River Walker

Trick or treat comes in at 3 a.m. Not able to sleep I was playing my cedar flute and combining words about trails done, and those sleeping behind the horizon, surprized at how finished it was sounding. It is the first cold night. The top of my water bottles is a quarter of an inch of ice. Surrounded by trees, I am on a flat clearing above Beef Creek. The sound of feet comes through the woods, intent and confident. It is the one sound I fear above all others at this hour. Only man walks the woods so boldly. Fearlessly I spring from my shelter because I am nothing but a target on my back inside a tent. She comes up easy as if smiling complete with her mask of black. She is young and hungry. Every leg in the forest is a worried belly searching under a full cold moon. Talking softly, my mind goes over my list of staples. Out of all the weight that I carry in materials I only come up with dried cranberries and spiced almonds. Hunger makes bold the shy...to a point. Tossing six almonds into the leaves, six almonds soon becomes a cup and a half, and my friend knows my life story. Delighted to watch my little friend with the white brow eat, and then catch an unwarry spider and eat that, it is an easy decision to share the rest of what was to be my mornings breakfast. Two hours pass. My little racoon friend is now coming into my tent foyer past my boots, and camp stove, beside my pillow to incline about perhaps just a few more of those almonds. All the almonds are already round in her belly. I do find a sweetened packet of instant coffee drink. Shrugging, I hand it to her. She no longer runs to devour her reward, deciding instead to hold up the packet squeezing it with her two mini hands and bite. Coffee mix powder goes all over her face in a poof. Alarmed, or insulted my little bandit runs from my tent, and keeps running until she gets to the tree line and then walks into the night. A date gone bad.

It is early morning. I am knee deep in the cold creek with my morning cup steaming from my hand. Fifty yards away is a steel I-beam and rivet bridge spanning above the waterway. The morning traffic of farm trucks, and the long fluted trailers of cattle and horses move along in gentle cadence. They slow on the bridge seeing this man perched in the water below. In earnest they wave their large cracked hands and weathered grins from under soiled brimed caps. For this one moment we are talking without words. We are America living. Exchanging dream for dream. Cameraless pictures taken. We are the freedom we feel tug at our insides when we watch wilderness movies. We are for this moment, the journey, not the destination. When I have emptied my cup I kneel like a prospector to swish away the holdings in the bottom of the cup, squinting up at the day. Walking up the bank to break camp as frost becomes dawn, I am better than clean, and saying thank-you.