November 30, 2014
November 18, 2014
November 7, 2014
On the Forest of Renous, New Brunswick
A man from
Plaster Rock just gave me an orange. He also told me that road ahead
is filled with wild animals and mountains and streams and often times
with screams, and he certainly did not envy me because of this... he said. But he was still nice.
Everyone
in Plaster Rock was nice. The lady
at the counter still filled up my leaky water jug.
The
pharmacy also had a overhang while a thunder and lightning storm raged.
The lightning dance around the sky, from under
my overhang. “It would be exciting if I were on my bicycle on top
of a mountaintop” I decide to make dinner.
When I had my sandwich the lightning and rain finished also, I began
cycling again.
I could
see the beginning of the forest, rearing through the clouds ahead of
me. It filled the horizon and set my skin alight with goosebumps
A wolf
running down the road stopped and turned to watch me, sending a
shiver up my spine, my heart. What a proud
animal.
The mist was becoming increasingly dense.
I did not
see a plane or a truck or a car in the Renous, and wondered if I had
entered a different world... or they had.
By the
evening all of my water had leaked out of the leaky water jug. I
decide to set up my tent on the side of the mountain, in a clear cut swath of land.
The wet
grass was crushed underneath the tent and the smell filled my nose.
The
Appalachian mountains surrounding me and the grass and the trees and
the sound of the rain drip-drip-dropping upon my tent…
The sounds
in a forest at night are more pronounced. The cracking and creaking
of trees tear the air and fill me with fear. I wear ear plugs.
I take out
my ear plugs for some reasons in the middle of the night. At that
instant I heard the wolf and his friends howling loudly beside me,
accompanied by new cracks of thunder and lightning which pealed and
split across the mountains.
Howling at
the clouds and the rain and the wind and the lighting and the thunder
and me. I lay there trembling. I was afraid they would storm the
tent and attack me.
Alone, in
the middle of the forest at night, I had only the companionship of my
thoughts. And my thoughts fought against my fears. My body
trembling; my mind finds courage: “If they came for me I would do
my best, but they hadn’t yet, and why would they?” I asked
hesitantly. Maybe the wolves were simply singing because they love
singing, like my friend Alan, with whom I had embarked upon this
journey many weeks of cycling ago.
…In the
midst of this new found song... singing it tuly was... Maybe to the
forest, maybe to each other, maybe to me, or maybe to us all…
I drifted
no longer trembling back to sleep.
I saw that
the Morning had a sunny blue sky and I dripped the juicy orange’s
juice all over my chin while thinking of the noises of night.
I began
cycling once again, through the beautiful forest. No mist, no rain,
no thunder.
November 3, 2014
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