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Caught in the middle in a land of extremes.  The silence and solitude of winter now so far away.  Today it’s about moving, shaking, building, banging, people, pleasing, chatting, listening, hearing a road racing with RVs and ATVs and almost forgetting the soft pale rumble I barely hear behind all this motion and commotion that is the Rio Grande.  A certain and steady flow, drawing the line in a crystal clear sparkling swath between a high mountain summer season Mecca and a tranquil hillside of dead and dying trees which is where my heart is lost this time of year.  Disconnected.

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It’s the end of another day spent cleaning cabins, working on our new one, and sharing it all with the steady stream of visitors which summer brings.  I’m going to go running.  The dark clouds that have been building all afternoon suddenly seem more serious and a few fat full heavy drops tap loudly on the metal roof like anticipating fingers on a table top as I’m taking off my work boots and putting on my running shoes.  No matter.  I’m going to run.  I’m going to sneak away from the goose, the tourists, the slowly growing cabin and the pending inevitability of figuring out what to cook for dinner over the old wood cook stove fueled by scraps of wood from the construction site, and appeasing appetites fueled from that construction work.

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Out there in the rain, under a dark sky and through oddly eerie brown blue spruce stripped of needles, some having recently left their load still pale green in patches beneath their slipping bark and along the trail.

An owl calls.  It is that dark.

The dog is in front, beside me, behind me, off in the woods to my left, my right, you never know except then suddenly there he is, as happy and wet and wild as I am and I’m feeling leaping over fallen trees that litter the trail, hair soaking and chest sweating and skinny legs nimbly peddling through wet brush.

I return to the baby cheeps of the goose on the top of the cliff above the river, looking down at me where I’m crossing – calling me home.  He the wild thing, and me the domesticated. But for right now, it all feels upside down in the soaked state of summer rains in the high country.

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Dear Readers:  In case you have not yet had the time, please be sure to put these books on your Summer Reading List:  The Color of the Wild and The Last of the Living Blue.  And when you have finished reading them, and I shall sincerely hope enjoyed them, please take an extra few moment (really, that’s all it takes!) and post a review on Amazon, Barnes and Nobles, GoodReads, social media… where ever you feel comfortable, for reviews do matter and really do help!

And Reviewers:  Those of you who requested and received a review copy. I hope you have read or are reading… and truly hope you enjoy!  When you can, please take a moment to post your review.  A huge THANK YOU to those who already have.

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Growing up.

The new house.  Not me. Though sometimes it feels one in the same.  Solid roots.  Walls.  The Real Deal. (My boys may cringe at that one.)

This week brought walls slowly rising.  Milling our own rough cut lumber.  Framing out the first windows.  Looking out.  Looking in.  Knowing now what that view will be like…  Not too bad.  Slow birth of a home, coming to life.

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Peeling logs.  Each a work of art.  New life to dead trees.

The culprit revealed as we chip off the bark and grind smooth the knots and corners.

Life among the beetles.  A couple years ago, we didn’t know what one looked like.  Now we crush them with our hand tools as we wrestle each log in place, flick them from each other’s shirts, shake them from our hair, brush them off the log surface before we draw the line to make the measure that will mark the cut for the next part of the wall to the ever growing home.  Did you know they bite?  Maybe after working on the mill and peeling logs and sweeping up sawdust, I smell enough like a tree that they give me a go.  We watch their random flight paths in the low light of evening as we pack up our tools and call it a day.

What will be the fate of the last living blue?

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This is how my mind works.  In random bursts. In colors red and gold then stormy steel grey, light and dark, warm and cold, getting colder. Discipline of body, of ritual, of ways to work.  But not in peace of mind.  You can’t really call me steady, level, even.

I leave you with this to consider.

A Rumi a dear friend shared with me yesterday:

 

Run from what is comfortable

Forget safety

Live where you fear to live

I have tried prudent living long enough

From now on I’ll be mad.

 

Don’t forget the power of anger.  Use it wisely. On one hand, it can eat you alive.  On the other, it can feed you.  Fuel the fire of inevitable change.

 

Nothing stays the same.

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