Meghan's Blog

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March 20, 2006

The Stillness of Simplicity

First of all, a great thanks to all of you who commented positively on my last blog entry. It's remarkable to experience support and care from the most unique and unexpected places. I appreciate it.

When life doesn't go "my way," or when it travels in an unexpected direction, I have the tendency to fill my life to its capacity with complex activities. In the past, I have recognized that such activities serve as temporary distractions from my concerns, crutches that assist me until the rocky roads settle smooth again. I have also recognized this as escape-artist behavior, avoidance in its fullest form. And further, while such mind-numbing, busy-body occupation is temporarily fruitful, it detracts from my ability to process my problems and move on. This time around (I make it sound like my life is full of problems, when really it is the opposite.), I told myself that I didn't want to do that.

Instead, I went to the backcountry, where it's impossible to avoid simple stillness. Sure, I was very busy out there, but I wasn't distracting myself with fast-action movies, other people's life dramas, or making a new running plan for the third time in a week. Rather, I went to a place and engaged in activities that gave me ample time to think and ponder.

We spent the weekend at the Basin Station Cabin, located in the Gallatin National Forest. It's a brief ski/snowshoe/snowmobile in, only 2 miles or so, across a wide open valley filled with a winter's accummulation of deep, deep snow. From the cabin, the backcountry opens wide into mountains, valleys, rivers, and lakes. The cabin itself is wonderfully primitive, consisting of two rooms, an outhouse, and a barn full of wood. There was no electricity, no running water, and only 2 woodstoves for heating and cooking.

We traveled in to the cabin, me on skis, my friend on snowshoes, and the dog on four feet, through a wild snowstorm. Luckily we only had to follow a forest service road to the cabin, otherwise navigation would have been impossible in the storm. Arriving to the cabin, we could only see its roof! On 3 of its sides, snow was piled halfway up the windows. On the front side, previous cabin users had done a good job of keeping the porch and door shoveled out. However, descending off the feet and feet of snow to go into the cabin was a surreal, sort of subterranean experience.

After arriving to the cabin, we dumped most of the weight of our packs and set out for an afternoon adventure in the direction of Hegben Lake, which looks a lot different in winter. By the middle of the afternoon, the storm had passed, leaving us about 5 inches of new snow and better weather for playing. We spent the afternoon in child-like play and arduous physical activity. We climbed a few tall hills above the lake, which gave us a literal bird's-eye view of the lake. It's a huge lake with many arms that jut out into valleys between big mountains, and part of it is open water, even in the winter. The waterfowl there were amazing, swans, geese, bald eagles, and other birds that I couldn't identify, and also highly vocal. You could hear their squawking and screeching from high upon the hillside.

We made hairy descent down to the lakeside, wherein I got to test my ability at turning in backcountry cross country skis. My turns weren't pretty, but I did well until the very bottom, where I hit something hidden underneath the snow. My feet abruptly stopped, but my upper body catapaulted forward into a fine faceplant in the snow. It was immediately funny, and nothing hurt because I bit it into feet and feet of fluffy snow.

At the lakeside, we discovered what appeared to be an inholding of private land surrounding the forest service land. The inholding was completely fenced, and had a hoity-toity suburban-neighborhood name. We went into it and saw that, indeed, it was a small subdivision of "summer homes" for the rich, way back here in the backcountry. The "summer homes," which had no sign of recent visitation or occupation, were houses and cabins much bigger than most homes I could imagine living in. Many of the houses were camouflaged well under feet and feet of snow. On some of the houses, snow was built up so high on their sides that it met directly with the snow on the roof. We had brought sleds with us, and we immediately recognized the sledding potential of these snowy rooves! By climbing the snow to the roof's apex, you could sled down the roof and onto the ground with little danger or effort. I felt very Monkey Wrench Gang-like or Edukators-like, playing stealthily in an empty, rich neighborhood.

After this, we spent the rest of the afternoon sledding on a big, open hill. It was akin to childhood again, racing uphill while sinking deep into snow and trailing a red sled called "The Torpedo" behind us, arriving at the top winded and unable to speak, jumping into a sled and heading downhill fast and out of control. I crashed a couple of times, filling my face and my jacket with crunchy snow; it never hurt and it made me laugh so hard!

At the end of the day, we had a few miles of skiing/snowshoeing back to the cabin, and I was exhausted by the time we got there. Despite my fatigue, I could still see the beauty in the waning light of day, with far-off mountains and nearby hillsides glowing pink in the evening.

The process of survival in a primitive place is a long list of physical chores. First, one must caudle and care for a little fire in a wood stove, such that it grows into a big, heat-producing, light-giving, food-cooking fire. Then, one must chop enough wood to heat a cabin from the winter cold for the duration of your stay. After that, there is the the task of melting several cubic feet of snow to provide water for drinking and cooking. Next, there is the endeavor of cooking, with primitive implements and over a primitive stove. We accomplished all of our tasks successfully, and found ourselves eating heartily, drinking plentifully, and chatting animatedly through the evening. When it was time to sleep, I fell asleep without issue, contrary to the brain-wracking and cover-twisting sleeping attempts I had been making for the last few weeks, all while listening to a the quiet crackle of sappy pine in the wood stove.

Running? I took the weekend off of running. I skied my arse off, though. I skied so much my arse it sore! I returned to running this afternoon, and I'll write about it momentarily.

Posted by Meghan at March 20, 2006 9:00 PM

Comments

Posted by: jeff at March 22, 2006 7:48 AM

Posted by: corrado giambalvo at March 22, 2006 3:04 PM

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