In the winter it's cold. The coldness dominates anything else visual or sensual. The sky is cold. The light is so cold it hurts my eyes. The sky reflects the white ground, and in between, on the horizon, I see the coldness, all its angles and sharp particles. I try to make the horizon my focal point, but it makes me its own, all the particles and lines drilling into me where I stand at my front window.
In December, and for the next couple of months, the snow turns to ice and becomes a hazard. I become conscious, for the very first time, of the bones in my feet and my ankles. I had never known these bones could break on impact, but I suspect it now. In winter I walk carefully.
I haven't seen the stars for a long time, the black sky and silver stars, a motivation for living here, for moving here. Only briefly do I catch a glimpse, while closing the shades at night, of the sky and stars, black and silver, and the moon pale and weak I'm worried it may be fading away for good. Much has changed since summer when I first arrived here in these mountains, when I realized that the smell of the piney woods might save me. And I was saved then, but it seems like long ago now, now that it's winter and everything's cold.
Last summer, I rested by a high mountain stream and while sleeping at night I dreamed new dreams. On a walk one hot afternoon, a grouse flew up in front of my path from her nesting place in the grass. I was startled. That single small grouse sounded like a thousand grouse, or a deer at least, or possibly a coyote, and for one split second, even, I thought it was the cougar I'd been tracking for two months. I'm not a very accomplished tracker.
Now it's winter and I'm cold. I can't think straight. There is nothing to do. I'm in jeopardy of selling the car to pay the fuel bill. Nothing moves, and the silence, the blunt and ostracizing silence, is going to drive me mad. The split wood in the stove cracks hard. I'm frozen.
During one winter not long ago, a woman was killed at the sawmill. I didn't live here then, but the story is told to me like some sort of newcomer's initiation rite. Twice a day the lumber ends are dumped not far from the mill, and people wait to pick them up for fuel. An old International truck backs up to the pile and spills out its load. We scramble, gathering hard and fast. The wood is always gone before we have enough to burn for a day, or save for the next.
There's a trick to this truck. The driver backs up once and dumps most of the load in a sawdusty rush. He then pulls forward. Those of us who know, will wait. He backs up again, fast, to empty the remaining wood. This is when she was killed, the woman who died at the mill pile, when she forgot, or didn't know about the second time, and was already bent over, picking up.
In the Baker valley, the lilacs promise spring. They are the only thing that does. Merchants, still fearful, begrudgingly have sales. School conferences are trying times, teachers, tight-lipped and narrow-eyed with the learned despair of prior generations, who refuse to place reliance in our blooming begottens.
On a good year, if a late frost doesn't kill them, the lilacs break out all at once with a sweet smell so strong it drifts inside, through closed doors and windows. During this, my first spring in the valley, the flowers are especially abundant. After all the coldness I'm euphoric. I cut armfuls of lavender and white and pink, and fill every jar and pot I can find. I am overwhelmed, giddy, that spring is upon us. I remark on the miracle to friends, neighbors and passersby who admire my own lilac trees. I'm told the lilacs mean nothing. The mountains could still avenge themselves on us, gather up napping storms and blast our wishful valley. Finally, pressured, I begin to agree that I am being unrealistic. After awhile I keep my thoughts to myself, and wonder if this is how it all gets started, this tight and narrow faith, dictated by the landscape.
Today, stuck in my still cold house with a chicken-pox child, I'm venting my frustration and fear of my life here on Mr. Bumby's parents who left him to go to the cafes. I'm out of stuff to read. I choose to count among my blessings the favors the librarian does for me by censoring the books I request through inter-library loan. She'd deny this, of course. I'm grateful, today in my bleakness. Those books always give me big ideas and leave me restless.
Ever since I first arrived in Oregon's small towns, I've found it almost agonizing to stay away for long. The country suits me. I don't belong, but it belongs to me. I am here to extract from this land. I know what I want from this high mountain desert, and I expect it to be given to me. I want the sky and stars. I want to find that cougar. Intending to be an observer, I'm smug.
But this is a land of hard times, one decade following another, like the stacked up cases of empties by the dumpster across the street at the bar. Maybe the mountains are angry, still grieving over that hole gorged through when everybody was looking for gold. And maybe it's this legacy of anger that's been handed down to the inhabitants below, who won't allow an observer. They demand, and receive, one way or another, participation.
1989
In December, and for the next couple of months, the snow turns to ice and becomes a hazard. I become conscious, for the very first time, of the bones in my feet and my ankles. I had never known these bones could break on impact, but I suspect it now. In winter I walk carefully.
I haven't seen the stars for a long time, the black sky and silver stars, a motivation for living here, for moving here. Only briefly do I catch a glimpse, while closing the shades at night, of the sky and stars, black and silver, and the moon pale and weak I'm worried it may be fading away for good. Much has changed since summer when I first arrived here in these mountains, when I realized that the smell of the piney woods might save me. And I was saved then, but it seems like long ago now, now that it's winter and everything's cold.
Last summer, I rested by a high mountain stream and while sleeping at night I dreamed new dreams. On a walk one hot afternoon, a grouse flew up in front of my path from her nesting place in the grass. I was startled. That single small grouse sounded like a thousand grouse, or a deer at least, or possibly a coyote, and for one split second, even, I thought it was the cougar I'd been tracking for two months. I'm not a very accomplished tracker.
Now it's winter and I'm cold. I can't think straight. There is nothing to do. I'm in jeopardy of selling the car to pay the fuel bill. Nothing moves, and the silence, the blunt and ostracizing silence, is going to drive me mad. The split wood in the stove cracks hard. I'm frozen.
During one winter not long ago, a woman was killed at the sawmill. I didn't live here then, but the story is told to me like some sort of newcomer's initiation rite. Twice a day the lumber ends are dumped not far from the mill, and people wait to pick them up for fuel. An old International truck backs up to the pile and spills out its load. We scramble, gathering hard and fast. The wood is always gone before we have enough to burn for a day, or save for the next.
There's a trick to this truck. The driver backs up once and dumps most of the load in a sawdusty rush. He then pulls forward. Those of us who know, will wait. He backs up again, fast, to empty the remaining wood. This is when she was killed, the woman who died at the mill pile, when she forgot, or didn't know about the second time, and was already bent over, picking up.
In the Baker valley, the lilacs promise spring. They are the only thing that does. Merchants, still fearful, begrudgingly have sales. School conferences are trying times, teachers, tight-lipped and narrow-eyed with the learned despair of prior generations, who refuse to place reliance in our blooming begottens.
On a good year, if a late frost doesn't kill them, the lilacs break out all at once with a sweet smell so strong it drifts inside, through closed doors and windows. During this, my first spring in the valley, the flowers are especially abundant. After all the coldness I'm euphoric. I cut armfuls of lavender and white and pink, and fill every jar and pot I can find. I am overwhelmed, giddy, that spring is upon us. I remark on the miracle to friends, neighbors and passersby who admire my own lilac trees. I'm told the lilacs mean nothing. The mountains could still avenge themselves on us, gather up napping storms and blast our wishful valley. Finally, pressured, I begin to agree that I am being unrealistic. After awhile I keep my thoughts to myself, and wonder if this is how it all gets started, this tight and narrow faith, dictated by the landscape.
Today, stuck in my still cold house with a chicken-pox child, I'm venting my frustration and fear of my life here on Mr. Bumby's parents who left him to go to the cafes. I'm out of stuff to read. I choose to count among my blessings the favors the librarian does for me by censoring the books I request through inter-library loan. She'd deny this, of course. I'm grateful, today in my bleakness. Those books always give me big ideas and leave me restless.
Ever since I first arrived in Oregon's small towns, I've found it almost agonizing to stay away for long. The country suits me. I don't belong, but it belongs to me. I am here to extract from this land. I know what I want from this high mountain desert, and I expect it to be given to me. I want the sky and stars. I want to find that cougar. Intending to be an observer, I'm smug.
But this is a land of hard times, one decade following another, like the stacked up cases of empties by the dumpster across the street at the bar. Maybe the mountains are angry, still grieving over that hole gorged through when everybody was looking for gold. And maybe it's this legacy of anger that's been handed down to the inhabitants below, who won't allow an observer. They demand, and receive, one way or another, participation.
1989
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