Big news. My LTC claim. A thick letter from Allianz. Your claim? Approved. Big news because it should pay most, if not all, of my Elk Run bill. It’s a big one.
When the house sells, I will fold up that phase of my life and put it in a lower dresser drawer. Maybe take it out on holidays.
With those complex hangovers from my Shadow Mountain life resolved I can concentrate on organizing my books. Will take a look at my last three novels Missing, Jennie’s Dead, and Superior Wolf. The first draft of Jennie’s Dead, three quarters finished, makes sense as a place to start.
Shadow went to play with Annie. An afternoon of running, running, running.
The sun has begun to disappear behind the spinning earth. Bergen Mountain slopes toward Elk Meadow. Grasses move in a gentle wind. I’ll finish this and in about a half an hour walk to the elevator and go to dinner.
Robin has begun to declutter my living area. Soon, maybe this week, I’ll have an organized apartment with art hung. Ready to live in, not just exist. Feels good to be at this point.
Struggled with workouts. Not sure why. I know how important they are.
Crystal, one of my favorite caregivers, came in to pick up Shadow for a walk. You have to see this. I thought it was a trash bag, you know, those stretchy ones?
She had taken trash out to the big dumpsters and there, on top of one, lay a dead black bear. The picture she took with her phone showed a large bear lying on its side on the blue top of the dumpster. Always sad to see dead wild neighbors.
How did it get there? Unknown. Though. The odds that it crawled up there to die? Slim. Would have been heavy to lift. A mystery.
Finished up my long term care claim form, mailing it back today. I have a good feeling about it even though I know they usually say no twice before approving a claim.
Shadow went on a play date to see Annie. She has a good time. They’re buds.
Rainy and cool here. Temps in the low forties, thirties. Snow in the forecast for tonight. Seasons.
Discovered from my neighbor John that the red fox I mentioned yesterday comes to Elk Run often. Our wild neighbors have their habits. On Shadow Mountain three yearling does came often, crossing Black Mountain Drive to dine below a large aspen. Three Elk bucks came, for four years straight, in the first week of June to enjoy fresh dandelion blooms in my backyard,
Sighting wild neighbors bonds those of us who live in the mountains. Bears. Mountain lions. Moose. Our shared home gives delight to all of us.
The nights have gotten longer, their temperatures dropping into the high forties. Fall, so reluctant these past few years, does come. Later than in the past. Though the golden aspens appear, daytime heat remains higher than normal.
Last year’s poor snowfall and the subsequent diminished rain fall in spring and summer drove our black bear population down mountains in search of food. More trash cans spilled. More human-bear encounters. More euthanized bears. A low visibility tragedy.
A week from today is packing day. Yikes! Just kidding. I have confidence in Robin and in the work done up till now. We’ll be ready.
A week from tomorrow I’ll be outta here. Hard to imagine. Eleven years plus on Shadow Mountain. Living on a mountain peak. All downhill from here. Evergreen, for example, sits 1,600 feet lower at 7,200 feet. Should aid my O2 saturation.
Elk Run’s main road passes the Life Care Center and the synagogue before ending at the entrance to Elk Meadow Park. This huge open area remains an Elk dense area as it has, I imagine, for centuries. I’ve seen herds of hundreds in it. Not often.
As a result, the synagogue, Life Care Center, and Elk Run have numerous Elk Bulls, Cows, and Calves on their property. Eating grass. Lounging under a bright blue Colorado sky. I look forward to seeing them.
Over to Elk Run today for an assessment that will determine what services I’ll need upon moving in. Shower help. Light help dressing. Rides to appointments. A walker for Shadow. That’s what I think I’ll need. We’ll see.
I will also sign a contract for my stay and any other documents necessary. A full morning. Ginny and Janice pick me up at 9:30.
They came over yesterday. Luke was here, too. Great conversation, laughing. Leo, Luke’s 13 year old Belgian Malnois, creaked around on arthritic legs. In spite of them he wanted to play with Shadow. Great to see his inner puppy.
Meanwhile, Dopy Don breaks ground for his triumphal arch. Please let this be one that can be stopped.
Smokey the Bear has his finger on low fire danger. The North American Monsoon produces rain and thunder storms, as the mountains cool and condense water from the Gulf of California and Gulf of Mexico brought here by shifting winds. This was the old pattern which made early July into September a safer wildfire season. Glad to see it asserting itself. May it continue.
I like the rainy afternoons, the sounds of thunder in the distance. Evokes Midwest memories.
The Midwest, my home for most of my life, has a hick reputation among the coastal airplane crowd. It’s the flyover. Whatever happens down there doesn’t impact (they think) their important lives.
Milk, meat, flour. Dear to the diets of even a Wall Street financier. They don’t just appear on restaurant memos or in the aisles of grocery stores. Dairy farms in Wisconsin. Countless acres of wheat, corn, soybeans. Feedlots for cattle and pigs. Grain silos. Combines lumbering down a gravel road. The world of farms and farmers. My world.
Until. Kate and I left it behind following Horace Greely. We permanently crossed the 100th parallel, the traditional dividing line between the rainy and bountiful east and the often forbidding arid west. Now I am a mountain man. Living at altitude with Lodgepole Pines and Aspen, Mule Deer and Elk.
You can take the boy out of the Midwest… So, I’m a mountain man with an older and more mature regional base in Indiana and the Upper Midwest states of Wisconsin and Minnesota.
Kate said often, “I feel like I’m on vacation every day.” I’m glad she felt that way. Yet it also means she nurtured, maintained, her Midwest sensibilities about landscape, about what’s usual. And why not? Like me she spent almost all of her life in Iowa or Minnesota.
This mountain life has changed me, made me attuned to lenticular clouds, full and overflowing streams in spring time, the hyperphagia of Black Bears in the fall. This is my world now, not the mile square fields of corn or the grain trucks unloading at the elevator.
Located at Life Care Center Evergreen I’m only a short walk from Congregation Beth Evergreen. Elk often fill the driveway, mountains on the horizon outside my room. I love being in the mountains, near home, while I work rebuilding my strength.
Occupational therapy. Activities of daily living. Increasing standing stamina. Moving plastic cones from one spot to another. Using a hand crank machine to rebuild arm muscles. Learning ways to work around a stiff leg.
Physical therapy. Walking with the walker. Feel strong. More standing stamina. Using a device that makes me rotate left, then right.
Speech therapy. Cognition. Difficult word finds. How to make sure my voice can be heard.
In theory I’m eager to do each one because it moves me closer to home. In fact, due to fatigue I often find myself wanting to pass. Fatigue=low T, head drop strain on back, the cellular level hit my body took from the pneumonia. I tire quickly, find the work onerous instead of challenging.
Mary and Joseph (oh, Mary and Joseph. Ha.) have been so wonderful. Working on matters related to home coming. Cleaning. Finding things I need. Visiting. Being the buffer between home and my absence. So necessary right now.
Still unsure how this will all workout. A significant part of me wants a simpler, less demanding life. I feel that in my bones. Another significant part of me loves Shadow Mountain, my home. The memories.
New microwave. A compact that fits on top of my dorm fridge. First use. Heated macaroni. Then. The door wouldn’t open. The LED read, unhelpfully, door. Had to unplug it, plug it back in to retrieve my macaroni. A call today to the Sharp’s folks. I need a working unit.
P.t. starts tomorrow. Glad. My situation is not dire, but it could go there with another illness or an injury. Regular meals have not, so far, increased my weight. I know from experience with Kate that gaining weight can be as hard as losing it.
More imaging. Later this month. Oh, boy.
Weather, though often sunny, remains unseasonably cool. 44 this morning. Warmer starting tomorrow.
Luke and Leo, Gabe and Levi coming today. Gabe for his graduation gift. Luke and Leo for a visit.
Another day viewing the world from the top of Shadow Mountain. Across the way Black Mountain greens up: lodgepole needles darker, aspen colonies fluttering new green leaves. Two mountains among the many that stretch over three thousand miles from British Columbia to New Mexico.
Tuesday gratefuls: Safeway pickup. Shadow, muster dog. Ana. A clean house. Alan, my chauffeur. Shadow Mountain. Artemis
Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: Yogurt
Kavannah: Groundedness. Yesod. Yesod is about establishing oneself in reality, refusing to rely on comfortable illusions.
Tarot: Queen of Arrows. “…represents intellectual mastery, logic, and honesty.”
One brief shining: The meaning of a mountain. Altitude. Peaks. Valleys. The crust of Mother Earth folded, compressed, lifted up from its underground slumber. Black Mountain. Shadow Mountain. The Rockies. Geological time made visible.
Each time I drive down toward Evergreen on Black Mountain Drive, I follow the declining northwestern flank of Shadow Mountain. Black Mountain rises to my left, ten thousand feet high.
The valley between Black and Shadow Mountains has four creeks that drain their snow and rain: Cub Creek, Maxwell, Blue, and Kate’s. As I go down toward Evergreen, I see snow melt flowing fast, filling, and sometimes spilling over the banks of Maxwell Creek. In winter snow-covered ice.
Shadow Mountain slopes up until it levels off at the top, giving me and my neighbors almost flat lots.
Orogeny. Mountain building. An example, the Laramide orogeny. A long, long time ago. The Rocky Mountains. The Wind River Range. The Black Hills.
I find the mountains mysterious. Their age. The Lodgepole and Aspen forests that clothe them. The wild neighbors who call them home. The fact that their rocky massiveness once resided in the earth’s crust. In a garden a weed is a plant out of place. Mountains are rocks out of place.
I often ponder my Mayfly life compared to the age of these mountains. How can I live here amongst these rugged mountains and not compare my life to theirs. It will take the creeks millions of years to drain them into the world ocean. We’re a blip. A lit match, soon snuffed out. This comforts me. Puts my ups and downs in a larger and longer context.
I am the universe experiencing these wonders it has built. I can feel their rough granite when I sit overlooking Maxwell Falls. I can smell the pines on a clear morning, wandering in my backyard. I can hear the wind racing through the trees, crying out, make way, make way. I can taste wild strawberries and wild raspberries that grow along Kate’s Creek.
I may be, certainly am, a blip. But to me. A day, this day, is a life full and overflowing. Nourished by the forests, creeks, wild neighbors. Sustained on my steady, stable mountain.
We may be short-lived creatures. Our lives weightless compared to a mountain. The mountains take our breath away. Yet. We sing songs about them. Write poems. Run away to them when press of urban life overwhelms us.
Shabbat gratefuls: Snow! Vince. Shadow, dancer in the snow. Ruth. French toast and bacon. Lab results unread.
Rene Good. Alex Pretti. Say their names.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: Snow
art@willworthington
Kavannah: Groundedness. Yesod. Yesod is about establishing oneself in reality, refusing to rely on comfortable illusions
Tarot: Page of Vessels, Otter I need more play, more lightheartedness.
One brief shining: Snow fell. Mountain joy. Our drought parched Arapaho National Forest. The lodgepoles and aspen at Shadow Mountain home. Need moisture. Even more, a lot more. I hunkered down, besotted by the falling, falling snow.
Snow brings water to thirsty grasses, trees. Skiers to A-Basin, Vail, Steamboat. Silence. Muffles sound. Alters the landscape, smoothing out rock outcroppings, covering vegetation.
Snow matters.
This winter, until yesterday: forty-nine inches. 2016: two-hundred and twenty inches. Snowpack way below normal. Never thought about snowpack in Minnesota. Here it’s vital. Not only for Colorado, but for the Colorado River basin. Las Vegas. Phoenix. LA. All depend on Colorado’s snowpack. Releasing water over time. Snow melt.
Surrounded by a National Forest filled with second stand, close together lodgepoles and aspen. Drought=high fire risk. Lodgepoles close together burn by crown fire. Fire jumps from the top of one tree to the next. Hot and fast. One reason we all pay ridiculous premiums for home insurance.
As the drought here deepens, I’ve been thinking about other droughts in my life. I’m in an exercise desert. My travel snowpack sits way below normal. Otter reminded me. I’m in a play and lightheartedness drought.
Exercise. Since I turned forty, I exercised. Daily often. No less than 5 days in a week. Resistance and cardio. Worked with my hands and legs in the garden. I was in good, no, excellent shape.
Of late. Not so much. I find excuses not to exercise. A tough day yesterday. Workout room too cold. Like today.
Mood regulation. Guard against heart attacks. Retain muscle mass. Balance work. Fall prevention. All benefits of regular exercise. Fights cancer, too.
But. Finish Ancientrails. I’m comfortable sitting down. I’m going to die of something anyhow. Why make the effort.
I hate this. Not exercising harms me physically. Perhaps even more mentally. Why am I not taking care of myself? A dissonance between how I perceive myself and how I act. How to bridge the gap.
Travel, like exercise, fills the heart. Shifts in perspective. Lightheartedness. So many good memories. Singapore. Angkor Wat. Joseon dynasty palace. Okgwa, Seoah’s home village. Street food in Bangkok. Blood pudding in Inverness. Italian coffee. Chilean fjords.
Last time I left home for more than a day: September, 2023. Back went bad. Sent me into chronic pain world. Better now. Stamina sucks. See exercise. Standing for any length of time. Nope. Makes travel feel onerous. Beyond me.
Drought takes. Water from the bunch grass and lodgepoles. Traveling to see Joe and Seoah. To see the National Museum in Taipei. Damages roots.
Like our snow drought I have no surefire way to fix my travel drought, my play and lightheartedness drought.
Drought dehydrates. Devastates. Stunts growth.
And yet. Snow slides off lodgepole branches. Shadow dances, her blackness covered in white.
Tuesday gratefuls: Sue Bradshaw. Shadow, bone crusher. Warming. A bit of Snow. Marilyn and Irv. Roxann and Tom. Jessie. Minnesota, leading the way. Non-violent resistance. Just folks saying no. Australia Day yesterday. On this side of the dateline. The Emirates. Saudi Arabia. Desert monarchies. Iran. Israel. Palestinians. Egypt. Jordan. Syria. Lebanon. Iraq. Kuwait.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Circle Route around Lake Superior
Life Kavannah: Wu Wei Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress
Year Kavannah: Creativity. Yetziratiut. “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ―Pablo Picasso
Week Kavannah: Rachamim. Compassion.
While chesed (lovingkindness) often refers to a choice of action, rachamim is deeply tied to visceral emotion and empathy—feeling the pain of another.
Tarot: Page of Bows, the Stoat
Connection to Nature: The Stoat serves as a guide to help you reconnect with the sacredness of the ground beneath your feet
One brief shining: The wild streets where violence and dominance meet love and resistance, a reminder that our animal natures lie not far beneath the veneer of civilization, only waiting the right insult to emerge, leap the whole construct of ego and superego, let that id out to play.
Minnesota on my mind: There is a spot on I-35 heading north where your vehicle crests a rise and suddenly, in the interior of the North American continent, lies a huge body of water and two port cities, Duluth in Minnesota and Superior in Wisconsin. From that crest you can see the shipping canal visible if you click on the link above. A shipping canal! On a Lake.
If it’s summer, Lake Superior straddles the horizon, a blue reflection of a northern Sky. In winter the Great Lake might be frozen or might be, as it had been on this cam for several days, a scrim of slate gray with Water Vapor boiling off it.
I never tired of seeing Lake Superior just as I never tire of living in the Rocky Mountains. Different geographical features, yes, but equal in majesty and wonder. Twice I drove all the way around Lake Superior, 1,300 miles. The shoreline itself is 2,726 miles. A big Lake.
We live our Mayfly lives in the presence of miracles. Black Mountain. The Front Range. Lake Superior. You. Your friends. The Atlantic and the Pacific. The Mississippi and the Nile. Africa and Asia. Wild Neighbors like the Mountain Lion of Pacific Heights in San Francisco. Kangaroos and swooping Magpies.
See what you’re looking at.
Soul work: Is easy. Let no one fool you. No clergy, no self-help guru, no psychologist. All you have to do? See what you’re looking at. Hear the world around and within you. Let your hand brush over the coarse bark of a tree. Smell that Wood-burning stove. Or a Stargazer Lily. Taste your morning coffee and, in your mind’s eye trace back to the hand that dug the clay and the one who shaped the mug, the Coffee Tree, the Bean picker, the who dried the beans, who packaged them.
Then. Notice who saw. Who heard. Who smelled. Who touched. Who tasted. Really notice. If it was the One within who saw the miracle revealed by each sense, that’s your soul. If it’s not, repeat until it is. Easy.
