The Walk - Epilogue

     Slept in on Friday.  Must have been near seven when the coffee started perking.  So easy here.  Could even walk about barefoot.  Sun was up and streaming through the lookout windows when I ate my last meal of camp food.  Yeah, the cupboard was pretty bare.  Needed a run down to Grand Marais for food, a store bought lunch, the library, do the laundry and see if the world still remembers I'm alive in my post office box.  Don't get much mail besides bills but you never know.  Tomorrow the plan is to recover my stashes.  Long drive but has to be done.  Hopefully, the coolers haven't spontaneously combusted from the festering contents.
     'Spose all was right with the world but couldn't shake the empty feeling that rose with me this morning.  Not of fan of things ending.  'Specially a trip like this one.  Lived as simple as simple could be for a couple of weeks.  Liked that a lot.  Hiking the trails filled me with meaning.  Nothing I could lay my finger on, just felt right.  And now that it's over… well, it's over.  Door's closed.  'Bout the only thing to do is plan a canoe trip before the lakes ice over.  Get my little world here at the cabin ship shape and head out for a few days.  But no LRRP rations.  Had enough of them for a lifetime.

     Town was still there.  Finished my rounds at the post office, Dairy Queen cherry shake in hand to help me find a few pounds I'd left back on the trail.  Fistful of bills.  Electric, phone - yeah I have a phone, use it a few times each month to check on family - truck insurance.  And a fancy envelope from Archie and Lauren.  Saw it and knew right away what it was.  Holy-moly, they were getting married tomorrow.  Guess my plans just changed.  Coolers'd have to wait.
     Now, this was back in the days when a man wore a suit to a wedding, a funeral or in the box when they buried him.  Mine wasn't exactly in style, lapels too narrow, but I sure had one.  Dark blue, wool blend, no holes, wrinkles or stains.  Even a five spot stashed in a pocket.  And a memorial card from Uncle Wilhelm's funeral.  "Yeah, though I walk through the valley of death." Uncle Willie was in the Great War and did his share of walking through that valley.  Probably crawled through it too.
     Didn't have much in the line of dress shirts.  Went with a Pendleton, plaid, said I was a man of the north who had little use for fashion but did like quality.  No tie.  Figured I'd simply button my shirt to the neck.  Buffed a coat of Kiwi on my funeral shoes and I was set.
     Service wasn't till seven on Saturday evening so I drove down in the morning.  Bummed a room from my sister Dora.  Drove over with her and her hubby, Ben.  Nice service, candle lit and all.  Had both a priest and a minister up front.  Guessed they were keeping their options open.  Options are good.  Hard to reopen a door once you've closed and locked it.  And believe you me, religions are big on locking doors.
     Got a minute with Archie later that night at Lauren's folks house.  Like to say we discussed all kinds of profound things but we didn't.  How much thought and feeling can you pack into a few seconds?  Archie had a big grin on his face.  Happy man.  I managed to squeeze back the tears, happy for him, sad for me, 'til I stepped outside.  Sat with Archie's mom, my sister Mary, on the cement steps out front.  Nice night.  Summer warm.  Bummed a smoke from her.  Kools, not my cup of tea but the occasion called for smoke.  Mary knew how much the boy meant to me.  And I knew how she felt.  Archie's not her only child but was her last by more than a dozen years.  A glance between us said enough.  We exchanged a few meaningless remembrances then simply sat smoking and enjoying the warmth of a late Indian summer evening.
     Long drive home on Sunday.  Bucked a cold, north wind all the way.  By Two Harbors, sleet.  Grand Marais, snow.  A melting inch on the ground at the cabin.  Most of the country'd see this as the arrival of winter.  Up here in the Arrowhead it spoke to me of a last canoe trip and spawning lake trout.

The Walk XX - Looking For the Ark

     Never did rain hard.  Didn't rain all the time either.  Probably no more than seventy or eighty of the next hundred hours.  And most of those hours were at night.  Like to say it was no big deal but it was no happy time.  Wasn't a sad one either.  Just a minor misery.  Like a never-ending hand pushing down ever so gently on my head.
     The forrest above and ground cover at my feet were both near the peak of autumn color when I set off.  Would've been spectacular in sunshine.  Wasn't bad in the half light of dense overcast, drizzle and mist.  Most of what I saw was framed by the visor of my ball cap and blinders of jacket hood.  Back in the tunnel.  Constantly absorbed in thought and slowly tiring of my sodden company.  Then hit another layer of acceptance.  It'd rain.  I'd get wet.  Walked through that open door and continued on.  Once I accepted, I could relax.  Oh yeah, I also tugged on a second layer of stockings.  My wet feet soon'd become abraded feet without that forgiving extra layer.  Had more socks waiting at my last re-supply.
     Didn't take long for my world to soak through.  Meals, clothes, shoes, feet, sleeping bag.  Even the water in the lakes I camped beside was wetter than usual.  Found myself jumping up and down every morning, lunch and supper to loosen the moss.  Never'd thought to bring a razor.  Never thought I'd grow orange lichens on my chin whiskers.  Looked like a damned leprechaun, smelled like a dead carp.  Yeah, I was not a pleasant presence to behold through any of the five senses on the last days of the hike.  Odd though it may seem, low grade misery grew to be my friend.  Came to relish the idiocy of what I was doing, the privacy of being hunkered in the solitude of movement and thought.
     And those thoughts kept returning to Archie.  Never had a child of my own.  Don't know what it'd feel like.  How I'd react to the responsibility.  And on the flip side, Archie never had a father to speak of.  Same boat, different lake.  We'd had the best of each other without the emotional baggage.  Years earlier, don't remember where, he'd said something to the effect that not having a father wasn't all that bad.  'Stead of having to deal with the mix of goods and bads of real flesh and blood he was able to make up the father he wanted from bits and pieces of the men he'd met in life or his reading.  Probably no man like that anywhere but in his head.  Don't know how he'd come to feel about himself when he had children of his own.  Probably feel he'd fallen short in most every way.
     Don't want to flatter myself but believe he might have seen me as being as close to his mental image as anyone.  If so, the man in his mind sure wasn't the man in the back of the canoe, though I doubt it mattered.  We took to each other pretty good.  Filled holes in each other's lives for a week or more each year.
     Not much to say over those last four days.  Rained.  Then rained more.  Got tired of LRRP meals.  Got so it was hard to choke 'em down.  On the upside, they filled me up and were warm.  What more did I want?  Except maybe a garden fresh tomato.  Or a banana.  Maybe an orange.
     On the short stretch of the Gunflint Trail a woman in a pickup truck slowed, stopped, rolled down her window and asked me if I wanted a lift.  Said,  "Sure.  Tell me a joke."  Got a stare then a laugh out of her.  Guess I gave her a lift.
     The thought of bagging the hike never entered my head.  Not that I was bull-headed just that I knew it wouldn't feel right.  Never been one to quit on something once I'd started.  Besides, like I said, I was having a good time in a low key kind of way.  Minnesota kind of way.  Yeah, there's a book full of jokes about our attitude up here in the northland.  Mostly founded on exaggeration of underlying truth.  Seems we know life's based on balance and usually stays pretty close to the fulcrum.  That it's raining today doesn't mean it'll be raining tomorrow.  Or sunny for that matter.  Life goes along its merry way doing what it has to do.  With luck a man can catch onto the ride for his three score and ten.  Take it as it comes and be ready for what's around the corner.  Though it would be nice to have dry shoes.
     Gave thoughts to what I'd do once I was home.  Wood to split, shopping in town, maybe a last canoe trip.  Then thought of the future.  My yesterdays now far outnumbered my tomorrows.  And how many of those tomorrows would be spent in good health?  And how many would be spent in my cabin?  All things a man doesn't want to deal with but knows he has no choice.  Life calls the shots and doesn't much care how any one man feels about it.  Simply put, I enjoyed my life and had no immediate intentions to move onto something new.  Figured to put faith in my feelings and, as always, my dreams.
     Sun came out for a few minutes on the bluffs above Rose Lake just past the falls.  Almost did a jig for joy.  Instead, simply enjoyed the moment of steam rising from my body.  Still some color down below but the rain had done a job on the leaves.  Mostly pine and spruce green with splashes of gold and crimson dancing off beneath roving cloud shadows to the Canadian horizon.  'Spose part of my joy was knowing I'd be home for supper the next evening.  September'd already seen its days come and go.  A fitting season for a man who was solidly in the fall of his life.  But October's a good month too.  Drops a few hints of summer here and there.  And calls for long johns more often as the days pass.
     Took my last break alongside the McFarland Road after it'd dropped the lake from view.  Thank God it was still raining.  Wouldn't have seemed fitting had the sun come out.  Almost an insult.  Been wet for four days and wanted to stay that way 'til I stripped the rotting clothes off my back.
     Came to the conclusion as stood under the shower that warm water feels better than cold.  And yeah, damn it, the rain stopped about the time I turned in the driveway.  Got me laughing.  Sometimes I think Mother Nature likes to play jokes on me.  If so, she's got a great sense of humor.

The Walk XIX - Homeward Bound

     Dear Uncle Emil,

     It's for sure.  The Ninth Division has been divided into two groups.  Two thirds of us (by us I mean me too) are going, the remainder have been reassigned to other divisions.  Of course my steps were dogged by my good friend, irony.  I'm not sure if that's the right word.  Maybe strange coincidence is more accurate but irony seems to make the story better.  As to where we're going, rumors ruled the roost until last week.  Fort Ord, California one day, Fort Collins, Colorado the next.  Once in a while Schofield Barracks in Hawaii popped up but who could believe something like that?  Well, Schofield won.  Back in infantry training when those of us with glasses were issued prescription sunglasses we joked we were getting them for our future duty in Hawaii.  Guess that turned out to be true for two out of a hundred, ninety-two of us.  Who'd have thought it would pay to be three days AWOL?

     When the sorting out process began, those staying in country were weeded out first but not all at once.  Over two cycles to the field faces changed.  New men arrived, others simply vanished to other units.  We were never told exactly what was happening during each step, things just changed.  However, with each passing day the rumors got more accurate.  Finally, we stopped going to the field and the war in the delta was taken over by the ARVNs.  Good luck with that.  From the little I'd seen of them they didn't seem to be much of a fighting force.  Hope I'm wrong.

     As the next few days passed those who were heading back to the World but had the least time in country began to be reassigned to other duty.  My two best friends ended up working at the PX.  Each morning in formation a dozen or two names were called out to be assigned.  After a week all but nine of us were either ordered to other duty or told they would remain with the company.  Finally, eight of the remaining nine were ordered to remain with Bravo Company but not me.  Last man on the fence.  It should have come as no surprise.  Part of me feared retribution from our First Sergeant for the time when he told me I wasn't paid to think.  When you're the last man it's easy to think you're being singled out for the very worst reasons.

     At last I was reassigned.  Turned out they were forming a new Field MP platoon and that's where I was headed.  Grabbed my gear and struggled off across base a happy man knowing I was on my way to Hawaii.  Would have cried for joy had it not been improper for a man who'd faced the enemy and not crapped his pants.
     So that's where I am, in a barracks filled with MPs and MPs-to-be.  We received one week of training then started working duty shifts.  Since us new guys are at the short end of the stick, we get the night shifts.  Odd how attitudes change in a heartbeat.  As grunts we had no love for MPs and now that we wear the black armband, MPs instantly turned into decent people.  Night on base sure beats night in the field and sleeping in a bunk feels much better than the floor of a rice paddy or under a haystack (yup, me and the Farmer slept under a haystack to escape a night time downpour).
    On my first shift I came to learn about the AWOL problem.  Apparently there were a few GIs who'd decided the war wasn't to their liking and walked off base with intentions of never being seen again.  Then word came down that the division was pulling out and they started to sneak back under cover of darkness, one at a time.  That first night, me and the regular MP I was riding with, had to arrest one of the AWOLs.  Felt sorry for the guy.  Both for the time he was going to spend in the stockade and for being dumb enough to do what he did and mostly for where he did it.  I figure he felt time in jail beat having to face the NVA should they win the war. 
     At night we get access to a WATS line.  I don't know if that's the right word for free long distance phone calls.  There's usually a half hour wait in line but it sure is great being able to call home.  At the moment there's a wedding in the offing.  I'm not sure of the date as it all depends on when I can get leave.  Once again rumors fly.  At the moment they're saying our leaves will come when we're finally assigned to existing units back at Schofield Barracks.  Who knows, maybe this one is right?

     Aloha,
     Archie

     That was the last letter I received.  Might be the last ever.  Archie's life is on the fast track.  Combat, release, marriage, all in a few weeks.  Doubt he'll find the time to write.  Or get his head screwed on straight for a long time.  Maybe our trips are done for good.  That I wrote 'maybe' is the hope of an aging man knowing life is passing him by.  Boys grow to men.  Men to fathers.  Free time gone to the winds.
     Awoke in the middle of the night, tent lit by the full moon.  Lap of waves on the shore rubble and a soft rustling along the tarp walls.  Popped the flashlight on a pair of beady eyes.  Probably following the scent of crumbs on my heaped clothes.  Doused the beam and lay musing on the mouse.  And that I was able to hear his probing.  A good sound when your hearing's as poor as mine.  Passed onto thinking of the unseen and unheard layers of life.  Felt like I was close to some kind of truth.  One that was about as substantial and lasting as the froth on the morning's stream as it passed beneath the log bridge.  Fought hard to get a grip on whatever that truth was but sleep got me first.  Maybe it had me all along.
     Clouds rolled in during the early morning hours.  Didn't feel like rain but strapped my rain jacket on the outside of the pack just in case.  Thinking of Bingshick Lake for camp tonight.  Either that or Harness less than another quarter mile up the trail.  Not much excitement today, just miles.  Dreamt of a maple tree in my neighbor's yard last night.  Double trunked, both dead at the top.  The man kept dropping hints he wanted it felled by your's truly.  I took one look at the surrounding power lines and knew there was no sense in me trying.  Didn't have the skill.  Don't know what it is about people in dreams.  Not a one of them shows respect for the feelings and skills of others.  'Specially me.  Been thinking of hiring a new dream crew.  Maybe some good looking ladies instead of idiot neighbors.  Maybe a couple of comedians.  Dreams of my youth had more pizzazz.  These days it's neighbors with sick trees.  Makes me consider foregoing sleep altogether.
     Reached Bingshick lowering under clouds but with near seventy degree air.  Time for a swim.  Don't know how cold a well digger's belt buckle is but I've heard they're near as cold as the water I swam in.  Raised my voice two octaves and gave thought to a late life career with the Vienna Boys Choir.  Couple of logs intended as benches graced the fire grate.  Have no love of logs when I'm canoeing.  Six hours paddling is pain enough in a man's backside.  But after a day of walking they had their appeal.
     Slept 'til near three before I stepped outside.  Felt the first raindrop on my return.
     

The Walk XVIII - Alte Wunderkindt

     My name is Emil and I'm a creature of habit.  Should you ask me I'd say ritual.  Has a more respectable ring to it.  Like a man of God in touch with the inner, unseen workings of the universe.  But habit's more accurate.  Closer to the ground I'm walking.  Not that habit's a bad thing.  No sir.  Takes a lifetime of sifting through possibility to find the things that're most valuable to a man.  Find 'em, grab 'em, hold on to them, cherish them, polish them to a fine sheen.  Now and then add a new one or modify an old.

     Anyhow, repetition was on my mind as I set off in the morning to the tune of a tailwind.  'Course in the woods there's no such thing as a true tailwind.  Just a tendency.  Trees play havoc with a breeze.  Bend it, twist it, turn it upside down.  Down at foot level, she comes at you four ways at once.  Five on a Sunday.  Definitely no pattern.  Figured to do the same myself when finding tonight's campsite.  Two overnights on Drumstick was fine, almost a pleasure.  But had no intention to repeat any sites on my way home.  The question was, long day or short day to get me started and out of sync?  Since I was on the trail before eight and feeling spry and being who I am, there was only one answer.  Besides, two extra miles got me that much closer to home.  Not that I'm not happy to be where I am but I can feel the gravity of the cabin.  And the closer I got, the stronger it'd be.
     Once in stride I turned my thoughts back to last night's letter.  Not so much the dysentery, more the dilemma of war and the idiots who get us into such fixes.  Behind the nobility of any cause stands a bully with a gun.  What we did in WWII was truly good.  Returned order to the world.  But would have been unnecessary without thugs like Tojo, Hitler and their henchmen.  How in the hell do such people come to power?  And what's to keep us from allowing those kind of people from ruining our lives here in America?  Frustrating.  Even more so when you're like me and don't have an answer.  And here I am, winding along the solitude of the Kekekabic, conflicted thoughts running through my head.  Platitudes of newsmen and philosophers clouding a perfectly fine day.  No white steed or shining suit of armor in sight.  Couldn't ride down into the maelstrom and bring good to the world on the tip of my lance even if I wanted.  May as well go back to breathing and walking.  Absorb the day around me.
     Took a break after crossing the log bridge.  Lot of work went into carving that log and all for a handful of hikers like me.  A few moments of thought seemed the least I could do to repay the effort and skill.  'Course good intentions come on faster feet than mine….

     Wrote this story in journal form.  Yeah, that's what it is, mostly.  Started off back at the cabin with intentions of writing in detail all that happened, as it happened.  Or, at the least, writing up some detailed notes every evening.  Photographs of words.  In years to come, as my memory clouded,  I'd be able to pull out these pages and relive the walk many times.  Good intentions, a little weak as to results.  Did make a few notes every night.  Well, most every night.  Would've written more but tired feet, tired mind and a sixty-three year old body said to take it easy.  But I do have a good memory.  Those few notes were outline enough to flesh out my steps while sitting above in my lookout.  What's on these pages is pretty much what happened.  Truthful as I could make it.
     Then, in desperation, at a loss for words of truth, I strayed from the path.  Ran amok on a convoluted story of my brothers Bud and Rich that never happened.  Oh it was a funny story alright, slapstick and biblical all rolled into one.  Right up there with some of my best.  But none of it ever happened.  Would have left it in had I not had the dream of last night.  By now you must know I listen to my dreams.  Most are lightweight corrections to keep me from falling off the tight rope.  Last night's was a welter, maybe even a middleweight.  Was building either a small cabin or garage.  Kind of like the little tale I'm constructing.  She was framed up nice, from the ground up to putting on the roof trusses.  At the last moment I decided to give the roof two parallel peaks.  Like the letter M.  Well, that created some serious problems.  Would've leaked in the valley and the eaves were all catty-wampus.  Don't know who it was that pointed out how messed up my roof was.  Voice of truth and reason probably.  Looked like a man I once worked with.  Didn't much care for him but he had no problem speaking his mind.  Knew I had to gut the roof.  Tear it down and start over.  Keep it simple and get it right.  But sure as heck didn't want to.  Woke up trying not to listen to the dream but it wouldn't leave me alone.  Went for a walk.  Came back and deep-sixed close to three pages of work.  Oh me, oh my.  Never done that before but, once done, it sure felt good.  But left the title.  I like the sound of it.
     So, consider this side step to be a part of the hike.  I do.  And want to remember it as such.  A man's life doesn't always move in a line.  Moves more like interlaced fingers, back and forth, back and forth.  Now here, now yesterday, sometimes tomorrow.

     Always liked the sound of rushing water.  A hundred voices, each whispering different songs, stories.  All in different keys.  Song of water, rocks, earth, plants, froth.  Reflections of broken sky and treetops dancing on the flow.  Galloping downhill in a crowd.  A few stragglers eddying back along the shore.  Dissonant, yet somehow those many voices fit together.  Can't explain it but sure do like it.  Sat there, pack off and gape-jawed my way through the concert.
     A walk like mine doesn't travel by the hour.  The feet do but not me.  My passage was five minutes of attention here, one there.  Together my feet and thoughts moved like a man with an easily distracted dog on a long leash.  Spent a lot of time on the trails chasing the scent of days no longer there.
     Finally rose from my haze, shouldered my pack and moved on.  No hurry.  Yeah, there was a part of me wanting to be home.  Standing shoulder to shoulder with Mister Hurry-up was another side saying I'd be a fool to rush the miles.  To this point I'd walked in both sun and rain.  Warm and cold.  No matter the conditions I'd managed to get through each day.  Still had plenty of food and fuel.  Also a last resupply no more than two days away.  Plan was simple, don't do anything stupid and enjoy the scenery.  Harness Lake tonight.  The site'd looked good a couple of days earlier, no reason it wouldn't today.  Continuity in the universe is a good thing.  Nice to know where the kitchen'll be when the lights are off.
     Week and a day since I set foot out of the cabin.  Yet it feels like I just started.  Time passes in the wink of an eye.  Augenblick in German.  Nice word.  And on the nail.  Two weeks seemed a long time  looking up the trail from the fresh shoes of those first footsteps.  A wink as a memory.  Must be some kind of mental effect.  Maybe like the Doppler one with sound.  The road of time looks a long way to the next curve.  Shorter than hell in the rearview mirror.  Eeeeeeeeeeeoww.
     Longest and shortest days of my life were back in the war.  Time on ship from one island to the next stretched to the blue horizon.  Then came time to load in the LSTs and time slowed to a crawl.  Each moment an eternity.  Did some reading a few years back on Zen Buddhism and how their form of meditation is simple awareness.  That and a guy in a robe slapping you on the back of the head with a stick when your mind starts to drift into how good that supper bowl of pickled radishes'll taste.  Awareness?  Don't need any reminders when the bullets snap past your ears.  Time?  A thing of the past.  Once thought to look at my watch when we were in the thick of it.  Yeah, it wasn't moving at all.  Time at a standstill.  At least until I wound it.  Got a chuckle out of that.
     The site on Harness Lake wasn't much but enough.  Lake wasn't much more than an aggravated puddle.  Red-black with bog stain, a good sign as to water quality.  Shore was jagged rubble, tough to walk on barefoot.  Ouched my way to knee deep water, there to dip my aluminum pot.  Kept my shoes off knowing a second trip was in order.  Then a third to clean up.  Come morning I'd settle for a simple face washing.
     Thought hit me while washing, how much water, trees and earth love sunlight.  Can't do without it.  Me too.  Lifts my spirits.  Carries some of the weight of my pack when it dapples down through the trees.  Might even get me floating if the pines and popples weren't stealing so many of the rays.  Yeah, those branches grab the light like a kid with access to a cookie jar.  Good thing for me they have butter fingers and bobble enough beams to brighten my steps.
     Stood there in the stained water a few minutes simply enjoying.  Light breeze, low autumn sun, minnows tickling my toes.
   

The Walk XVII - Smile and Whistle

     Woke up this morning with cobwebs in my cobwebs.  Felt like I was two steps behind myself when moving through camp and falling farther behind.  Hardly noticed the rain had stopped.  Though my body was awake enough to be heading brushward for relief, my brain was still on the other side in dreamland.  Not unusual had this been one of those middle of the night trips.  Then I do my best to hold onto my sleep side so as to nod off as soon as my head hits the pillow on my return.  But this was different.  Sleep was holding onto me, not me it.
     Normally there's two worlds - surely there's more than two but I don't want to go there at the moment - in my day, awake and asleep.  Either in one or the other.  No between.  This morning was different if only for a moment.  Maybe not even that long.  Give me an inch of measure here.  I'm not explaining something physical like an igloo.  This is more like a feeling, a hint, a breath of fog.  Anyhow, when sleep let go I had a flash of passing through something as I rose.  Like a thin layer, so thin it's almost not there.  Had the feeling it was the course of my life as it was supposed to be lived.  Kind of like a river or a strip of movie film.  Stood there for a minute watering a patch of gooseberry bushes accompanied by all kinds of philosophical notions about the layer.  What my straying from it might mean.  Yeah, all kinds of high flying notions about meaning.  As I drew my zipper and washed my hands on the big, rain-wet, green leaves I realized what a bunch of hooey my thoughts were.  The only truth was that thin layer and I had no idea what it was, only that it was there for a moment.  Time to return to earth and my morning's oatmeal.
     Everything in camp was sodden.  Not an inch of dry as far as the foot could wander except for the few square feet under the tarp.  Good job Emil.  Above, the clouds were broken and the last few stars faintly peeked through here and there.  The air cool enough to send a warming shiver through my body.  No ice on the bedewed leaves.  Couldn't be colder than thirty-five.  Stripped to my waist and washed.  Wisps of mist rose and hung over Drumstick.  A pair of loons, their checkered mating colors fading, passed, then silently slid below the surface in pursuit of breakfast.  Felt good to be cold, felt better with sleep washed from my face and hair, better still covered with three layers of cotton and checkered wool.  Best of all knowing I'd travel light today and have no camp to raise on my return.  Intended to return by mid-afternoon, hopefully in sunshine.
     To this point I'd traveled at my leisure.  Stopped to look when there was a vista, rested before I got tired.  Ate before I was hungry.  Today was a day for miles.  Fifteen or so round trip with a light load.  Water, rain gear, dirty clothes and snack food.  Lunch was waiting, three hours away.  The return would be heavier but still no more than thirty pounds.  Life was simple on the trail.  So were the joys.  Bear scat here, wolf there.  Evidence of deer and moose.  Squirrel-shucked pine cones atop logs and stumps.  A few of the stumps spoke of ancient pines reaching the sky.  Three or more feet in diameter, mossed and jagged as mountain peaks, grain raised higher than pulp.  Done in by old age, disease or lightening?  Me, I'm hoping old age'll do me in, though lightening might be a more exciting send off.                Occasional large, saucer-shaped cavities in the thin soil spoke of root boles that once were, trees that'd storm toppled and melted to soil.  The trail led me on, swam rivers of yellowed hazel brush and waded brooks of scarlet maple seedlings wherever sunlight streamed to the forest floor.  Light pack, light mind, the miles peeled away.  Clouded thoughts of the darkened morning hours had fizzed away like froth in the bottle of cola waiting on me at lunch.  Simple civilized pleasure in a green bottle.
     The few thoughts that arose drifted away on the freshening breeze, washed from my brain like the rain cleansed air in my lungs.  Damnation I was happy.  Thoughts would only cloud things.  Best to slap 'em down as they entered and get lost in the song of my footfall.  Ain't that poetic?
     Used to pray every night when I went to bed.  That's the way I was raised.  Same as my dozen brothers and sisters.  Yeah, we were a baker's dozen.  Guess God didn't want my Mom and Dad to feel like they'd been shorted when it came to help in the kitchen or the fields.  Hands make a farm work.  Probably where they got the phrase farmhand.  Every night like clockwork we were taught to say our 'Our Fathers' then proceed down the litany of 'God Blesses' for every soul close to us.  Would even've thrown in a Catholic 'Hail Mary' had I heard the an archangel pucker up and blow.  I was third in line, so in the beginning there was little challenge in remembering the 'God Blesses'.  Then every year and a half another brother or sister would sprout up.  Throw in a few uncles, aunts, mutts and friendly barn cats so by the time I was ready to leave home it was a regular recitation of the Encyclopedia of Schonnemanns.
     Don't pray as such any more but do spend time in bed thinking over the day.  Haven't even given formal praying much thought in the last few years.  That it came to mind today might be for a reason.  Maybe taking up the 'God Blesses' once again would be a good thing.  Run down the list of souls who've meant something to me. There's something of me in each of them and a bit of them in me.  We share memories, experience, helped make each other the persons we are.  Kind of a chain.  Yeah, could be it's a time to pull maintenance on the links before the chain breaks.
     Lost in the song of rustling leaves and needles above, I walked past my resupply cairn.  Seems it'd been toppled.  Bad structure or bad spirit?  Didn't matter so long as my food was intact.  The Fernberg Road told me I'd gone too far.  Also told me to mind my step lest I befoul my shoes with the dust of civilization.  Stood in the dappled shade inches from the glare of the gravel.  Too bright.  Too naked.  Over the days my eyes had come to welcome the filters of cloud and tree.  Paused for a good minute before retreating to the safety of the forest.  Felt like a reprieve from the governor not having to step onto the graded surface.  Turned and sought out my cooler.
     The single base rock of the cairn remained where I'd set it.  As did the marking blaze and cooler.  I was set.  Double rations and double clothes inside, half for the forsaken hike to and from Ely.  Way more than I needed to get me back to the final supply.  Nothing to do but strip buck naked and draw on clean.  Eat and look like a new man.  Like to say I was in no hurry but the wakening skeeters put urgency in my movements.  Also got me thinking, 'warm enough for bugs, warm enough for a swim today.'  Took an RC Cola length break, filled my shirt pockets and pack with goodies.  Ate the rest of my lunch as I strolled.  This man had a destiny with cleanliness.  No time to lose.
     The challenge of a wilderness lake bath is wet feet.  Once out of the water they'll attract every pebble, stick, leaf and needle on the beach.  'Less of course you can walk on your hands.  Could be the reason man has always wanted to fly.  Cruise along, dive in, emerge and air dry.  Slick.  Sure'd beat having to work the grime from between the toes and off the soles before yanking my socks up.  Helped to have a sunlit slab of basalt along the shore.  Once dry and dressed, couldn't help but whistle and smile.  Smile better than I whistle but that's not sayin' much.  Still had better than two hours of sun.  Went to work on dinner.
     Skeeters sacked out before I did the same.  Fine with me.  Few things louder than a loan mosquito in the dark.  Those who don't know the sound figure it to be annoying.  Those who do, know it to be violently maddening.  Idiot beast won't leave me alone even though it surely knows it's courting death.  Not tonight though.  Blessed peace once again.  And a few minutes to prop my head and flashlight another letter:

     Dear Uncle Emil,

     We had a serious water problem a few days ago.  And that led to a different water problem which put me where I am at the moment.  I don't know about the rest of the country but we get our water flown out to us around lunchtime each day.  It's the rainy season and there's no choice.  Whether from a river or moat the water here is basically thin mud.  Don't know how we could drink it no matter the number of iodine tablets thrown into a canteen.  Until a week ago the water we'd been given was decent.  Then, somehow, someway, the formula for treating the water changed and it became chemically foul.  We had no choice but to gag it down.  The only solution was to do with less.  Not good when it's a hundred above.
     We were out on patrol two days ago when a canteen was passed forward.  I was told it was flavored with a root beer fizzie.  In case you haven't had one, a fizzie is like a koolaid tablet with bicarb in it for effervescence.  Regardless of the flavor, they're all foul tasting.  But I was thirsty and figured a sip couldn't be all that bad.  At the moment I didn't know it was dipped from a Vietnamese rain barrel.  When I found out I drank no more.  At least that's how I recall it.  At the moment my brain is a little deprived of anything provided by digestion.
     Mid-afternoon found me squatting, butt to the wind, over the edge of a rice paddy dike.  The rice is real pretty now.  Like four foot high, jade colored grass.  Didn't interest me as I squatted.  The monsoon is now in full swing so we set up at night on high ground, usually around a farm yard.  It's a lot like we're taking hostages with the idea being the VC won't mortar a farm.  Long story short, me and three other men spent our night crapping our brains out.  As the night passed each of my trips to the paddies got harder and shorter.  My last was on my knees.  Come morning the four of us were medivaced out.  I didn't like it but loading up a sixty pound pack seemed an impossibility.  
     So here I sit.  Either on my bunk in the barracks or over in the outhouse.  Doesn't matter what I put in me, lately it's been nothing but water, it explodes on through in the length of time it takes me to get to the crapper.  Seems like I could move into that little house as I've come to feel at home there. 
     Outside of that it looks like we're definitely leaving country.  The division is starting to shuffle troops around filling up companies into those that are leaving for the World and those staying in country.  Don't know my fate yet but it looks good.

     As always but now a little thinner,
     Archie

     I started the letter at night and finished it in the morning.  Slept with it on my chest.  Power of the letter's suggestion had my oatmeal going down uneasy.  My experience in the war told me Archie probably had a dose of dysentery.  Saw it many times.  Not usually fatal unless you blow out your sphincter and turn inside out from downward pressure.  That's much funnier than the reality.  Yeah, he should be right slim after it's all said and done.
     Another good morning.  Blue sky, awakening breeze.  Maybe something coming.  Being on the return side has me itchy to be done but'll make an effort to not push it.  Hard to relax and take it easy when you're trying hard to relax and take it easy.

     
   
   
   

The Walk XVI - Truth

     Drumstick?  Chicken leg or tom-tom pounder?  Hoped for the latter but either way the lake's name lacks the charm of Kekekabic.  My choice, I'd call it Bath-time Lake.  The splashings I'd done in the mornings to this point had kept most of the flies away but not much more.  Needed a full fledged swim with a bar of soap.  Wasn't possible as this was Boundary Waters territory.  No soap allowed in the water.  Also wanted to dry myself when I came out.  Also not possible in this rain.  Here's where the movies'd have the rain come down in buckets.  Me standing buck naked, arms outstretched, face to the sky, triumphant music blaring in the background.  Sun'd come out and I'd dry myself with armfuls of lavender and violets under the spreading arc of a rainbow.  Maybe tomorrow.
     I creaked my way around camp.  Took some effort to string the tarp when my wrinkled fingers decided to cramp up.  They've been doing that for years when cold and wet.  Hammering, canoeing and fishing do a job to them also.  Fingers cross and lock into place.  Nothing to do but beat 'em against a white pine 'til the pain loosened 'em up.  It was a challenge to draw the tarp drum tight.  Finally decided the best way to deal with the situation was to not think about it.  Just keep moving forward 'til I was fed, water drawn for the morning, coffee made and the tarp restrung for sleeping.  Had three hours of dim light and used every minute 'til I was tucked in the bag,

     Dear Uncle Emil,

     Rumors have been flying for the last couple of weeks that we're to be the first Division pulled out of country.  One minute we're going for sure, the next we're not.  Every day a new rumor.  So many I even started a few of my own.  One came back in much the same shape as I sent it out.  Hope it didn't turn out to be true as I had us going to the eastern front to refight the battle of Stalingrad.  If there's any Ruskie spies around they might already be fortifying the city.
     My mouth got me in trouble once again.  I'm starting to think the Army isn't a democracy.  Wonder if they know that?  We'd been in the field for better than two days.  Doesn't sound like much unless you know about the effects of the monsoon on tender American feet.  On the third day we were waiting for the choppers when word came down there'd be none.  It seems another company was in trouble and needed every available Huey.  So we set out on our ten click hump to Fire Base Moore.
     Six miles isn't much of a hike.  We'd done twice that in training but all of those miles were on roads. Here with the land in flood, we had a dozen or more rivers and moats to cross.  And bitched about it every step of the way.  Didn't think of it until now but the VC do all of their traveling on foot.  Monsoon or not, they get out and do what they have to do.  Could be that's the difference in the war.  Attitude.  Simply put, they're tougher than us draftees.  Maybe because they have to be.  Communism, democracy, I don't think either of those two philosophies matter much when push comes to shove.  We were fighting a war of sketchy principles, they were fighting for their homeland.  Most of us were trying to last out our year.  Big difference and they have a home field advantage.
     Anyway, mid-afternoon we made it back to Moore.  Once I pulled off my boots my feet began to swell until the toes pointed up.  Nearly everyone was in the same shape as me.  The medics put over half the company on bed rest to get the swelling down.  That lasted about half an hour.  Seems there wasn't enough bodies to man the bunkers so, bed rest or not, a lot of us were ordered out.  Not me but it was yours truly who shot his mouth off.  The sergeant passing on the order said not a word, left and returned a minute later.  Seemed the First Sergeant wanted a talk with me.  Yeah, I knew I was in trouble.
     Top told me in ten words or less to keep my mouth shut.  Of course I jumped to my defense but got no farther than, "I thought…" before he shut me up with "The Army doesn't pay you to think!"  He had me there.  Pissed?  For sure but at least I was smart enough to keep my mouth shut this time.  
     A part of me just doesn't understand what's going on.  I'm in uniform, a soldier in an army, carrying a rifle, in a war zone and yet, I act like I'm still a student in college.  A mouth with no real concept of my circumstance.  
     Beyond that the rumors continue to fly.  Hope they're right.  This is not a good place for a fool like me.
     Archie

     The letter started me chuckling.  Not that it was funny.  Well, it was funny.  And sad at the same time.  In a nutshell, Archie was a boy trying to become a man in a world that had the jump on him.  And he's not alone.  There's thousands of boys just like him over there.  There were plenty of them in my war also.  Boys, fools, maniacs, cowards, egos run rampant.  Lots of them.  Even some men.  More and more of the latter as their time in combat grew.  Enough to get us through.  I act like I know all the answers but I don't.  I suspect no one really knows.  Where are the wise old men and women in this world?  And would we know them or listen to them if they were recognized?
     And what was I doing out here on the trail?  Wanted it bad before I started and now I wanted to be done with it.  What was the point of it anyhow?  For that matter, what's the point of anything?  So many questions, so few answers.  Nighttime thoughts.
     War does that to a man.  Gets him questioning.  Wondering it there's any meaning behind the mass stupidity he's passing through.  Maybe we're too limited to know the truth of life.  Only smart enough to ask questions.  And with luck get an occasional answer from out of the blue.  Could be the feeling I got from the return letters I received from Humphrey and McCarthy was right.  I'm not much more than a monkey in pants.  At the moment I wish those pants were dry.  Still raining when I switched off the flashlight.