Rascals

Leah’s conversations with her dad, whether in person or over the telephone, often began with gentle, back-and-forth teasing that went something like this:

Leah: “Hey there, Pop!”
Bill: “Hey there, you Rascal!”
Leah: “You’re the RASCAL!”

Their talk would then ramble on, Leah filling her dad in on what was growing in our garden, or what produce she was canning, or the bread she’d just baked. Bill would talk about his golf game, or a trip that he and Leah’s mom had recently made with the senior citizens' group, or what he and the other members of the church choir were going to sing on Sunday.

In the 38 years that Leah and I have been married, I have been the fortunate eavesdropper, observing or listening in on the loving conversations Leah has had with both her parents. But it was her talks with her dad that gave me, as a male, reason to smile...to notice the way my father-in-law, a strong, tough guy, former Navy man, turned to Mister Softy when talking with one of his little girls.

Bill’s health has not been good for the past year or more, and two weeks ago the 83-year-old husband, father, grandfather and great-grandfather passed away. Leah immediately caught a flight to be with her mom, and I joined them this past weekend.

Family and friends filled the church in our small, Ohio hometown where Bill had sung in the choir, and where his memorial service was held Saturday. Many pictures of my father-in-law’s life were on display: His high school days as a strapping and handsome young athlete; his Navy days; his days with a growing family.

Also on display was a funny picture that I took years ago of Bill, grinning impishly while posing with several Seattle Seahawks “Sea Gal” cheerleaders. Bill had come along with me on the field as I photographed a Seahawks game for Seattle’s morning newspaper. I remember that it took very little prodding on my part to get my father-in-law to pose with the cheerleaders.

Such a Rascal!

Sad News

Leah’s father passed away last Thursday, and Leah immediately flew to Ohio to be with her mother. I stayed behind to take care of our small farm and critters, but will join the family tomorrow for a memorial service.

I’m posting the above image today, not because it somehow visually says something about passing seasons -- though it might...I leave the interpretation to you -- but because the scene is one I happened to encounter this week.

Please keep Leah’s family in your thoughts and prayers.

Seeing Winter

I’ve visited a lot of parts of this country -- the East Coast, the Midwest, the South, the Plains States -- where I have heard folks make pretty much the same joke about their local weather: “Hell, if you don’t like it, just wait five minutes.”

Here in the mountainous Pacific Northwest, we might offer a slightly different wisecrack: “If you don’t like the weather, just go up a ways.”

The elevation of the small harbor town where I live on Puget Sound is only 69 feet above sea level, but my neighbors and I can look west, crane our necks up a bit toward the Olympic Mountains, and see a range of peaks that reach nearly eight thousand feet into the sky. Or we can turn southeast and take in the view of Mt. Rainier, a massive volcano 14, 411 feet in elevation and the highest summit in the Cascades.

As a photographer, I can report that all this up-and-down topography is appealing to the eye, though the differences in altitude make for climatic conditions that are boggling to the mind. Consider the photographs I’m posting today, for example. They are from my two most recent, winter-season hiking outings, and yet the look and feel of the scenes is so very different. The above image is a reflecting pond in a forest near sea level, where, even in winter, the air temperature was in the mid-40’s and the plants growing in the pond were as happy as little green clams. Below is a picture of ice on a decidedly chilly creek in the Olympic Mountains, elevation about 4500 feet. The temperature was 14-degrees.

Like other areas of the country, the five-minute-rule applies here in Washington too, and a clear, sunny day can turn stormy and foul in no time. I have explored amazing places, low and high, for 35 years now. Each unpredictable trail has taken me, not to Lake-This, or Mount-That, but rather to a place of humility.

The more I experience, the less I “know.”

Life Lessons

This was a week when life quietly stepped up behind me, tapped me on the shoulder, and, in words that felt filled with grace and compassion, whispered: “Excuse me, but I think you might sometimes forget that I don’t go on forever.”

It was a week, you see, when I heard that two people I know, one a young man, the other an older, much-loved grandpa, had died. And news came too from Mt. Rainier -- as a hiker and climber I have spent many happy days there -- that four people are missing after last week’s winter storm that in two days dropped four to six feet of snow in the high country. An air and ground search was mounted, but was called off yesterday when another storm moved in.

Such a week.

But there was also this:

A couple from the local Tibetan community called during the big snowstorm, wondering what the roads were like where I live. My friends needed to make a trip to a town about 20 miles away to pick up a visiting Tibetan lama who would be their house guest for several days, and their route would take them through my snowy neck of the woods.

I told my friends that I hadn’t even tried to drive since the big storm, but had made a trip to town that morning on cross country skis and had seen that a few folks were out and about in cars. I was a bit worried about my friends’ plans to drive on the snowy roads, and it occurred to me that I might be more experienced at navigating than they are. I offered to join them on their trip.

My friends have a vehicle with four wheel drive, so driving wasn’t too bad. We took it slow and easy, and I joked with my friends, saying that once we had the lama in the car, we’d have his good Karma with us and could drive a little less cautiously.

We picked up the lama, and I liked him immediately because he had a smile that brightened even that stormy day. My friends and I decided to take a more major highway home, so driving was in fact a breeze.

The next day my friends invited a small group of people to their home and the lama offered Tibetan Buddhist prayers for world peace, and that beings would not suffer but find contentment.

Yes, it was quite a week.

Sacrament of Snow

I don’t think I’d be overstating things too terribly if I say that, in the American West, snow is something of a sacrament.

To be more accurate, water is the real sacrament here. But since a lot of our water falls first as snow in our mountains where it naps peacefully till summer and then melts, it is plainly logical that one should pay some pretty heavy homage to the miraculous snowflake.

Rivers and streams are Mother Nature’s transport system, bringing the mountain snowmelt down to nourish her valleys, and those water courses are then tapped into by farmers who irrigate thirsty fruit trees, hops fields, grapes, and more. If you additionally consider the hydroelectric power that we Westerners generate from water that began as snow, you’ll appreciate that cold, white stuff for us is more than something on which we ski and snowboard. Snow is darned near as essential to us as air.

It felt good, then -- very good -- to wake up to a fresh snowfall yesterday in the Pacific Northwest, since our winter weather the past couple of months has been unusually warm and dry and un-winter-like. The mountain snowpack has been looking a bit anemic, and when I heard a radio report that said that Mt. Rainier might get as much as 47” of snow in the next day or two, I believe a lot of us thought: Well this is more like it!

I took a camera in hand and hiked around the area where I live. A neighbor’s horse was exploring his suddenly-white pasture, and it seemed to me that photographic possibilities were falling from the sky along with snowflakes. The iconic Northwest fir trees were stunningly beautiful, and the witch hazel plant near my back door (it always blooms right in the middle of winter...what’s up with that?) looked spring-like, even in the chill.

Lastly, I photographed the snow-covered prayer flags that Tibetan friends gave us when they came over for a picnic last summer.

This canvas of white will last only a few days here in the lowlands. Up in the high country, however, the sacrament of snow will remain, sustaining us through even the warmest of days of summer.