Adventures in Glacier and Doubt

Three Sisters and Moon


On The Book:

Inspiration can be a fleeting thing: overcome one minute, left empty and gasping for words the next.
At this moment, when all human voice have gone and I am left with the birds, whales, seals, the drone of Cessna's, the rumble of boats and the whirl of competing currents - I am truly inspired, yet left with no words.
The pervading calm absorbs me and my mind wanders to the people and events of my book. Still, I only dream of them as I fall in and out of consciousness.
So often other words crowd my mind - poetic verses, arguments and expositions - and there is little left for the task I set forth.
Sometimes it's fear that holds me back: how dare I even attempt to write when the works of truly great authors are left untouched on dusty shelves?
How can I ask someone to give their time to my words when they have not yet absorbed the Angst of Dostoevsky, the lessons of Dickens, the challenge and absurdity of Roth, the poetry of Pushkin, the bite of Diaz, the sad whisper of Lahiri, the tearful laughter of McCourt, the history of Tolstoy, the forward simplicity of Hemingway, the fever of Hughes, the humanity of Shakespeare...?


On The Road:

I have decided not to post chronologically, the things that happen along the way. Some events and ideas develop over time: I may have had an encounter in Maine, but only realize its importance when I experience something else in Alberta, and am only then ready to write about it.

I have now ridden more than 4000 miles across Canada and the U.S, with at least 4000 more to go. I am more than 2 weeks behind schedule, which means by the end of this leg of the trip, I will have been on the road for 2 months, not 1. I wonder what that means if I planned on being done within 2 years…?

Over the next 4 posts I will relate a series of events which occurred in and around Glacier National Park...


GLACIER 1: GOOD BEGINNINGS

I arrived in Glacier some weeks ahead of schedule and with 2 new friends. It was nice to travel with some fellow bikers, if only for a couple of days. The following morning they left, and I met Sarah. She was also alone in the park and looking for someone with whom to hike. Within 10 minutes of meeting we were on the back of my bike cruising down the windy road to get backcountry camping permits. A couple of hours later we were on our way to Snyder Lake for a warm-up day hike, Sarah’s sweet southern drawl accompanying us along the way. The more she and I talked the more similarities we found; though from backgrounds as disparate as our gender, she growing up in the Appalachian mountains of Virginia, we found an uncommon amount of parallels in our thoughts and ways. As per my usual, the second I saw the lake (as I do with any body of water, particularly is its cold as hell), I was soon thereafter naked and splashing in its icy waters. Sarah only dipped her calves and promised to go in next time.
Besides my own good lord’s blessing, Sarah and I shared an incredible amount about ourselves, but it seemed as natural as we had known each other for years and not just a few hours.
The following day we found ourselves in the backcountry of southeastern Glacier, around Cobalt Lake.

To be continued…