my own journey
Last week, I asked my 053 students to think and blog about where they would go if they were to walk away from their lives for a year. I told them I was going to blog about that too, but then this week got complicated and the idea of walking away was just too compelling. When things get tough, I think we often think of taking to the road — of moving away from the complex. Kerouac did it, so did Thoreau. Dickinson, on the other hand, moved father and farther inside herself in order to get away from the buffeting this world can give a soul.
So where would I go? The mountains outside Taos, NM — which is to me a sacred place. The light is different there, the stories stretch back longer through the people of the pueblo and on through to the Big Reservation. In my dream, I live in a one-room cabin and work for the Park Service — watching the animals and landscape change, gathering data on the ways in which Nature is reacting to our overbearing presence. There would be time upon time for writing and reading, and only a two-way radio — to let the Park Service know when I need more rations : ). There would be fishing nearby and I could go out to the river and work out the knots in my neck, casting out over the still water in the warm light. There would be quiet — no electricity, just a wood stove and gas burner for coffee. All I would ask is a year, and I would happily take down any and all information on the ecosystem around me — but short of a monthly check on me, no human contact. Nothing but my own heart held in the large sky, as people since the Anasazi have lived. My only companion for that year would be Willa, who would have to learn to live in a world much wilder than suburban NJ, but who could keep me warm at night, and bark when needed.
A year is all I would ask. Chris (Into the Wild) made his year happen. I have so many ties here with a job I love, students who continue to impress and challenge me, and the many relationships that sustain me. I love my life even when it is difficult, and I don’t want to leave it behind. So my cabin on Taos Mountain is a daydream that comes from the back of my mind whenever I read Thoreau, Emerson, Cather, and Krakauer. Maybe the big idea here is that we all need an escape planned, even if it never comes to fruition (why in the world would the Park Service hire an education professor to be a field biologist???).
The dream makes me feel better, though, like a secret I have in my back pocket. I live the life I choose to live and if I want to, I can choose another.