Montana Mega-Weekend

In Montana, the plains are soft with grass and the mountains are always standing watch. At dusk, the details flatten out and all you can see is shapes, triangles stacked up North to South—each peak cast sharply against a prism of golden light. During dinner at Catherine’s house in the Bitter Root Valley, in the shadow of St. Mary’s Peak, I squashed mosquitos and sweated through my jeans while Jedda, the pup, barked and chased. She loves Montana because of all the space. No leash. No rules. It’s nice to be wild.

Since last writing to you, I drove out to Big Sky Country for a long weekend—our annual swim mission, skate mission, dog mission, beer mission, BBQ mission, bike mission, sunburn mission, heatstroke mission, hike mission, camp mission, everything-that’s-good-about-summer mission.

I bought a cowboy hat. I saw an owl. We got to skate two new Evergreen parks, one of which had ponies galloping by and both of which served up stupid beautiful vistas. We got to drink straight from streams and swim in the most lovely lake. I ate the best-tasting PB&J of my entire life next to an ice-cold plummeting waterfall. We hung with friends and their family, and we laughed a lot and baked in the sun.

I was very at home in Montana. It felt effortless and natural to be there. The sweeping scenery relaxed me as we drove along. The high-country smells of dust and pine bubbled up a sense of peace from my kid-hood in Colorado. When we drove by tidy farmhouses for sale, I saw myself buying them, selling off my Portland possessions, disowning my city life, and moving there to chop wood, grow vegetables and walk in the snow. I could do it, I swear. Not yet, though. Not yet.

As Of Late

Go Skate Day: Old news but good news: Go Skateboarding Day happened, and I skateboarded. It wasn’t exactly a satisfying session, as skate sessions go, but it was a premium hangout with my old-time skate buds. For me, that’s what it’s all about these days—that good stuff that happens when you do something you love with people you love. Rolling. Laughing. Falling down. We're humans. All we have is each other. So, another GSD spent with Scott and Ashley and Derek and I couldn’t ask for more.

Work train to Seattle: I rode the train up past the Puget Sound (destination: Seattle) to do a fancy ad-agency pitch for Nemo. It was a fun and adult-y thing to do. I like train travel even though it makes me a little bit car sick. Train sick? Anyway, it’s very hassle-free. A throwback from another time. Also, train stations are beautiful, and I always take time to appreciate beauty in my travels.

Holiday crowd avoidance: For the third year in a row, we went into the woods for a couple days, walking far and high, sleeping in tents, and then returned to town on July Fourth afternoon so dirty and dog tired that there was no need felt to celebrate, to light things on fire. Instead, copious food was eaten, and day beers drank at George’s house, and then home to watch TV as the mortars blasted through the evening cool. This has become my “America day” ritual, and I am not sorry.

Homesteading: Like a boss, Mark framed up a shed/living quarters AKA shedquarters in two days. I tried to help. I moved some two-by-fours from one pile to another and also tacked up plywood with the motherfuckin nail gun. It feels good to be building, building something real made from tangibles like wood and nails and windows, but also building a life—a potentiality of future days spent easily and peacefully off in the forest.

My Wandering Days Are Over

It makes sense that we would go back to the forest to get married. At the altar of fern-laced trunks—the big, ancient trees that teach you how to grow and stay—Mark and I conspired to celebrate binding our two lives together last Friday.

Family and closest friends embarked on a journey to meet us there. It was far. They navigated traffic, paid bridge tolls to cross shimmering waters, and bravely left behind LTE and 3G to follow written directions to a dirt parking lot in the woods.

By the river, on the brink of a waterfall, I said my promises to Mark, and he said his to me. We talked not of chains but of the freedom in standing together. We talked not of giving things up, but of gaining strength and certainty. We talked about what love might look like—then, now, forever.

Plummeting water was the music. Garden blooms veiled my head. As I spoke, a strange salty water sprang forth my eyes. We both felt weird—light and full of vibration, floating and spinning like plumes from a dandelion. The only thing holding us to earth was the crowd gathered round. Without our people, we might have wafted clear off into the ether.

After the ceremony, we drank cups of champagne, then drove in a big caravan back to the city and into the storm. The rain fell in a curtain beyond the tents while we ate and drank. It was a soggy feast day, but warm with love and friendship. Kids played, defiant of the wet weather. The puppy turned into a feral creature—biting the heels of revelers as they walked by with heaping plates of food. Magick was all around.

People ask if it feels different. It does. It is different. We’re bonded for life, by symbolic rites carried out in front of pine fronds and faeries—but also in reality. In our purpose. In our finances. In our house. In our hearts.

3 Gratitudes

Puppies: Apropos of last weekend when I went over to Jesse's house and met his new dog, which made my day—my world. This young, sleek fellow is a parvovirous survivor. You can't keep him down. Convalesced from his ailment, he now likes to hang with the big dogs, nipping at their heels, and then fall over spent to nap amidst cool shade. I can’t explain it but I just feel better—more tethered to earth—when I’m near a sleeping dog.

Josh Brolin on What The Fuck: A great actor who shines in person, too. There’s a deep satisfaction to knowing that a guy you gravitated towards on screen due to his rough wit and hard-boiled-ness is, like, really that guy.

My garden at 4:30 p.m. on a Sunday: This weekend I sat out in the yard looking, just looking. There was a wonderful heat. There was so much noise—bees and blue jays, kids and cookouts. I could see the blue, way up there in the place you can never really go. I felt comforted. I felt confident in a future.

The Northwest-est

Piney’s gone. There, I said it. He’s on the other side. I’ll tell you more about it sometime, but for now I thought I’d get out of town. Get moving. Move on. I never did know anything else to do.

In our ambition to flee, we thought about driving south to California—but ended up heading north and west—the northwest-est—to the Olympic Peninsula. Here, is where the trees are so old and tall they meet in a perfect V overtop the road. Here, is where arctic oceans end in glassy bays at the feet of a razor-sharp range. Here, depending on who you are, is the promise land.

Pic by Mark.

Camping without my dog, or any dog (who is “my dog” anymore? I’ve had many …) was strange. After making camp, I didn’t have anything to do, no one to keep an eye on or worry about (except Mark, and he doesn’t need eyes keeping on him). I just sat in the sun and drank wine and read while the tide rushed in. Darkness fell, the stars came out—stark, distant, beautiful. When I looked up, a vast loneliness harpooned my soul. Guys, I’ve always been searching for something and never really found it. Maybe it’s the big “why.” Maybe it’s the definition of “me.” Having no real answers for you, I do know that the path to self discovery is a way full of desolate wonder. I leaned in and stoked the fire.

Pic by Mark.

Pic by Mark.

Sunday morning we awoke to whale spouts past the breakers and a pale, slippery head emerging from the sea. Rising and falling. Curious, but not too curious. An intelligent eye looking solemnly our way. I don’t have particularly eloquent words for what it feels like to see and be seen by a whale. Special? We felt special. It was everything you could hope for. We packed up and went home.

Pic by Mark.