San Francisco Peaks, Flagstaff, Arizona (courtesy of Kirk Anderson)

Who?

Gratitude for Youth Well Spent

December 7, 2021

December 7, 1984 – a date that will live in infamy, nay, memory – we were suddenly and deliberately attacked by the love of life and the invincibility of youth. We were filled with multitudes and every moment vibrated with energy and promise.

It was a  Friday in the greatest of all my autumns. Another day of listening for the secret and searching for the sound. We were cash-poor, thin and almost always hungry. For the next meal, for the next moment. Blessed beyond words.

Another unremarkable, cheap, camp-style, long-forgotten dinner before the main event. We were out to see what might be around the next bend. Sangre del Toro y el camino Woody Mountain. The sun had  gone after its short work day. Left to us was the cold invigorating snow of early December and the call of the unseen. Get on with it! Into the truck, away from Humphreys Street, onto the westward, mythic, Route 66, and out of reach of the built world. Go around that bend!

Still silence under starry sky. Alone together, we were but a small speck on this large spinning wet rock we call home. Our only home. Earth! Beautiful. With my dearest dog-friend Hiyah (The Bonehead), known to some as Hat-bo, we trudged through crusted snow. Rhythmic steps carried us away from the truck, alway from the road, away from the established, to a small wooded rise across open ground to the north. It was a short walk. So quiet there was no room for sound.

Stiff pulling of the cork with the Swiss army screw and blood of the bull flowed into our sierra cups. Salute! Twenty-seven trips around the sun for you my friend, and counting. Good ones, less good ones, but none thrown away. And the expectation of only good ahead. Laughter, more wine until gone and then, in drunken joy, we count our change and make the trip back into town to retrieve an encore bottle. The energy of youth! The joy. The blissful stupidity and celebration of perfect moments. We returned to our retreat on the rise.

Laughter and chatter slow to stopping. Full of wonder, wonderful. The stars screamed down in beauty. Who could be happier?

Who?

The sound, the call across the infinite darkness. Mysterious eternity.

Who?

You! Us! Everything! Cosmic connection with the heard but unseen. Good omen; greeted by an owl, the symbol of wisdom, magic and mystery, bringing good fortune. Is there anything else in the universe but this place? This moment? Piercing. We call back.

Who?

Who!!!

Later, in warmer times of spring and summer along Woody Mountain Road, perspective is revealed. Our wooded rise retreat is something of an island on the margin of a lake. The crossing to our small, short-term winter portal to the infinite might have been much wetter had we broken through the ice. But it was not. It was, and forever became, a youthful Nimoy-esque perfect moment that was had, but preserved only in memory. Sweet memory.

Who can forget such things? Who cannot be touched? Who can say what is beyond the next bend? Who can avoid being grateful for such connection, friendship and the pursuit of unseen, unexpected wonders and moments?

Who?