It felt as though he had excused himself from the rest of the world. He was making a habit of forgetting about all the things that had gone on before and concentrating on the task at hand, felling, cutting, hauling, and splitting firewood.
Elevation certainly has a way of creating a sense of isolation. Like the Grinch looking down on the town, or how he feels as he travels into the deep North with the forest creeping to the edge of the cleared path he drives, the calm euphoria that only the modern day cell phone can dampen.
At 9600 feet, and a few miles deep in the valley from the nearest settlement, he watched autumn turn into the old man. These last October days had value. Yet often he was stuck between the busy preparations for the incredible winter ahead as he was so advised, and just sitting on a rock by the river and watching the yellow Aspen leaves float slowly down and sit upon the current.
Each morning, after his partner and mate drove to town to wait on the locals at the diner, he would spoon feed his daughter from the plug-in hot plate and then quickly bundle her up for the morning’s chores. Once in the framed back pack they would cross the river, rock by rock, carrying saw and ax, while his dog Rebel bounded through the rapidly cooling waters.
He would cut a branch down to a cleat length and prop the pack and the little one right up on the side of the tree, so she could watch. As long as she smiled, laughed, and cooed he would continue his work. An early introduction to patience and cheerleading he figured.
Then he would put her pack on his back and a nice eight foot section of pine on his shoulder, and begin the process of carrying his catch back to the rented cabin. Though this was work for him, she and the dog felt removed from the toil and engaged in the sun filled valley, the sounds of the river, the hum of time passing, oh so removed from everything else that eventually became “nothing else.”
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