I recently Goggled the term “rural heritage” to learn exactly what it means in terms of its usage today. It’s often used to describe buildings of historical nature. My usage differs as I use it to describe those things learned from living in close proximity to the soil. Not necessarily farming either. Rural heritage can span any number of subjects in the context that I freely employ. For me it’s a story of learning. One of family history and that of my own. It is a connecting piece of my story that has profoundly shaped my life in more ways than I sometimes even recognize.It’s easy to take for granted those things we associate with normal in our locales. Those things that we are accustomed to may not give us any pause for reflection. But when we engage in a conversation with someone who has lived in another part of the country or perhaps in a more urban setting we can suddenly realize our differences. Our normal may be very foreign to them. Our daily routines as we live out our existence in the places we call home could be considered “run of the mill” in terms of weather conditions and seasons. There’s a larger observation that deviates from my intended story. When I hear the term “run of the mill” something far different enters my mind. I think of a series of events that spans decades. The “run of the mill” in my life is a story uniquely my own. One with many gaps and unanswered questions. In my story are many small stories. I suppose they could be considered branch stories. True to the nature of my written work I leave clues buried in my stories for those who wish to dig deeper and search for larger meanings. In deeper reflection there can be a greater destination where a reader can arrive with a better understanding of themselves. I charge you the reader to remember your personal journey and your memories from that journey. As for this story? I hope to take you to a place of my youth where I can almost smell a certain memory! A story that revolves around a much younger me in the beginning. My memories are often gray in the misty years of time passage. It concerns me at times honestly. But that is another story. This I do remember and commit it to cyberspace.As a young boy we lived in a renovated farm house on the site of the original Washburn homestead in the Township of Macomb,New York. It’s the first place I ever lived and the source of my earliest memories.The house was set back from the road a short distance and had a huge lawn that was dominated by giant elm trees. Their sprawling branches nearly touched the ground in spots. They were a favorite nesting tree for families of colorful Baltimore Orioles each spring. The woven nests always amazed me as they swayed in the summer breezes. Our property also contained a small horse barn and two garages. Further back was a hay barn that was part of my grand parents dairy farm. We had a large garden area as well behind the house. I suppose I could write an entire post about my boyhood home at some point! My earliest and fondness memories are being outdoors playing in that large area. Some distance off was my grand parents large dairy barn. Beyond that their house and out buildings. A fence that surrounded our property was a boundary not to be crossed although as my parents would learn that my curiosity and desire to wander would challenge that boundary often. Living close to an operating farm was a source of ever changing sounds. Machinery and mooing cows. The milk truck with its throaty diesel as it slowly entered their bumpy farm driveway. But one noise stood out with a clarity all its own!The loud noise of the sawmill operated by my grandfather. I was taught to avoid the sawmill and the huge piles of logs in the stockpiles when visiting at my grandparents house. (I was there quite often as both my parents worked). My father would take me up to the sawmill sometimes and I was fearful of the large circular blade mill with its many moving parts. But the scents were the draw. Fresh pine sawdust from recently milled lumber in a huge stack where a drag chain piled it. Racks of milled lumber covering the ground in dimensional piles of certain lengths. And the logs. Everywhere.Always a big pile lined up on the landing where they were rolled onto the sawmill. My grandfather had built a large building that covered the entire operation. At the back there was a truck landing where slab wood and finished lumber could be loaded. It was large and intimidating to me in its layout. The building still exists to this day on my Uncle’s property but it’s only used for storage now. I have a faint memory of my father talking to my Grandfather about something while I stood safely beside him as my Grandfather throttled the engine down and the huge blade stopped spinning. Other than that I remember very little actually. But some memories still possess the ability to transport me. Those of playing in our lawn on crisp autumn days while searching the sky for migrating geese. I always hated going in at night! Winter memories also have retained their clarity. Cold and snow. Sleds and toboggans to slide down the steep hills in the pastures. One winter the snow became so crusted that we could walk on top and explore beyond the lawn. Far over back the pasture was covered in thick layers of slab wood where it was dumped each time the truck was full. I never got to really know my Grandfather all that well. He passed away when I was still quite young and the sawmill was no more. My two Uncles were too busy running the dairy farm to continue operating it. My parents moved us to our farm property about 1 mile away around 1970 and I lived there throughout high school. Sometime in the early to mid 1970s the elm on the farm began to die from Dutch elm disease. Everywhere elms of every size were dying in large numbers. My father decided to begin burning wood again in the farmhouse to use up the over abundance of dead wood. Some was used in the sugar house as well. It was during the fall and winter months of the 1970s that my training to become a woodman began in earnest. Most winter Saturdays were spent in the forests around the farm using a team of horses and a set of sleighs to draw loads of firewood. We also saved saw logs from some of the larger trees. One spring across the meadow from the farmhouse my father cleared out a huge section of large dead elms for logs. They were trucked to an Amish sawmill about 5 miles away on a wagon. The Amish had moved into our area and set up sawmills where they would do custom sawing if you delivered the logs. Elm is a heavy and difficult lumber to build with but very strong. It doesn’t hold up well to moisture though so must be used for interior construction. I spent a lot of time loading and unloading lumber from all those logs. Red elm was a prized saw log on the farm. They grew to large proportions and made wiry but strong lumber. One log in particular stands out in my memory. We labored long and hard to get it skidded out and loaded. That one log made an entire load for the mill. It sawed out nearly 1000 board feet of lumber! I learned a lot about hitching chains and skidding logs. The dangers of felling trees and chainsaw safety. I learned a variety of tricks for loading logs and safely binding them down for transport. My fear of sawmills hadn’t subsided entirely either.When we would deliver a load of logs to the Amish sawmill I would stand back and watched as the large circular blade ripped through logs at what seemed an unreasonable speed. The sawyer was an Amish named Ben Shetler. A friendly man who became good friends with my father. Ben’s manner of sawing was not my idea of fun I decided. Fast and furious! Regardless I learned to handle plenty of lumber at a safe distance from the blade. Eventually my father trusted me to draw loads of logs with the tractor to the sawmill. I learned how to unload them after marking them with our name and the “cut specs”. We used a simple lumber crayon to accomplish this necessary task. After unloading some logs I would need to load up any lumber that was ours and draw it home. I spent hours on a tractor in those days and wish I could remember more but much of that time escapes me. I just remember working very hard and how much I enjoyed working at the logging. Eventually the elms were mostly gone but occasionally we would find a dead one to salvage around the farm. My Dad used that tough elm lumber for everything around the farm. Once nailed in place it was almost impossible to break! Another memorable logging event occurred in my Uncle’s woodlot near Heuvelton, New York. My uncles hired my father to fell and skid out a large bunch of white pine logs. I loved the woodlot property! Sandy soil and low swampy sections full of blueberry bushes. Huge stands of white pine growths and stands of white birch and soft maple. Very different than the rocky ridges of our farm property. My father brought a single draft horse to skid the logs. A black Clydesdale/Percheron horse named Don. He was a true gentle giant! I was given the job of leading him to the log landing with single log hitches where the logs were loaded onto a truck owned by a bachelor named Claude Rayburn. I will write about him sometime! Don was such a good horse that he would actually pull a log to the landing without leading him! I don’t remember much more than that really. All I know is I found the logging venture fun and exciting! Beyond that the years on the farm continued with a “run of the mill” change of season and task. Each season with its own challenges and menial jobs to be performed. But the responsibilities I was given were to shape the form of the future me. I became more of a woodman. A farmer as well. I learned to care for cattle and horses. I became a lover of horses and riding. A great wanderer of all the surrounding land in an ever larger circle of travel. I hunted and trapped for fur. I was a wannabe mountain man I suppose. But my roots were grounded in nature and the many changes that awaited me would not tear those roots free. Yes I lived a run of the mill existence. One I treasure as a gift in my older years. The farm property is sacred ground to me. A place where I can go to escape in mundane task even now. There is a larger story that I will tell of logging and sawmills. But not today. It must be told with many words and great detail. For it is the second chapter of myself in a different time. A story of gains and losses. I must assemble the words with loving reverence.✍️
Tag Archives: time
What I Never Knew
History is an important part of adventure for us! There’s nothing like stumbling upon old foundations, buildings, and other human impacts that nature is slowly healing and covering with vegetation. Some areas however have been changed forever by large and costly human endeavors. At a glance these locations might never catch my attention at first glance. But everything changes when I suddenly find myself in one of those locations and realize something much larger once occurred there. I can and will explain but first I must lay some groundwork. It’s January 11th 2022 and I have flown to Florida to visit a friend. I escaped northern New York just ahead of a bitter cold front that has temperatures well below zero. I have settled into a fully functional Airbnb in the Dunnellon area and have a rental car at my disposal. I arrived here late Sunday and spent the day yesterday catching up with my good friend Norm. He once was a neighbor of mine at Black Lake where he and his wife Ellen owned a summer cottage below my former home we called Hill House. We became friends and we fished together occasionally out on the lake in his pontoon boat. He also loved to hunt so I introduced him to our farm property where he could roam at his discretion anytime he wished. He became hopelessly addicted to our farm crafted maple syrup at some point! He once asked me what I put into the stuff! My answer was simple and honest: energy and love of tradition. To craft the finest tasting maple syrup and be proud when people noticed! Norm became a steady customer and would always stockpile his supply of maple syrup before heading south each autumn. Time passed. Years that sped by with season and task. Norm and Ellen decided it was time to sell their lake property and would only be visiting upstate New York on occasion. We talked on the phone and I continued to get his syrup to him through a courier type system when necessary or through the mail. I missed my friend and our time together. Norm is 24 years older than me and I had confided in him when we fished together as the sun would set on a tough day for me. I trusted his advice and wise consul. I believe I thought of him as someone who was much like my father. Older and someone to be trusted for advice. I never told him that though. I think I will before I return home. Some things shouldn’t wait I have learned. At the time however it wasn’t necessary in the givens of common bonds. Some history to note. Norm and Ellen had been and were travelers. Wanderers.Full time Rver’s for over a decade. Adventure lovers and nature enthusiasts.In their stories I could feel a kindred spirit.Wow! I fear that I begin to stray far from the original story! Suffice it to say that Norm and Ellen invited us to come to Florida to visit them at their place on Lake Rousseau. Circumstances kept us away until I finally decided enough was enough in 2021. I won’t go into lengthy details of how those plans changed or how it finally occurred. I am here now and writing in the moment. Yesterday after Norm and I had some breakfast together we headed out onto Lake Rousseau for some fishing. I was immediately interested and intrigued by the lake itself. Channel markers everywhere amid dead tree stubs that rose above the water with a stately perseverance. Below the surface algae covered stumps were abundant and needed to be avoided. My curiosity perked and I began to grill Norm with questions. What had happened here and why? What was this lake all about? Man made reservoirs are nothing new to me most certainly. But this one in this location begged further investigation. And just like that history unfolded and opened up the doors for a much larger story! A place of history that I had never knew existed. Enter the story of the cross Florida barge canal. Lake Rousseau had been created in the early 1900s to create power for industrial purposes. The Great Depression would create a larger vision that actually was put into motion. The cross Florida barge canal was begun and never completed. It was a potential environmental disaster that was averted if the facts are correct. It’s a piece of history that I would have never known if not for my friend. I have visited Florida many times over the years. I came for sun and warmth. A break from the north country at times. I know the traffic packed highways await me as I become a part of the problem each time I visit.History was never a motive for visiting but now it will draw me back again. Norm and I discussed the need to keep the mind active and alive today.Those things we do to aid in that capacity. History is the perfect place to keep the mind in motion. What can I learn tomorrow? What did I learn today? I learned that we as humans often don’t truly make the best decisions. But the habitat of Lake Rousseau has become a place of refuge. For birds and other wildlife. It controls flooding and more. It is a marvel of human engineering and worthy of praise. It could have played out much differently but it didn’t.One thing is most certain. It is of a very human and personal nature. Don’t wait to visit a friend. Tomorrow is uncertain. Today was secured and now a memory to cherish forever. MOONTABS! They’re as simple as it gets! Wherever you find yourself!When you enter the realm of history and reality it can offer a new place of spirit energy. We can’t live in the past but must acknowledge it sometimes. It has shaped the world around us. It as shaped us.✍️
Thoughts For The New Year
2022 is upon us already! Seems like the past couple months have been a blur quite honestly. Work,the holiday season, parties, gatherings, etc. My work adventure in Lake Placid has entered a new reality of part time work as December fades behind us. It’s time to catch up on those things back in the valley that took the back stage for much longer than I intended. A new MOONTABS strategy is brewing . It must be implemented in 2022 I have decided. There needs to be a greater blog presence that encompasses the daily rhythms and hiccups of my life. I feel there may be a larger connection to positivity that remains hidden at times. It could emerge from the shadows of negative realities that so many people face including my own. It’s going to take some heavy thinking to take that chance and a greater balancing effort of time on my part. I think the message that I am attempting to send is that of recognizing the positive energy that can exist in the smallest details of daily routine. In those things that occupy much of our time. The importance of those moments can be lost when we fail to acknowledge them. My plans for 2022 and all of time beyond will manifest themselves from simple routines and activities. The word ordinary is in the word extraordinary. That magic that happens during a “run of the mill” day. Watch for the story titled “The Run Of The Mill”.
Today I once again postpone the larger story as it must be told properly and with many words. Today’s schedule is booked and waiting for me hit the timelines of appointments and details. A new adventure is but days away now and another immediately behind that as January enters its third week. Our calendar for 2022 began to take shape well in advance. That’s something that Jennifer and I share in common. Planning. We have learned that flexibility will play a huge role in all we schedule. The positivity lives in the desire to stay in motion and chase adventure. We can’t predict tomorrow but we certainly can prepare for it. If all this seems a bit confusing that’s because that’s my intention. To remind everyone to expect the unexpected and face it with a tenacious attitude. Make plans to escape the run of the mill when opportunities present themselves.Schedule your vacation time and don’t look back!Sorry no stories today. Just an update and a brief check in. Creativity is rarely far away but often takes a backseat to daily details. It’s going to take some time on my end to get this right. Btw! Don’t forget to watch for my words and photos on the Facebook group Just Go Outside. You will find short segments of my life there when I am silent here. It’s a fun group! Let’s all make 2022 count! With hopes and dreams filled with promise! Forward momentum. I call it “MOONTABS In Motion”. That’s a larger story that bids its time.✍️
Autumn Finds Us
The final week of Adirondack camping for me. It’s been an incredible summer here! One that led to autumn ultimately. It’s such a gentle transition that I marvel sometimes at the progression of season. Summer days seemed to flow with a different pattern. Autumn crept up suddenly and quickly. Yes I saw the soft maples giving me their hints way back at the end of August. No surprise there. The change when it came hit with mind shattering speed! Slow at first I suppose. Maybe I didn’t tune in quite quick enough. Long work days draining my energy could have had an influence. I did tune in eventually and once I did it was game on! On my commutes I’d focus on certain sections of forested slopes. The winding roads in the Tupper Lake and Saranac Lake area don’t allow for careless driving!So it was glance and go! But as the weeks passed it became a place of sensory overload! Almost overwhelming in its magnitude! The colors intensified every day. There was so much to see with every passing day. Going home on the weekends brought a different perspective to everything. Down in the St. Lawrence Valley we seem to run a solid two weeks behind the Adirondacks. I could notice the difference on the commute down as the miles passed.The peak came just before Columbus Day weekend in the Lake Placid area in my opinion. Then the rain and wind took their toil on the foliage. The ground began to be littered with more and more fallen leaves. Suddenly you could see it. The forest opening up. But beautiful sights remained. The vastness was too great to be done that easily. The beauty was found in a smaller landscape. The overwhelming vistas replaced by simple fixtures. For me the magic lives there. I love the over stimulation of peak leaves but relish the search for the secondary treasures. It will can be found long after many depart the area. I wait with patient anticipation one of my personal favorite fall spectacles. The turn of the tamaracks. Also known as larch.They are the strangest of trees! Carrying needles like a conifer yet shedding them each season. Unnoticed in the forest most of the time they step forward late in autumn. Their beautiful time occurs well after peak deciduous season. I suppose that’s why I find them captivating. The forests will have shed their thousands of leaves and the tamaracks will still be holding their golden needles. They favor wet locations and can often be spotted on the outskirts of marshes and beaver ponds. They grow throughout the St.Lawrence Valley and well into the Adirondacks. Once prized for sturdy timbers and rafter poles they live on in old barns and houses. Large ones seem uncommon now although I am sure they exist. I hope to find some old growth ones someday. I pulled their large timbers from the barns of the past when I reclaimed wood in the time around 2006. The barn builders of the late 1800’s obviously prized their strength and versatility. I wander far here into places some may fail to appreciate. Perhaps my love of the tamaracks may need further explanation. Not today however. I think the simple message I hope to offer lies in the transition itself. That place where you move beyond the super stimulation of peak leaf viewing season. The beauty remains in smaller places. It’s easier for me to see then. I’ll take it all! The full on and the less noticeable. My connection to nature lives to its fullest there. The beauty and the magic of the autumn transformation goes far beyond when you take that extra time.To notice. To look closer. To connect in that which you may have missed. Short and sweet. To the point. Little more may need be said. And if more need be said then let it be said.✍️
The Transition
Wow! Week 7 here in the Adirondacks of upstate N.Y. as my work adventure continues since August 9th.Tonight camped out here at Little Wolf Campground in Tupper Lake. It’s had unexpected bonuses! The sunsets here are unbelievable! I never expected that I would like it so much! I initially thought this place was too small and crowded. But in September it’s quieter I think. Pretty busy on the weekends it seems. When I return on Sunday nights the Happy Campers are still in full swing. It’s a party place for a certain group it appears. No worries here as I spend most of my weekend in the valley. No surprise that I will exit the ADK park tomorrow night after work. Always details that need my attention. It’s my time to grab Zane and spend some quality time with him. As for the transition it’s underway. Today the first day of fall ushers in a new season here and in the valley. The leaves are changing fast with each passing day. Thus the transition. Less daylight greets me on the morning commute.32 miles that I actually enjoy driving each end of the day.The sun rises through the trees and over the mountains with a weather determined predictability.It usually seals the deal for me on most mornings. It’s so very different than the flatter lands of the St. Lawrence valley. I watch for deer and truly hope to see a moose sometime. As for the job I signed on for? In the dirt and totally outside at the mercy of the weather. I love it though! The simple tasks.The big sky above. The high peaks in the distance. Close and familiar to me.I came for the experience and the location.A chance to live a few months in the Adirondacks. Money and benefits that will further the MOONTABS vision as winter settles over the northeast. My schedule taps my energy and severely impacts my writing! The stories add up and don’t get written. They occupy my mind and grind away like the contents of a cement mixer. It’s hard to focus sometimes on a certain post. But I live in the midst of an incredible transition.Autumn in the Adirondacks. My first ever. That’s what lies at the heart of the transition.Deeds.Work. A shuffle of time and energy. Miles and purpose. But most importantly nature showing her colors. It represents so very much to me this special time of year. Perhaps the primordial hunter/ gather lives in spirit energy at the heart of my enthusiasm. Mental or something much more? Something more I can safely say after my many decades of experiencing this feeling. The transition is as much a part of my identity as anything I have ever known. It’s raw and powerful. A place where words fail me. If only I could share it properly. The challenge presents itself I suppose. Autumn doesn’t happen overnight after all so why should my words? While experiencing the change I too transition. If the decades of my life are likened to seasons then perhaps I have truly arrived to my temporary destination of autumn. A time to show my colors. The connection is obvious to me if not to everyone. And there lies the aspiring writer’s challenge. To draw you into the transition. It lives in scents and sounds. The changing leaves that will fall with a timeless grace of all that will be reborn. The migration and the preparation of those who remain to face the winter. The energy is intense and urgent. But never unfulfilled or wasted. To the watchful observer it plays out with a familiar progression. The transition. Follow it.Embrace it. Find it in yourself. It’s so simple in its perfection. True happiness lives there I think. Other things can wait in the demanding burdens of a frantic society. Small blessings and simple truths multiply during this magical time of year. It is now week 7.Day 4. The final 10 hours of work on the Olympic Center Revitalization project in Lake Placid, New York. Who knows what waits to be discovered today!✍️
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Times Like These
Week 4.Day 3.It’s how I refer to my time here these days. I really need to cut to the chase this morning. Work in a few minutes and another busy day ahead. The totally lost words of the August 16th post titled The Return has been frustrating to say the least! I started piecing it back together but have decided to table it for now. It was a two part story anyway. If you’ve read some of my introductions then you are familiar with my attempts to write raw and honestly as I put it. Driving in this morning I realized something. It hit me with a sudden clarity. What triggered it actually was the rising daylight coming through the trees as I sped along the mostly empty highway headed towards Lake Placid. I snatch views as possible ever vigilant for the deer who love to feed on the roadside grass.They ultimately place themselves in my path. But I am trying to respect that the Adirondacks are their home and slowing down is the best way to coexist. So the trees! Solid and silent. Their branches and needles so finely detailed it was breathtakingly beautiful! There never seems to be a good place to park the car for a photo in these moments along the narrow highways of the Adirondacks. What’s this got with words on a blog post? Triggering. The title of this post was triggered. It’s a borrow on a Foo Fighters song I recently heard on satellite radio. It fits the mood and tone of my daily routine these days. There’s no internet service at my campsite so I do very little writing at night. 10 hours a day on the job site and the 1 hour plus daily commute leaves me somewhat drained I suppose. I truly do enjoy my work outdoors on the Olympic Center skating oval. It’s as raw and honest as my words. I show up clean and leave dirty. Wet sometimes after a day in the rain. After spending much of my career inside of buildings I relish the big skies overhead with the high peaks in the background. They shore me up with positivity. Always there if I needed to escape for some mountain therapy as a friend of mine calls it. There’s a lot going on in my life right now. It was my choice to be here in the first place. I came for a new experience. A story. Dollars and cents. Benefits of all sorts. It plays out like a movie script. Life is never perfect nor without challenge. How you embrace the challenge defines you I like to think. I strive to be a solid presence here. Much like the trees along the highway. I have been busy getting people’s stories. At the campsites and on the job. Many thanks to everyone who takes time to chat with me! You are all part of the MOONTABS In Motion project! I’d like to acknowledge several people from the last few weeks! Ron and Nancy.Jason and Darlene. David and Kelly. Mike and Sammi.Just to name a few. We find common ground in nature,camping,and in life. That’s the heartbeat of this project! Don’t get lost in “Taz-mania”!This story is far from over!
The Debut
It’s been a busy summer so far and time seems to be flying! We’ve continued outfitting our Airstream coach since bringing it to Jennifer’s. She took charge inside setting up drawers and cabinets with all sorts of household items that would be needed to make for a successful outing. She’s good at things like that but it takes some thinking to make everything flow when space is at a premium. We settled for a 27 ft. coach for several reasons. Weight was certainly a factor although my truck is capable of towing a much larger trailer. I’m very impressed with how well it actually tows! It’s very stable with the “Blue Ox” hitch I purchased at the dealer coupling it to the truck. I haven’t towed it that many miles yet but know that I’d leave for a cross country trip with no hesitation! I also purchased a type of insurance called “Coach Net”. It’s like Triple A on steroids! We hope to never need to use it but it provides some nice benefits if we ever have issues with the coach or problems of any kind on the road. Time will tell the tale and I’ll give it a review sometime. My thoughts were simple. We travel to have an enjoyable adventure.Why not do everything we can to give ourselves peace of mind? Check it out if you’re not familiar with it! Another factor in choosing our coach size was our desire to “fit” ourselves easily into camping sites. Backing a travel coach into sites can be challenging. Experience will come in time I realize but it’s a little daunting! In the Adirondacks we haven’t seen any “pull through” sites to date. They may exist but we haven’t found them yet. In fact the places that we are camping don’t even have full hookups. I’ll cover that in greater detail at some point. A third reason for purchasing our coach was practicality. We expect that Jennifer and I will often be traveling alone. Two people and two dogs. We have plenty of space for that! All this being said we slowly transited into a “pre-flight” mode of setup. I load tested the small Honda generator I purchased for boondocking. Quiet and easy to move around at 47 lbs. Our twin set of batteries keep the coach alive when we aren’t connected to a permanent power source. The refrigerator functions with electricity or propane so there’s never an issue there. Same with the water heater.We’re very self contained. Pretty typical for most campers but I think Airstream has added some nice bonus features. We have an onboard inverter for added power when the batteries are utilized. Having two batteries is definitely a bonus. The days ticked past and our debut camping trip drew ever closer. We checked off our lists and added to them as well! Our trip would be a bit of a hybrid. A mix of outdoor cooking and some items kept in a cooler. Our Airstream has a nice sized refrigerator and freezer but our trip was to last for 6 days. A cooler was still a necessity. A tent was as well. Jennifer’s giant two room tent would house Zane and his belongings. Overflow storage as well. I also brought my screen house but I‘ll revisit that some other time! We planned to use the toilets and shower facilities at the campground to conserve our water supply and not overtax our gray and black water tanks. You can’t make it 6 days with 3 people otherwise with no hookups. Our group was supposed to be larger but circumstances kept that from happening. With a larger group using the park facilities would be even more of a necessity.The weather forecast was less than perfect but we decided to keep our plans regardless. Having the comforts of the coach outweighed any negatives overall. We packed extra tarps just in case we needed them. Jennifer and I both like using plastic totes for storing camping gear. They’re easy to transport and great for organizing your belongings. We set up a staging area in Jennifer’s garage and our gear pile grew quickly! We planned on taking the canoes so there’s paddles, life vests, and cushions to pack. Folding chairs and camp tables. We decided to cook outside so we were bringing a propane stove and griddle as well. We use the picnic table that sits on every site for a multi purpose work station and eating location. It’s amazing the number of items it takes to prepare for a comfortable outing! We also included our fishing equipment into the pile. Jennifer began stocking food,spices, and paper products into the coach as the week progressed. We started the refrigerator 24 hours before our departure to get it cooled down properly. It takes longer for an Rv type refrigerator to cool due to its design. We placed some blue ice packs into both the frig and freezer to aid in the process. Things were shaping up! We got the truck prepped and packed ahead of time as well. Monday morning came and I got ready to hook onto the coach. It takes a few minutes and there’s a checklist of sorts that I follow. Finally the moment leading to departure. Light check. I powered up the coach camera that is typically used for backing up but it’s a great tool when driving! It gives you added vision when on the highway. I felt that momentary twinge of anxiety I get just before towing any trailer but knew it would quickly pass. The truck and Airstream are well matched for the road! It always amazes me the amount of time it takes to prepare for an outing away from the comforts of our homes! But it’s time well spent when you plan properly!The day had arrived that had sat on calendars weeks in advance. The debut was about to begin. The events of those days of camping worthy of their own post. It was time to begin MOONTABS In Motion!
Glamping
I have spent many years camping since my early boyhood adventures shortly after we moved to the farm around 1970. My first campsites were primitive but carefully chosen for their rock formations or views. The locations scattered across the one hundred plus acre of the farm. Little or no evidence remains of those sites these days. Maybe a few fire circles crafted of gathered rocks that nature continues to reclaim with each passing year. Some day to transition back into their former state of wildness. They will only exist in the hazy depths of my memory. I show some of them to Zane on our many wanderings in Macomb. As a well seasoned camper since his earliest memories they hold little allure to him as actual camping destinations. He’s conditioned to mountains and waterways where more abundant activities abound. But as boy I didn’t have the benefits of those distant locations. My father wasn’t a camper but encouraged my love of it. None the less I enjoyed many adventures within walking distance. I learned to prepare and pack for an overnight trip where I would need to prepare dinner, build a fire, and try to escape the hordes of biting mosquitoes. My trusty basset hound Hush Puppy would often be my only companion although as I got older my friends began to join me. As for my shelters they varied from simple leanto structures constructed with an old canvas tarp and poles of wood to a small pup tent I got on my 12th birthday. 46 years later I still possess that tiny shelter of countless memories as only a hoarder type can enjoy. In time my wanderlust expanded and with a driver’s license,bigger tents, and added camping equipment the destinations crept out to new terrain. My friends joined in and we had some pretty crazy times out there. The tempting warm days of spring where mornings would cover the landscape with blankets of frost. Blistering hot summer nights where it was almost impossible to sleep with hundreds of buzzing mosquitoes attempted to breach the tent screen. Chilly fall storms and freezing temperatures would find us hunkered by the campfire. Offering silent prayers to the sky that morning would find us dry. But I remained ever passionate and true to my love of the outdoors. The wet gear was dried. Dirty clothes and bodies washed clean. The discomforts would be forgotten and the next adventure would take form in the mind.Many stories live within this story and probably should be written in time. Years passed and I became a more experienced and well traveled camper at any rate. It wasn’t until 2012 that I would enter the world of I call “glamping”. We purchased a used 19 ft travel trailer and a new truck for an extended road trip to Alaska. That too is a unique story. I took to the life of a camper traveler quite quickly actually. Not without a serious and stressful learning curve! I survived the trial and made the 4600 mile to Alaska safely with family intact. After a 2 week stay we made the decision to sell the trailer in Wasilla after our friend’s dad said he’d help us accomplish that objective. That would end my ownership of a travel trailer every since. But that brief life of adventure has never left my heart or my mind. It tugs like an invisible magnet and lifts my inner spirit. The road calls and many of my questions I offer into a sleepless night may be answered out there somewhere in those vast and wild expanses. It is my life long passion to wander and seek the unknown. That story is written in my short story “The Other Side of the Hill”. I have no reservations about placing it in my first book. It’s tied to everything. I wander far within this post itself and apologize for the length of it! But here I sit outside a rented travel trailer in the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York with a calm lake awaiting our paddles and sunny skies beckoning. What would you do?Sit and tap out a blog or take off? A day waits for us out and a new story waits as well. I am the happy camper once again. Or should I say Glamper? A little of both but I will explain that later. Sorry no time for edits! Teachers grab your red pens!
Home Is Where You Hang Your Hat
A March cold snap has postponed our maple syrup season momentarily so my thoughts run in a different direction today. Yesterday I wrote of the freedoms of having a blog site to basically write whatever subject matter seems pertinent at any given moment. While my blog is heavily nature themed most of the time there are other topics that invite pragmatic muses. A while back I wrote a post titled It’s About Time. I mentioned Hill House where we have lived for close to 6 years now. I have been wanting to sell it for almost 2 years but despite two different realtors efforts nothing happened. Just a couple totally ridiculous offers that I refused. On social media recently I have hinted around about being busy and making apologies for being a bit behind with my blogging. What most people don’t know is that we have been packing and moving our belongings out!We are selling Hill House and will be spending our last night here very soon. The story of how we came to be here in the first place really doesn’t need to be told. Let’s simply say that it was part of my “old life”. 2017 would be one of the most challenging years of my life. I was faced with many tough decisions. I tackled them one day at a time. I threw myself into my two large work projects and decided that they would be my last. I retired that November. It was one of the best decisions that I have ever made! The way forward wasn’t always clear but time passed. I put my son Zane’s happiness and needs at the forefront of all my plans. We bonded greatly through those days of massive change. He kept me focused and on track. I found more time for writing and nature once again. We continued living at Hill House despite the fact that it was way too large for us. I wasn’t ready to uproot Zane. I felt that he needed that sense of home and stability. We ditched Hill House in the summer of 2018 and moved to our cottage on Black Lake for a few months. We lived a carefree existence of camping and hiking in the Adirondack Mountains a few days each month. Adventure became our theme. Hill House was still home base but I think the lesson that I was presenting to Zane was beginning to take hold. We could feel at home wherever we found ourselves. In a wind swept tent on an Adirondack camp site buffeted by rain and struggling to keep dry. Emerging in the morning and laughing about our harrowing night! Or in a sketchy motel room with no locks where we barricaded the door with furniture. In the old cottage at Black Lake where we shared evenings paddling and hunting beaver sticks. Barbecuing and sharing dinner with family right next door. It was proof of the old adage “home is where the heart is”. Back at Hill House in the fall of 2018 big chances were about to come. Jennifer would enter my life in October of 2018. She’d bring joy and new meaning to our time spent at Hill House.Meals shared together and a most special memory of the Xmas we decorated a freshly cut tree together. Time spent safely tucked within its warm,safe haven as winter blanketed the north country. Home yet sometimes falling under the shadow of the old life. We’d feel moments of home in the tiny unfinished interior of our farm cabin during maple syrup season in the spring of 2019. Gathered around the wood stove for lunch before returning to work in the sugarbush. Summer 2019 more tenting and camping in the Adirondacks. Again that sense of home. Camping and traveling with Jennifer to Limekiln State Park near Old Forge, N.Y. with her nephew. Tents our home for a few. Fall 2019 the first of our Adirondack rental cabins. A week of home within a log cabin. A wonderful fireplace for basking with morning cups of coffee and chilly October evenings. Another fall at Hill House stacking in the large piles of firewood to heat it and the garage. Sometimes we’d stay at Jennifer’s house where we always felt at home after a day of adventures. Home was wherever we were together. Summer 2020 would find us calling the Adirondacks home more frequently. Tenting in the backcountry as we continued our 46 high peaks quest. Back to the log cabin rental once again at Tupper Lake. I’d leave for Pennslyvania to work for a few months and share a small apartment with my two friends. It was a home of necessity but I never cared much for living there. Dinner times when we shared a meals and conversations were the only time I felt a small sense of home. Sleepless nights missing my loved ones would become my norm as I searched the Pennslyvania countryside looking for a place for them to visit. Fate would not allow it however. I’d return home for good in October shortly after spending a most wonderful week with Jennifer,Zane, and her family at an Adirondack rental in Cranberry Lake. Once again proving that home is not one fixed destination. I spent a couple weeks in late October working on a project on Whiteface Mountain near Lake Placid,N.Y. Once again calling the Adirondacks home for a few. My motel room near Lake Placid was less than home so I moved to a small Airbnb in Saranac Lake. The moment I stepped into my new space I felt at home! Missing my loved ones but knowing they were only a short distance away. Something that was impossible to feel in the suburb city of Beaver, Pennslyvania weeks earlier.December 2020. Jennifer and I spend a few days in a cozy Adirondack Airbnb in Wilmington. That sense of temporary home again as we returned from our daily adventures. I did a quick count just now! I have used the word home 19 times give or take a few! Totally my intent! My objective was simple this morning. I hope that I have succeeded in making you think about all the places you’ve called home over the years. I mentioned just some of mine. We are about to close the door forever here at Hill House. The final door of the old life. The closing of a chapter. Zane is feeling a little sad these days at times but he’s traveled enough now to know that home can be many places for us. As for me I feel little sadness leaving here. I will miss our beautiful views of the lake. Our private location. Our good friends and neighbors who live just down from us.But home for us becomes a blank page once again and a new year of adventures await us. We’ll live at the old cottage for the moment while we decide our next destination. Home will be many places once again this year. We leave Hill House with our many MOONTABS. Home will be where we hang our hats! Always!
Cold Memories From A Warm Heart
A cold morning at Hill House this morning!It’s been a strange winter for sure!Quite mild actually, with minimal snow.The Lake only sports about 8 inches of ice down in front of the house. After last night I expect that changed. As I stepped out to fire the outside wood boiler (aka The Monster) in my bathrobe and Crocs I realized there was a significant wind chill also. A bathrobe and Crocs is standard attire for a retired person up here on the hill. After all what’s the hurry? It’s that time of winter when the increase of daylight becomes noticeable.Icicles form and drip as the sun hits them. Mini avalanches send snow sliding off the southern and western portions of the metal roof with startling rumbles. I have a lifelong fascination with ice. Walking on it.Following the streams and exploring beaver ponds. Taking shortcuts across it to save time. Always looking for that perfect picture of it hanging from ledges. Amazed as the lake ice booms at night as you shine a flashlight on a night set walleye tip up. Ice is powerful. Cracking concrete. Moving foundations and lifting asphalt. A morning such as this reminds me that this morning’s temperature of 7 degrees Fahrenheit is nothing! I am always telling my teenage son Zane about the cold winters of my youth. He scoffs and says “ older people always say things like that!” But I remember many cold days and nights from years ago. The weather began to take a sudden turn here sometime in the eighties. More unpredictable and sporadic. We still had some fierce winters but things were much different. The winters of 1993 and 1994 were some of the coldest in recent history as I recall. The winters of my youth were rather predictable most of the time throughout the seventies. Late November would find the freeze up beginning. By Xmas time the ice was nicely formed and the snow would begin to accumulate. The temperatures would continue to plummet and by January it could be brutal!We would however often get a January thaw that would last a few days then disappear. Nothing like the up and down cycles we endure here now each winter. Sure there were abnormalities and breaks in the patterns occasionally. Typically after the January thaw the weather would remain very cold till March.The first two weeks of February could be some of the coldest we’d get all winter! The sun might shine but when’s it’s minus 20 or below it didn’t matter much! Growing up on the farm winter changed the routine immensely. Everything was more difficult. Snow to shovel.Hungry horses and cows stabled in the warm barn to feed twice a day. Their waste to be removed from the barn each day.Water to keep from freezing as well. Doors and feed holes always sticking. Saturday’s would find us out with the team of horses cutting firewood. We pulled a big work sleigh for hauling the wood to the farmhouse. No fancy dry weave or nylon clothing. Wool was the answer to keeping warm. Wool pants and chopper’s mitts. Wool toques the standard fare. The job of the farm boy was to always break the sleigh runners free with a large steel bar before they could be moved.They’d freeze down to ground and take some effort to free. It was a cycle of life that became the normal. I think it’s why I have this tremendous connection to the seasons. Sometimes it would be too cold to even venture out to work. But that was rare. The daylight would increase and we’d skip work some Saturdays. We’d load our gear and head to the lake for a day of ice fishing. We’d drive right across the lake with the truck on 20 inches plus of ice.Great memories!One winter especially comes to mind. It was 1978 headed into 1979. Xmas day a balmy -25 degrees Fahrenheit. The oil filter on the Ford Mercury burst when trying to start it. The days of that winter would see a 30 day plus run of days that never got above 0 degrees Fahrenheit! Brutal and testing the limits of people and machines! I learned the tricks of survival.Battery chargers and booster cables. Dry gas to keep fuel lines flowing. Fuel injection not yet common as carburetors ruled the realms of internal combustion engines. We didn’t own anything diesel then. The winter of 1979 and 1980 was equally cold. As I think back over the years I can remember so many brutally cold days and nights. So today feeling cold at 7 degrees Fahrenheit seems wimpy! I think we need to put on some dry weave inner layers with a nylon outer layer. Maybe my Gortex hunting jacket. I have been eyeing the real wool outer wear they sell at a store in Malone,N.Y. Perhaps it’s time to return to the old ways. Or maybe a blend of both worlds. One thing I can’t buy at any price is a pair of my Grandmother’s hand knit mittens. Or a wool jacket with a hand stitched cotton neck liner to keep the wool from irritating my skin. We survived those challenging days of years past. We’ve grown soft perhaps with these new winters. Those winters of our ancestors were very real! Not just a figment of aging memories. I know! I lived some of them! Close to nature. I am the fortunate man. To know the swing of seasons with passing days.To learn to care for livestock. To know the value of home heating fuel that came from the forests of the farm. To appreciate the warmth of the farmhouse at the end of the work day. Meat and potatoes to replenish and nourish the weary body. My roots are deep and well planted. For that I know I am truly blessed! The memories will never die if I keep them alive with words. Some things are best left forgotten but some are not. The stories are many and wait to be dredged like buried gold from the years. To leave them uncovered could be a loss. For Zane and all my family. “It’s no bad thing to celebrate a simple life”. (J.R.R. Tolkien)