains, a little dog and a middle aged, overweight writer with a fear of heights. But it took my agent to recognize that and get me to embrace it. I was thinking about all this the other day on Black Mountain - the one here in Jackson, not the one close to Moosilauke.
When we reached the summit there wasn’t much of a view. The forest has grown up around the summit rocks and the only way to see Washington, the Wildcats or Carter Dome is to look through and over the lush July foliage. Without much of a view I sat down and opened up my backpack and Atticus and I shared peanut butter crackers. We then both drank some water and after a bit I got up and started walking.
I noticed I was missing something. I looked back to the summit rocks and Atticus was still standing there, looking at me as if I’d forgotten to do something.
I knew immediately what he wanted. I walked back and picked him up as I always do on a summit and he sat in the crook of my arm. He looked out through the trees at Carter Dome. After a minute he turned his gaze to the Wildcats, eventually swiveling his head to see Washington. And there it was – his heavy sigh. And his body relaxed into mine.
I’ve always said that the mountains are my church: the climb is where I confess my sins; the summit is where I take communion. Communion – it’s a wonderful word, isn’t it? The first two definitions from American Heritage are as follows: “the act or an instance of sharing, as of thoughts or feelings; religious or spiritual fellowship.”
That’s the beauty of my little companion. He’s not only good company, there are times he makes me see things in a different way. Holding him in my arm with the setting sun in his eyes, the man-made lenses inserted during cataract surgery were easy to see. I cannot imagine a dog who could possibly appreciate modern technology that allowed him to see again more than he does. Up high, looking out together like that, it’s our own little ‘spiritual fellowship’. Whenever we have this communion between us I cannot help but think of that Saint-Exupery quote: “Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward in the same direction.”
And there we stood ‘looking out in the same direction’ for a long while.
Who would have thought we’d be here now, when seven years ago all I wanted was a dog to replace the one I’d lost? But now we are on a threshold to a very exciting time. Between then and now we’ve been through so much together. Back then I made a living writing a political journal in Newburyport and if you know anything about small town New England politics you’ll understand it was mostly about where man had gone wrong. But because I picked up a little dog, then started following through the woods, we eventually made it to the mountains. One look around from the top of Mount Garfield, our very first peak on September of 2004, and our lives were transformed. I began to see what was right with the world. Politics went out with the trash and we moved north.
Looking back on the confluence of experiences leading us here, I suppose it was all fated to work out this way. As Einstein said, “I refuse to believe that God plays dice with the Universe.” There have been too many things conspiring to bring us to this point in our lives.
And now you can see how just as my agent has recently ‘stretched me out’, that it only took place after a little dog and these great mountains had done the exact same thing.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Which Five Pics Would You Pick?
We're sending out our book proposal to publishers soon and the last step is to include five photos of Atticus. But as you might guess, we have so many of them. We'd love to know which five you'd include. Take the poll to the right (choose five). Polling has now closed. And the top 10 are now placed in order starting with No. 1 in the polling and going down. If you'd like to make a comment, you can do it at the bottom of this post.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Hey, Where Are The Views?
This afternoon Atticus and I hiked Jackson's Black Mountain. Unfortunately, when this little dog got to the summit he gave me this look that said, "Where are the views?" I picked him up so he could see Mount Washington, the Wildcat Ridge and Carter Dome over the trees and - I love this about him - he let out a deep sigh of contentment and gazed out at them until I put him down a few minutes later. He's definitely different.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)