Reflections on National Public Lands Day…

I turned the ignition to my old ford pickup only to be greeted by the soft smooth voice of the group Parmalee singing, “Home is where my heart is still beating.” The lyrics stuck in my mind as I sat in my drive in a form of a conscience day dream, reminiscing about home. Not the home I share with my wife and raise my son, nor the home in which I grew up, but rather the home where nature first took grasp of my soul. A little red cabin snuggled into the bank of an outside bend of the White River. It wasn’t the river, nor the cabin, or even the deer and turkey that frequented the 46 acre parcel, but the entire manner in which nature was able to surround our lives in an intentionally complete way.

My earliest memory of home, which we affectionately called “The River,” was sitting at the breakfast table in front of the large picture window that faced up river from the big bend. With my nose pressed to the window, I watched as chipmunks darted in and out of the tall grass that lined the the steep bank, and squirrels hung upside down from the baffle to get to the bird feeders situated beneath the eve.

“Would you like some more pancakes?” my great grandmother asked, while sliding a short stack off her spatula and onto my plate. “Of course you do, yep, yep, yep,” She worked the kitchen like a pro, moving from the griddle to the stove to check on the sausage, and back again. Wearing her patented look of light blue Capri pants with a white blouse, she manufactured some of the most incredible tasting homemade blueberry pancakes the world had ever experienced.

I backed my truck out of the drive and headed down the road. If there was a red light at the traffic signal at the end of the street, I paid no attention as I glided through the intersection in deep thought.

Home, was not only a summer destination where I learned to read the river, and entice bites from the native trout, but as the summer months turned to autumn and the leaves began to change and flutter to the ground, home became deer camp. The small two bedroom cabin was always full of life and excitement as fathers and sons waited the much anticipated deer season.

We had hung many deer in the old pole barn behind the house, but not one felt as satisfying as my first. I can still remember grasping the marble white colored bone in my young adolescent hands and feeling a sense of pride that words are unable to duplicate. I had stepped out of childhood and into an unfamiliar role as a provider. It was strange to me then, and still in a sense now, that a single pull of a trigger, was the difference between life and death for that animal. There was sense of remorse in its death, and yet sense of celebration of the life it had given my family with its flesh. A feeling that squeezing a trigger, induces to this day.

I turned the old truck down a wash board road and followed the track to the end. As I placed the gear stick into park the cloud of dust that followed me, floated by. I stepped out of my truck, and within moments had a tree stand on myback and a bow in my hands. With the sun in my face, I headed west across an overgrown field. I stopped and took a deep breathe allowing fresh air to fill my lungs.

As I grew older, home became less of a destination for excitement and adventure and more of a refuge from a world that seemed always connected to artificial things. Every spare moment in every day life was filled with information and interaction, but home was always there to allow me to decompress and reflect upon the necessities of solitude.

On May 9, 2014 I brought a visitor home. I led her by the hand down the the steep steps leading to the waters edge. We settled onto a bench, just above the high water mark, and began talking about the tranquility and beauty of the sounds and sights of the river rushing by. My stomach doubled in knots and my voice shook as I took to one knee. With a resounding “yes” I slipped my late grandmother’s ring onto her finger.

Finally situated in my tree stand I took a deep breathe, as a stiff wind out of the west swiped across my face. It had been merely three months since my family had sold the cabin, but I couldn’t imagine missing it anymore than I did at that moment. It was disheartening to think of all the family reunions, birthday parties, and hunting trips that I had experienced as a youth, and that my children would never have the opportunity to have those same experiences.

I sat in silence as the woods surrounded me with the familiar noises of squirrels skittering through leaves and birds chirping from their perch. I watched as a chipmunk darted in and out of the tall grass beneath me. A smile spread across my face, as I thought of those who had the forethought to set aside land that everyone could enjoy, everyone could retreat to, and everyone could call home. While I did not spend the money for this land, I did own it, my children would inherit it, and they are given the opportunity to make lasting memories.

I closed my eyes and laid my head against the bark of the tree and whispered to myself, “This is home.”