ALONG THE ISINGLASS

March 31, 2014March 5, 2013 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

As I said at the time …

After dropping the kid off at school for a rare Saturday session (costume design class), noon, I stop off at Mount Isinglass for a short hike, in part to eat up a bit of time before our customary Saturday afternoon wine tasting and opera broadcast.

While most of our snow has melted, the woods are still covered, even in Gonic. The trail’s quite icy, with a few bare spots for relief.

Amazing how many people rely on their dogs as an excuse to take a walk – as the droppings in the snow attest.

Still, a good exercise, this trek before the snowpack is completely gone, at least if I don’t slip, fall, and injure myself.

Coming down near the river and former bridge, I view a black pool of stilled water brimming slightly over the usual banks, a complete contrast to the two snowy forest hillsides it cleaves. The utter beauty is timeless, and yet totally of the moment. While the water is quiescent, the air resounds with the ferocious chords of the cataract just out of sight.

I approach the top of the falls, the water gaining inevitable velocity and muscle, some of it careening into rockface and then pushing across the current. The narrow, sloping trail down to the base of the cascade, however, remains ice covered, and the places I would normally cross to the river are now mid-stream anyway. I back off, and head back, rather than attempting to scale the cliff to a possible overlook from above.

The temptation becomes too much, and I venture off the return trail, my feet crashing through snowpack that still comes to my knees, until I come to a place where the falls are in view off to the side below me. Rather than the miniature Niagara I’d expected, however, the water’s not rounding off to drop vertically, as I’d seen it in high water here the previous autumn. Rather, it shoots straight out – sometimes into a sheer wall of rock.

All of this wild power – untamed, exuberant, destructive or even cleansing, hissing like strong wind with drumming somewhere deep within. Anyone pulled into the current would be broken by the weight, crushed on the rock, torn by the crossfire. The mill that once channeled this energy has long been swept away by such outbursts, with only a few foundation stones remaining. Downstream, this water will be used at least twice to generate electrical power, but here it explodes for its own glory.

What is it that attracts us to cataracts? The description that comes to mind is “awe,” an acknowledgment of natural, inexplicable power far greater than our own mortal existence. Or maybe the seemingly inexhaustible stream of profusion that outlasts our own span of concentration and observation.

Even so, as the Psalmist noted, “He leads me beside the still waters,” not down to the base of the torrent. I think of two Plain meetinghouses in Ohio, both named Stillwater – one Quaker, the other Old Order German Baptist Brethren. The still water as a place of clarification, the sediment dropping away, a clear drink or safe place to water livestock and wildlife. Waterfowl, too, take refuge. Here the energy is latent and gathering, ready for release. In the meetinghouses, the worshipers gather, still themselves, become clear, preparing for the channel of the week ahead.

The contrast within one stream couldn’t be sharper, one as the other face of its complement.

On the walk back to the car, an icy beech leaf turns translucent on the snowy trail.

a beech leaf
translucent with ice

floating on snow

FORGET THE ROBINS

March 24, 2014March 21, 2014 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ 5 Comments

Yeah, I know that seeing the first robin of the year is supposed to be a harbinger of spring, but the reality is that it’s possible to see them all winter, even where we live.

Just consider the day we looked out the window in the middle of February and saw 10 flocking together in our driveway – and believe me, we were a long way from the end of winter. There were more on the snow on the other side of the house, too.

The true bird of spring tidings is the buzzard. That’s right, the one more properly called a turkey vulture, back from wintering in Florida. (I happen to think there’s a lot of symbolism there. And they call the senior citizens “snow birds”? Maybe a better term would be “bait.”)

Yes, you can observe the stray vulture around here in the middle of winter, but they arrive in numbers just as the air’s turning from the depths. Sometimes it’s just as the last snow of the year is melting, in years like this when we’ve had a heavy and sustained pack build. Doesn’t matter, really. Somehow, they know.

Unlike the robins.

GLIMPSED FROM THE FREEWAY

March 24, 2014April 21, 2013 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

When I grew up in the heavily farmed Midwest, a beaver dam or lodge was a rarity, an awe-inspiring emblem of wilderness.

But if you pay attention while driving the freeways around here – including those near Boston – you’ll catch a glimpse of a beaver lodge and then recognize the surrounding pond, frequently soon followed by another.

The sight reminds me of a wonderful documentary I once watched on public television. The program followed the life of a beaver colony through an entire year, and then, at the very end of the hour, the camera pulled back from the dam and lodge to reveal a busy limited access highway at the edge of the pond.

It’s enough to make me appreciate both kinds of engineering.

This beaver lodge appears to sit securely in remote wilderness ... — This beaver lodge appears to sit securely in remote wilderness …

... until you turn around to see it's built right at the side of a busy freeway. — … until you turn around to see it’s built right at the side of a busy freeway.

Further back in the pond is the large lodge that first invited me to pull over to the side of the road.

HUNTER-GATHERER DIMENSIONS

March 21, 2014March 5, 2013 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments

As I told them:

Although Jnana does not hunt, he observes points at which ancient traditions – including hunting and gathering – influence modern religious practices, meditation high among them. Jnana also acknowledges the role organized sportsmen have performed in restoring populations of wildlife, and has learned from hunters eminently adept at reading animals’ ways in the field. These days, living in New Hampshire, he keeps an eye open for moose rather than elk along the highway.

WEATHER REPORT UPDATE

March 15, 2014March 1, 2014 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ 4 Comments

Noticed a few months ago I wasn’t checking the weather forecast as much as I did when gainfully employed.

Back then, I faced an hour-long commute each way and knowing the outlook might prompt me to leave earlier or take a less vulnerable route. Trying to navigate a downhill curve in a freezing rain was one experience I never wish to repeat, and I’ve seen enough vehicles slide off the road while trying to go faster than the nasty conditions allowed, well, to keep me from trying to press my luck. Arriving early might also help, since we’d often be handed an early lockup on the first edition of the newspaper to give the delivery crew an extra edge, and anything to lessen the deadline pressure on all of us would be a blessing. A storm might even mean packing for an overnight at the office, as some of my colleagues did during one really big blizzard. The forecast could even prepare me for changing my plans at home beforehand when shoveling out the driveway would take priority.

This time of year, flash flooding, sleet, fallen limbs, or power outages can also be a problem.

This is northern New England, after all.

Now that I’m retired, the commute’s no longer an issue, except for my weekly trip to choir practice in Boston – and if the weather’s treacherous, I have the option of staying home, which was never the case with my job. Since we rarely need both cars on conflicting schedules, it’s much easier to leave them at the end of the driveway to cut down on the snow shoveling. Our biggest weather concern is frost at crucial times in the garden. Or, during the summer, the Atlantic water temperatures when I’m considering a swim at the beach.

This winter, though, has rekindled some of the obsession. We’ve had far more single-digit and zero-degree nights than usual, plus a constant snow covering with more than six feet total by the beginning of March, even as most of the storms have veered south of us. My fascination has come in tracking four different online forecasts and seeing how far off target they’ve been. As for agreement, forget it. You could just as easily toss a coin. (And that percentage thing they throw at us? A 60 percent chance of snow in practical terms means nothing: either it snows or it doesn’t. In other words, it’s all or nothing.)

Considering everything, though, it’s rather nice to not be complaining about the weather itself. I can more or less take it as it comes, thank you, with all of my sympathy to those who must venture forth, regardless. At the moment, I think I’ll put another log on the fire.

BOBHOUSES

February 16, 2014 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ 6 Comments

When they lived way up in Maine, with a large lake just down their road, I remember hearing Eric tell about the morning he looked out the window and saw a traffic jam. Miles and miles from the nearest traffic light, here were bumper to bumper pickup trucks heading to and from the lake. Soon, he realized they were removing their bobhouses before the ice melted.

Bobhouses, of course, are part of the male culture of northern New England and many other frozen parts of the world. Since I don’t fish, no matter how much I admire fly fishermen and their skills, I really don’t appreciate the special savvy of landing one’s meal from under the ice. You can do it, of course, by drilling a hole in the thickness underfoot and then sitting or standing out in the cold. But the really serious guys build or buy their own little houses for the tradition – some are quite basic, while others, I’m told, come with TVs and Web connections. Still, I’m curious about what draws men from their warm homes to spend long days or evenings in a very cold environment. One of the answers is that it’s an excuse to drink with your buddies. Another is that it’s just to get away from the women. Except that it turns out some very adventurous women join in on the expedition. Are the fresh fish really worth this much effort?

Even so, that afternoon, Eric looked out again and saw another traffic jam, this time with trailers hauling their boats to the water. Presumably for more fishing.

How did they know this was the day the ice would go? What clues am I missing?

FROM SHAMANS AND NICE GUYS TO THE LEFT HAND OF GOD

January 7, 2014January 7, 2014 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

With the annual Christmas shutdown, I thought my reading drive had also collapsed; seemed during the first two months of 2007 I wasn’t getting any traction, either. Only when I sat down to update the list did I realize I’d got up through quite a number here, and there may have been more. So to continuing this month’s survey of Books Read, here are a few more entries:

Jeremy Narby and Franics Huxley, eds: Shamans Through Time: 500 Years on the Path to Knowledge. Anthology of selected excerpts of field observations of “magic men and women … with the power to summon spirits.” Ranges from hostile writings by missionaries to anthropologists who submit to healing sessions, and from Siberia to South America and Africa variations. Includes mention of the dark side of the practice, too.
Paul Coughlin: No More Christian Nice Guy. Argument for a masculinity that has boldness in the face of fear – one that confronts prevalent assumptions in society at large, protects the weak, and upholds Christian values in the home and the workplace.
Stephen L. Carter: Integrity. This legal scholar of ethics presses the case that integrity is more than simple honesty. Rather, it is a matter of actions based on deep reflection, which also demands listening to perspectives other than one’s own. The crux of integrity, he says, is the willing of good rather than the willing of evil.
Geri Doran: Resin (poems). “We rowed all night in the river of God, / singing kyrie, kyrie.”
Sascha Feinstein: Misterioso (poems). Pieces rooted in and flowing through jazz.
Toni Tost: Invisible Bride (prose poems). “My friends are wheels turning away from themselves.”
David R. Montgomery: King of Fish: The Thousand-Year Run of Salmon. A geologist examines the pressures on salmon, both in historic preservation efforts in Scotland, England, and continental Europe as well as those in New England, and in the Pacific Northwest today. Includes consideration of the dynamics of rivers and they ways various varieties of salmon have adapted to the specifics.
Michael Lerner: The Left Hand of God: Taking Back Our Country From the Religious Right. A social activist rabbi argues that in removing religious values from public discourse, the left has left a vacuum for the political right to exploit. Rather than being value-free, the result has been value-less positions by the left – and the left is perceived as spineless and without beliefs. Lerner has some good insights on the American workplace and the tension people feel, blaming themselves for unhappiness in their employment while applying value systems that are diametrically opposed to their religious faith. Much of this volume is quite painful to read, addressing public issues in full candor and complicity.

OF THE GRAVE AND BEES TO PERFUME AND HOLLYWOOD

January 6, 2014January 6, 2014 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Continuing this month’s survey of Books Read, here are a few more entries:

Graham Montague: The Stillness of the Grave and the Quickening of the Spirit. Pamphlet by a contemporary British Friend, suggested by Patrick Burns. I love the use of Walt Whitman’s description of attending his first Quaker meeting and sensing the worshipers were as still as the grave — followed by insights of dying to the world around us momentarily and resurrection.
Matthue Roth: Never Mind the Goldbergs. Flippant fiction as late-night fun for this reader. One of my favorite teen-angst novels, it has some marvelous insights into religious identity as well as some scathing portraits of Hollywood values and practice.
Holley Bishop: Robbing the Bees: A Biography of Honey, the Sweet Liquid Gold That Seduced the World. Although the author spends much of her time following a commercial beekeeper in Florida, she does present a range of fascinating detail on the care of honeybees through history, the evolution of commercial hives, and the place of honey and beeswax over the centuries. A book to stand alongside, Cod, Salt, Cotton, and other basic commodities. Includes recipes.
Mandy Aftel: Essence and Alchemy: A Book of Perfume. A beautifully designed and produced book (North Point Press) exploring the history, artistry, psychology, and ingredients of perfume. But do I want all of those recipes?

FROM THE WEATHER TO SUICIDE OR EVOLUTION

January 5, 2014January 5, 2014 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Continuing this month’s survey of Books Read, here are a few more entries:

Dave Thurlow and C. Ralph Adler, eds: Soul of the Sky – Exploring the Human Side of the Weather. A Mount Washington Observatory publication presenting literary writing about weather.
Milan Kundera: The Art of the Novel. Seven essays in “a practitioner’s confession.” From a peculiar Central European perspective, he admittedly stands at odds, as he points out, with contemporary French fiction. After a first read, I find it difficult to place my work in relation to what he argues, except to acknowledge the ways my work does what only a novel can do. On the other hand, I like work that conveys solid reporting as well – history, geography, geology, theology, and the like – something Kundera clearly disdains, except in a most generalized or abstracted manner.
Albert Huffstickler: Poetry Motel memorial edition (No. 32). Work that stays too close to daily journaling for my taste. I’ve seen other pieces by him that seemed to take flight.
Maxine Kumin: Jack and Other New Poems. This volume doesn’t go far beyond observations of a New England horse farmer, of the genteel sort.
Jeff Clark: Music and Suicide (poems). A controversial and often sophomoric collection (from the Academy of American Poets), yet parts of it catch fire – get the juices going. Coming after Kumin, this is poetry.
Patricia Fargnoli: Duties of the Spirit (poems). Centering on a quotation from Thornton Wilder, Fargnoli argues for the duties of joy and serenity – all too easy, methinks, for an old lady living in rustic retirement. These are all pale garden pieces, of the white linen sort – dirty fingernails being for the hired help. Righteous anger, like the social justice verses of Isaiah, are also duties of the spirit – where the red blood flows through muscle.
Ntozake Shange: The Sweet Breath of Life. A marvelous collection of poems written in reflection to inner-city photographs by the Kamoinge Inc. collective (and edited by Frank Stewart). An incredible match-up.
Jon Tolaas: Evolution and Suicide. A thin freebie, this work turns into a fascinating consideration of the meaning of consciousness itself, using Darwin and Freud as its starting points, pro and con. At the core, perhaps, is the insight that the central question is not, What is the meaning of life, but rather: What have you done (are you doing) with your life.

FROM MATING AND DATING TO THE GREAT NORTH WOODS

January 4, 2014January 4, 2014 ~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Continuing this month’s survey of Books Read, here are a few more entries from my scroll as I kept it:

Andrea Orr: Meeting, Mating (and Cheating) – Sex, Love, and the New World of Online Dating. One journalist’s argument that matchmaking is what kept Internet companies afloat during the dot-com bust. Also interesting vignettes of the changing nature of courtship in America.
Nathan Graziano: Frostbite. Fine short stories in a Bukowski vein, set mostly north of Concord. Pessimistic, young adult outlook. Is title a pun on Robert Frost, for a Granite State writer?
Ray Blackston: A Delirious Summer. Frothy romantic comedy set in South Carolina. But ultimately sexless enough for Southern Baptist readership.
W.D. Wetherell, ed: This American River – Five Centuries of Writing About the Connecticut. Good way to begin thinking more pointedly about living in northern New England, where I’ve now been nearly two decades. (Compare what I’ve done here so far to my reading about the Pacific Northwest back in the 70s and my Olympic Peninsula longpoem.) From where I live and work, the Connecticut seems to be the backdoor of the house, with my orientation toward Boston and Maine. Yet it also leads up to the crown of New Hampshire, which I need to explore sometime.
W.D. Wetherell: North of Now. Some personal thoughts about living in Lyme and the changing character of rural New Hampshire.
Simon Ortiz: Out There Somewhere. Poems and journal entries by a major Native American writer. Found the paperback in Kettering, Ohio, and shared portions on the Northwest Airlines flight from Detroit to Manchester with a lovely Sioux across the aisle. Still, the collection comes as something of a disappointment: I expect work of the level of the piece Rachel had for class discussion.
Iris Moulton: A Thin Time. First volume by a young Utah poet who seems to be instrumental in a revival in Salt Lake City.
Stephen Gorman: Northeastern Wilds. Full-color photos with essays exploring the Great North Woods sweeping from the Adirondacks eastward across Maine. Suspect I’ve seen many of these in Sierra Club calendars, and the writing often seems pitched to glossy magazines, with three or four not quite continuous sections pieced together to create a single chapter. Annoying, saved mostly by some decent reference material. An Appalachian Mountain Club volume.