Blackmare Lake

August 6, 2023

Mariposa lillies, Payette NF

This summer rolled into August and we found ourselves near Cascade, Idaho preparing for our last hitch together. At the behest of Idaho Fish & Wildlife the five of us would head into the Payette National Forest for 9 days. Thankfully they outfitted us with pack mules. Had we carried 8 nights worth of food and tools out upon our backs they’d have found my body among the tobacco brush and huckleberry bushes.

My 22nd birthday came the Sunday right before we were slated to hike out. Three of us woke early at Warm Lake and went over to Trail Creek Hot Springs for a morning soak. There was a big rectangle pool with incredibly hot water, and a fancy little spigot you could turn to regulate the flow of cool creek water coming into the pool. But even with the creek water flowing in at full throttle the heat was something to get used to, and I’d periodically have to hop out of the hot pool to dredge myself in frigid creek flow. I wondered who it was that dragged all the pipes and cement and mortar down this steep hill to spruce up the hot spring. 

The rest of the day was spent gathering supplies for the hitch, prowling Cascade’s grocery store for bear creek soup packets and laying out our gear for Monday. The crew pulled out some cannolis for me—one of my favorite little treats. I’m sure they bought them in Boise and where they hid them in the truck for a day I’ll never know. But they were delicious, and I settled into my tent late once I was sure we were prepared for the extended workweek, reading the little birthday card they gave me.

Goose creek falls, Payette NF

Aug 7

The next day dawned. The mule packers got to work weighing and balancing and loading our gear onto the animals. Our project partner, Michael, gave us some apple slices to ply the mules and horses with. I hiked slow, trailing behind the rest of the crew as usual. A cool morning gave way to a hot midday upland hike, and when we got to our overgrown camp, six miles in from the trailhead, we spent hours hacking away and clearing out spaces to lay our tents and tarps out. Pushing back the overgrowth along the trail leading up to camp and the trail from camp to Blackmare Lake would be our mission for the duration of the hitch. 

Then the storm came, all six of us huddled beneath the kitchen tarp to escape the deluge. With luck on our side and Lily's tenacity we got a fire going after dinner when the rain died down, which helped dry and warm us. Looking back on my journal I seemed to be in a pretty low mood by the end of the night, being cold and wet from walking through waist-high brush to get a bucketful of water to put out the fire.

Aug 8

In my hammock around 10 at night I remembered two currant fruits hanging from a bush, dark and shiny like a cow's eyes. Which brought me back to our previous project overlooking Hell's Canyon in the Payette NF, where I saw elk along the trail. That was the week before, and today we scratched out a different trail. I was on my knees, smelling the sweet scent of earthchunk i'd pried up with my hoe. Beautiful soil layers, laced with some sort of yellow fungal life.

I saw some beautiful mushrooms, one with a little green round leaf embedded in its smooth cap, and the veinskeleton of a decaying lead stuck to its neck. I swear I saw beneath the cap little moss fingers growing out of the flesh. I peeled up patches of moss from boulders along the trail--beneath the electric soft-green carpet is attached a thin layer of new dirt--made of fir needles, and a spruce cone stitched up in this bryophyte blanket. The complete confusion of a forest barely disturbed.

Painted lady landed in an alpine meadow.

Aug 9

Elijah is at the beach at Bald Head, North Carolina, where the sea turtles have left their eggs upon the sand. Today I am lopping swampy trail, a delight of life. Pull back & look close, kneel upon the squishy earth--see stalks of moss, little translucent electric petals shining with moisture. I ran a saw for the first time in over a month. Downed wood abounds, along with patches of huckleberries for us to pick through.

pink clouds beyond the campfire, dead mouse upon a big ole rotting tree. That chunk I cut out took four to push aside--the heart was still solid, throwing sweet smelling ribbons 

rings within, reality that gives you pause. Ate lunch by mycelium, strong web upon deadwood. Peek a distant peak

Aug 10, Thursday

I realized that pissing outside is a strong motif in my writing. Today I sawed like 14 fallen trees. Some were damn near soil already. Tapped and pried at the sloughing bark with the pulaski to find a grub curled up asleep in a rotting cubbyhole, and frantic hordes of ants and spiders crawling from the wounds I’ve made. Though pulpy, the faces where the saw chewed through still smelled sweetly of conifer.

Aug 11

The crew is gathering around the smoldering fire watching uncut gems which will downloaded onto his phone. I am listening to the lovely rush of south fork Blackmare, which i bathed (half-assedly sat down and splashed myself) myself in after dishes. 

Today I sawed more. Methodically cut out big chunks, wider than I am tall sometimes, pushed ‘em out and watched them roll down and away, landing with a thunk or a splash in a creek. Before lunch, and older solo hiker came through, headed for a bushwhack to the lake. Oh, to have a lake all to yourself. I hope my sawing didn’t break his peace. The peace of lying on your back right on the dirt after lunch, stopping wherever shade is to be found. Of saw maintenance with a mountain view at the close of a day.

My summertime out west is dwindling, but for now life is simple. We gather sticks to stay warm, sweat as we swing tools in the sun, sit upon the rocky shallow bottom of a creek to get clean. The wet start to the hitch was a blessing as now these dry sunny days feel wonderful. I am growing to enjoy ripping the chainsaw which I couldn’t say for myself when I first learned how to use it this past winter. And I am stocking up on my serenity before going home to face the city and school. 

Cockroaches flee from the wood I pry apart. Paintbrushes stand guard along the trail corridor. Patches of moss upon boulders, the way great trees fall then crumble into soil which begets more trees, more life.

Aug 12

Huge dragonfly hanging out over camp, checkin’ out the fire. It’s come around for a couple nights now. Today I sawed some more big logs. One particularly difficult one was rotted bleach-white and suspended across the trail under a lot of downward pressure. Wedges didn’t work, and I was having a hard time just lining up the undercut and holding up the saw to cut from beneath. But eventually it came down.

After lunch in a shady little grove I was trying to head back to this big ole boy I was cutting up, and I got turned around in a meadow, the one choked with paintbrush near the larkspur-full drainage beneath the high rocky peak. I retraced my steps over and over again and finally found the entrance to the woods that I’d come out of.

Now in my hammock listening to Blackmare again. Recent nights it’s been hard to sleep, my mind races, thoughts fluttering towards the future. But today in the meadow: yarrow, paintbrush, aster. Dark beetle upon deadwood. Saw a scrub jay on the way up the mountain in the morning, and at the end of the day going back to camp I saw two in the same spat of trees. What’ve yall been up to all day?

summer’s end comes in the crisp coldnuss of these woods whenever the light leaves.

Tufts of moss which sink in like a cushion where I place my boot. Amber liquid froze up on the bark of trees—I collected pieces to throw in the fire, just to see what they’d do in the flames. The sweet smell of cut timber, and horsemint crushed underfoot. & the satisfaction of forcing movement from a big ole stubborn log—rock n’ roll baby!

I find little tufts of moss everywhere—stuck to my braid, snuck into my underwear, and the inside of my nasty work hoodie. 

Sunday, August 13

Almost done with reading EO Wilson’s Diversity of Life, which I have been working on since March. 

The dusk call of a scrub jay. Or some other screechy bird. And again, Blackmare.

I feel like such a damn far cry from the little lady I was 3 summers ago.

A playlist for backcountry yearning

Lover’s Rock - Sade

Swimming - Maple Glider

Shake This Frost - Tyler Childers

blue valentine - nina

Wildflowers - soccer mommy

Gentle on My Mind - Glen Campbell

I’ll be There in the Morning - Townes Van Zandt

Promises - Cleo Sol

Somehow I haven’t pulled a single tick off of myself out here. Just chipmunks scurrying across the backs of fallen logs and little ants in a frenzy.

I had set out to cut out every log on the path to the lake, but as the day wore on it became clear that there was a lot left to do and I would have to content myself with having done the best I could. Around 4 I decided to just hike on up and check out the lake like our project partner suggested we do. I stashed the saw and chaps and pulaski and headed up the steep trail. Passed some big ole blowdowns, oof—good luck to the next trail crew. Shallow streams with sandy bottoms crossed the trail, which came out of the woods onto ground that was exposed rock. Breathless, I knew I’d made it when I gazed up the hill and saw blue sky flat above the trees. Henry and Lily had passed me on their way back down, and I found Madison and Will up by the blue water.

Up on the flat of the lakeshore there was a bleached ole animal skull and rusted coffee cans with labels from decades past. The ground was worn flat from campers through the years—though the overgrowth we’d been battling for the past week suggested for some reason the visitors waned as years rolled on. 

The water was clear, and I dipped my hand in to feel its coolness. Rocky peaks rimmed it and great white boulders which fell from the peaks stood along the bank. So many noteworthy boulders along the trail—a spat of quartz embedded in one tugged at my gaze.

The trek back to camp was a different story. I didn’t get back til 6:30, saw upon my shoulder, all tuckered out. But filled with a sense of accomplishment for our crew’s work. As I sawed my diddly darnedest with the MS261 the rest of the crew lopped and handsawed and chopped the trail out to daylight it all the way up to the lake.

Yee

Aug 14

Hot day. Heat that smooths out the brain; my mind completely unwrinkled by the time i finished saw maintenance. All we had to do today was carve out 1/4 of a mile of tread leading up to camp. Tough going, as the hardy grass clumps’ stubborn roots resisted the whacks of our toolheads. But we accomplished what Michael would’ve wanted for the steep slope. The sun was blazing by noon, and we headed back to camp before 2. 

Then I gave the chainsaw one last wipe down and some final licks. And then I headed to the southern creek crossing to wash off. 

I was so groggy and drowsy by then. Made dinner with Henry, finished Diversity of Life and read some of his copy of The Sun Also Rises. After dinner I laid on the trampled ground by the fire and Lily and I droned on about the future, school and such—while I watched the swaying trees surrounding camp, whose crowns were touched by evening sun. Now the sun is gone and it is chilly, but it is not entirely dark. 

I am uncertain about some things. And concerned that once home I’ll be again consumed by that weariness and wariness, and that yearning to be elsewhere. 

But most I can do is intend to savor the present once I’m back in Kentucky.

Idaho Conservation Corps, Orange Crew, Summer ‘23 <3

:P

Last summer, near Walker, CA

Two entries from late June, starting out on the PCT backcountry crew. This was back when we were training somewhere off highway 395, and my writing had space to breathe in the boredom of time passing in camp as we went through wilderness first aid and crew member training before the season really picked up.

6/27/2022

The way a piney floor warms, cut sparsely by a gentle breeze. Time to time, the wind picks up, a sheet of sound moves through these mountains. Fallen pine cones scatter amongst the needles. We pry off a scale, snap each in half to reveal the ribs beneath the woody surface. 

Just past 6 I headed up the ridge and bore right for a view of the valley going wide, out to the town in the flat. Trying to understand my position between these slopes. These ravaged slopes–a sliding mess of ash, of downed pines, and the greenery fighting to stake a claim on this severe slope. 

Twin babbling creeks, a spindly lupine taken root. The placement of boulders. The ones I sat amongst to shelter feebly from the wind. And the puzzling, rounded ones I saw high upon a steeper slope, left of where I chose to go. 

6/28/22

My sleep broke up into little anxious shards. This morning I got up at 5:20 to mount the ridge again. Walking up along the scree I was morning light thrown upon the far slopes. The sun was somewhere, hidden. 

Now it’s just before 10 and I’m in bed, fly open, spread wide to see the luscious array of stars upon the dark. I am tired.

Tired day. I took a wretched nap after lunch laying in the bed of needles by the babbling creek. Warm sun and flies danced upon my face. There and now a delicious rousing breeze would push through the valley. 

Stevie, fielding, jake and I went up that scree-covered slope to see what there was. We went up and up to the left, where I’d never been, us in a rocky intermediate hilltop all surrounded by majestic slope. Jake reads my tarot. We sit upon the earth, I dip my hands into earth and ash melded together and the dust glitters upon my sooted skin. 

I am going down alone, watching my shadow cast down the hill, making big strides as the sweetest portion of day blooms into light. 

Today after class was over I set out on the trail leading out of our campsite. 

I watched the crown of light shrink upon the rocky ridges, and a haze of sweet evening light settled and morphed over Walker. Then back down. Bed down, bedtime.

Penstemon’s fiery plumage looking down the spine of a valley. Granite faces that beckon you to mount, to push further, that threaten to take your breath. The squirrel mewling in the newborn dawn. The fractallike patterns found in the arrangement of scales in the freefallen pinecones. Vibrant snowflower pulls life from a fungal system. A snakefly meanders through the deep furrows of spruce-bark. The land that still has so much to teach me. What will i learn this summer?