Saturday, January 23, 2010
Sunday, January 3, 2010
A Small Cabin On A Mountaintop- Part One
It was May when I first drove the winding country road through the deepest parts of one of the most beautiful States in our country; West Virginia. The year was 1966: The Vietnam war was raging, young men and women were dying, protesters were marching and going to jail and some of them were dying as well. It was a time of almost diabolical contrast. The killing fields of Vietnam vs the loving fields of San Francisco, and other places. Woodstock was yet to be. United States president Lyndon Johnson was saying that we should stay in Vietnam until Communist aggression was stopped there. US troops now totalities, 385,000, and 20,000 Buddhists marched in demonstrations against the policies of the military Government in South Vietnam.
Driving that back country road as the beauty of Spring was coming to life, I was feeling far removed from all that was going on in "the outside world." And yet, I was about as non removed as a person could be. My father was Government. I was, in the words of John Fogerty; "a fortunate one." And yet, I had already refused to take part in the safe life, having publicly burned my draft card, refused induction into the Vietnam War after forcing the Selective Service to reclassify me from"fortunate" ( otherwise known as 3-A, that is a family hardship deferment ( What Hardship ?) and a college deferment to boot meant I was never going to Vietnam. Except I was not going to sit silently and watch others die while I took the easy road out. So as I drove that beautiful country road, I was remembering the day I was supposed to step forward and accept enlistment, but instead stepped backward and said " No Thank You," I laughed as I remembered the Sargent's face looking like it was about to explode.
So Prison was no doubt in my future. It was part of my plan to accept nothing that "they" would offer, but first I was going to have a little fun and lead them,the FBI, and a few others on a merry chase for awhile. There will be more on those adventures in the future, but this is about the wonder and beauty of aloneness and the ability to sink into one's mind with the sounds of the City and the normal rush and noise of the day to day world left behind.
So driving on, I finally entered Alderson, West Virginia, but to get to where I was going would be a few more miles on paved road, then 2 miles up what amounted to little more than a trail. and the last two miles would be on foot. And as yet,there was no cabin, That would need to be built before the first cold began on my mountain top.Walking up the last few hundred yards to where I would spend the next year of my life, I could see smoke.Were the woods on fire? The nearest cabin was about 3 miles on the other side of the mountain, so it could not be a fireplace. But it was.The friend that I would spend the next year with-a very self-efficient and capable woman had already built a fireplace of rock. In fact, it was one wall of what would be the cabin. Having no other heat or electricity, this fireplace would be used not only for heating the cabin but heating hot water and cooking. It was large enough to heat a very large kettle of water or food, with a side stove for baking. Other walls had been started, with the help of the nearest neighbors, as well as a garden begun. Emily, who owned the property, was also a military brat. But very against the war, her Father was a General in the Army,she was not just going to sit around and wait for me to arrive. Her abilities were made even more remarkable by her small delicate looking frame and pretty face. Not the type of look you would expect on a woman who would carry rocks and wood and begin the building of such a place.
When the cabin was finished, we tended the garden, grew sunflowers, and took long hikes either together or alone. A stream ran through the property about fifty yards from the cabin, from the top of the mountain where there was a medium size waterfall and I spent many hours alone there thinking of the future, the past, and mostly the beauty of the present.I heard birds singing, and occasionally the sound of something in the woods, could be a bear, wolf, or deer....this was true wilderness. It was not unusual to wake in the morning to see a deer or a few wolves playing in the yard, or a bear trying to get over the fence that protected the garden, or into the small barn built for one goat for milk. Goats milk, by the way, in my opinion is very good. And we had a few chickens for eggs. Fish came from the stream and meat was never eaten. We had beans, rice, plenty of vegetables, and fish. The diet was sound and healthy and provided by us for us, and not by the local Stop and Spend.
The mornings, even in the summertime, can be a little chilly and a fog will add an even deeper mystery to the world. Forms move across in the distance almost like spirits, and the Cardinal, the state bird of West Virginia, will begin to sing the sun awake while the soul seems to have found its place on this earth.
After a year I left Emily and that mountain. I never saw her or the mountain again. I often wonder, is she still living there, or if she also returned to a city somewhere remembering the mountain top days. Even if that is so, I like to think that there is still an old stone fireplace standing and reverberating the memories of long ago, and maybe the great grandson of that old bear still rubs against the garden fence, and the wolves welcome the moon at night and the Cardinal sings to the morning sun. It can take my soul back to that place of peace, believing that is true....
Driving that back country road as the beauty of Spring was coming to life, I was feeling far removed from all that was going on in "the outside world." And yet, I was about as non removed as a person could be. My father was Government. I was, in the words of John Fogerty; "a fortunate one." And yet, I had already refused to take part in the safe life, having publicly burned my draft card, refused induction into the Vietnam War after forcing the Selective Service to reclassify me from"fortunate" ( otherwise known as 3-A, that is a family hardship deferment ( What Hardship ?) and a college deferment to boot meant I was never going to Vietnam. Except I was not going to sit silently and watch others die while I took the easy road out. So as I drove that beautiful country road, I was remembering the day I was supposed to step forward and accept enlistment, but instead stepped backward and said " No Thank You," I laughed as I remembered the Sargent's face looking like it was about to explode.
So Prison was no doubt in my future. It was part of my plan to accept nothing that "they" would offer, but first I was going to have a little fun and lead them,the FBI, and a few others on a merry chase for awhile. There will be more on those adventures in the future, but this is about the wonder and beauty of aloneness and the ability to sink into one's mind with the sounds of the City and the normal rush and noise of the day to day world left behind.
So driving on, I finally entered Alderson, West Virginia, but to get to where I was going would be a few more miles on paved road, then 2 miles up what amounted to little more than a trail. and the last two miles would be on foot. And as yet,there was no cabin, That would need to be built before the first cold began on my mountain top.Walking up the last few hundred yards to where I would spend the next year of my life, I could see smoke.Were the woods on fire? The nearest cabin was about 3 miles on the other side of the mountain, so it could not be a fireplace. But it was.The friend that I would spend the next year with-a very self-efficient and capable woman had already built a fireplace of rock. In fact, it was one wall of what would be the cabin. Having no other heat or electricity, this fireplace would be used not only for heating the cabin but heating hot water and cooking. It was large enough to heat a very large kettle of water or food, with a side stove for baking. Other walls had been started, with the help of the nearest neighbors, as well as a garden begun. Emily, who owned the property, was also a military brat. But very against the war, her Father was a General in the Army,she was not just going to sit around and wait for me to arrive. Her abilities were made even more remarkable by her small delicate looking frame and pretty face. Not the type of look you would expect on a woman who would carry rocks and wood and begin the building of such a place.
When the cabin was finished, we tended the garden, grew sunflowers, and took long hikes either together or alone. A stream ran through the property about fifty yards from the cabin, from the top of the mountain where there was a medium size waterfall and I spent many hours alone there thinking of the future, the past, and mostly the beauty of the present.I heard birds singing, and occasionally the sound of something in the woods, could be a bear, wolf, or deer....this was true wilderness. It was not unusual to wake in the morning to see a deer or a few wolves playing in the yard, or a bear trying to get over the fence that protected the garden, or into the small barn built for one goat for milk. Goats milk, by the way, in my opinion is very good. And we had a few chickens for eggs. Fish came from the stream and meat was never eaten. We had beans, rice, plenty of vegetables, and fish. The diet was sound and healthy and provided by us for us, and not by the local Stop and Spend.
The mornings, even in the summertime, can be a little chilly and a fog will add an even deeper mystery to the world. Forms move across in the distance almost like spirits, and the Cardinal, the state bird of West Virginia, will begin to sing the sun awake while the soul seems to have found its place on this earth.
After a year I left Emily and that mountain. I never saw her or the mountain again. I often wonder, is she still living there, or if she also returned to a city somewhere remembering the mountain top days. Even if that is so, I like to think that there is still an old stone fireplace standing and reverberating the memories of long ago, and maybe the great grandson of that old bear still rubs against the garden fence, and the wolves welcome the moon at night and the Cardinal sings to the morning sun. It can take my soul back to that place of peace, believing that is true....
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