Pax Plena

  • Streams & Smoky Mountains

    I’ve been on a trip the past couple of weeks visiting friends in Virginia. We opted to take a roadtrip to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee to catch a dinner theater performance, and visit Dollywood. It was a fun slice of Americana, complete with over the top Christmas lights and outlet mall shopping. I did manage to snag a pretty cool pocket knife – so no complaints.

    But what was the most meaningful part of the trip to me, aside from the time spent with my friends, was a day drive we took to visit The Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

    I wasn’t unfamiliar with the Great Smoky Mountains. My Grandfather’s people, the Cherokees, called the area home from time immemorial through the Indian Removal Act and the Trail of Tears in 1830. Even after, some bands of Cherokees remained, taking to the Appalachian hills and making a life among the thousands of acres forests, creeks, and valleys in the southeastern United States. Having visited, it was very easy to understand why some chose to remain. The place is nothing if not peaceful. A refuge lost to time.

    The park takes its name from the natural fog that results from the park’s trees and vegetation. The fog hovers over the mountains, making them look bathed in smoke from afar and even from within the park itself.

    Far from it though.

    The air was fresh and crisp with a hint of November chill. It smelled of pine and growth, and of the soil that has eroded from the craggy terrain for millennia.

    In all, it was a place mostly undisturbed by mankind spare the roads and few visitors taking in its wonder on a cold day. The quiet streams and rivulets ran throughout the park, paying no heed to the passing cars. The rustle of branches in the wind gave greeting as we drove, accented by the occasional warble of mischievous bird overhead.

    The mountains themselves are said to be the oldest in the world. I suspect the Cherokees would agree with this sentiment. The fog and the air give the mountains a certain natural stateliness that is coupled with mystery and grace. They seem to look out over the vast Tennessee landscape toward the resort towns of Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge with a kind of bemused wonderment at the bustle of the world going on around them. And yet, within the park reserve, life goes on as it always has. Nature’s cycle continues apace. The streams continue to bubble over the rocks that have been there since the foundations of time were set.

    I think if I had my druthers and could shuck off the fetters of responsibility that anchor me to my lived reality, I would transport myself back to 1830. I would build myself a little cabin along side one of the babbling brooks and make my home from the land.

    Of course, armed with no knowledge of how to do this, I probably wouldn’t last very long. As Will Ferrell said in a recent movie, January was the leading cause of death in the 1800s. But there’s something about the ancientness of the place that conjures the romantic latent even in my calloused soul. I am mindful, though, of my own, human tendency to romanticize the past. It’s easy to think that prior eras and generations were really the golden age in which to live. I suspect that sometime in many years hence, future generations will look back at this current era and yearn for it in the way that I do the pre-1830s Smoky Mountains.

    So, rather than wish for a bygone era, I resolved to be grateful for the existence of such a place, and thought about how fortunate I was to set foot on the lands of my ancestors. I hope that in 2123 the waters will still meander through the park, and that the fog of the mountains will still entice visitors with mystery.

  • The Night Before I Turn 40

    It’s a drop past 11pm here on the East Coast, and just a few minutes away from my Fortieth birthday. I usually don’t let big, decade birthdays consume too many of my thoughts – age is just a number, as the kids say.

    But it’s hard not to think back on this night ten years ago and reminisce. I had just driven back to my hometown, Walters, Oklahoma. I had finished up my law school and doctoral years in Tucson. With no job and an uncertain future, I left the Old Pueblo and headed for home with my nearly one-month old newborn son, and then wife in tow.

    It had been a predictably long drive. God knows the drive between Tucson and Walters is long. But we made it safely. The photo below, marked the first time that there would be four generations of Fodder men all in the same place. It was also the first time that my Grandfather would get to meet his Great-Grandson.

    Now my son is ten. My Grandpa has passed on. And life seems far more complicated today than it did back then. But it’s hard not to be thankful. My baby nephew is now playing football. My Dad is well. I’d say we fared okay, all things considered. I hope that we will be so fortunate in the next ten years.

    It seems like a lifetime ago, and yet it seems like yesterday. I remember how tired we were after the drive. How great it felt to be home. How excited and nervous I was at the thought of being a parent. It was all so new.

    But it strikes me that each milestone year is like that. Ten years from now, I don’t know what I will be doing on this night. I don’t know who will will be by my side when the next picture is taken. For all I know, it could be my Dad holding his latest Grandson. Stranger things have happened.

    What I do know is that I don’t want to take a single moment of this next decade for granted. To paraphrase Thoreau, “I want to live deeply and suck out all the marrow of life.”

    If I had had this perspective ten years ago, I would have cherished each moment when that photo was taken. I would have basked in the company of family, and relished the excitement of welcoming a new life into the world. I would have been satisfied with a weary body, tired after closing an old chapter and excited to open a new one.

    But the past is done.

    Like the tree above, we all inexorably shed our old leaves no matter how vibrant they are in order to reset, rest, and to welcome the new.

    In five minutes or so, it will be time to turn the page on my 30s and see what comes next.

  • Crows on the Lawn

    I saw a gaggle of crows outside my office window this morning. They foraged in the grass, looking for food, I assume. Either that or looking for whatever crows look for on sunny fall days. With expert practice, they flipped the leaves with their long beaks and nuzzled their way into the grass underneath the leaves.

    After a time they became bored, strutting about the lawn before taking flight in the direction of the sun.

    This morning I read that the midterm elections are tightening with all signs pointing toward buoyed Republican prospects next Tuesday. Perhaps sensing the inevitable, President Biden and the Democrats are bemoaning the news, warning Americans that potential Republican gains are simply “dark forces that thirst for power.” Meanwhile, most Americans are simply fed up with both parties, and seem to think that no matter who wins they will do a piss-poor job of governing the country.

    With war still raging in Ukraine, inflation running rampant, and grocery prices soaring, the only glimmer of hope that even CNN can offer us is that avocados are getting cheaper.

    How I envy those crows.

    The crows didn’t seem to care much about who wins next week’s midterms. I suspect that they would gladly poop on whatever political party is in power, and fly off cawing to one another about the reactions from the humans on the ground far below them.

    They’re also wonderfully content. They feel no need to annex another crow’s territory, or threaten their existence with nuclear weapons.

    And they take sustenance from the world around them. The crows have no use for money unless it’s a paper bill that might make good lining for a nest. Grocery prices, gas prices, mortgages, credit card bills – all of the things that our more ‘sophisticated’ species takes for granted as part of every day life – have no relevance to my black-feathered friends.

    I believe the crows are on to something…

  • An Unusual Date

    2/22/22. Or 22/02/2022.

    The inter webs have called it “Twosday” because the auspicious number falls on a Tuesday. Thousands of people have flocked to Vegas to get married. And Russia stands poised to invade the Ukraine.

    [Link]

    I don’t know that this day has any special significance for me. But it seemed neat to make the day here.

    And who knows? Maybe 400 years from now, when we have the next 2/22/22 falling on a Twosday (2/22/2422) – maybe this site will still exist in some form. If it does, I hope that my ancestors will look back and smile at me for being so sentimental.

    And they would be right. I’m nothing, if not a sucker for hope.

  • The Old Sentry

    The backyard is my project for the day. There are four or five large trees in total, but they provide a fine canopy over the whole area. Every morning, I am greeted by squirrels zipping across the yard, scurrying up the trees. They mischievously chase each other from limb to limb and across the power lines, nuts in tow.

    A couple of brave chipmunks have even chanced to come upon the deck to grab some of the Biscoffs that I had set out for them. Meanwhile, the birds of the air flit back and forth among the canopy branches and the woodpeckers tap in vain against the synthetic siding of the house. My chipmunk friends look on in bemusement. I can also rely on a family of cardinals and a family of blue jays to make their appearances. This is, perhaps, the only time that red and blue can get along, pecking amongst the grass for provisions.

    At the center of it all, a giant silver maple stands sentry in the middle of the yard – a massive tree that has seen more life than I ever will, and has probably done more good than I ever will too. His branches reach 50 feet into the sky with ease, providing a playground to the chipmunks, and the squirrels, and the birds.

    How interesting that a living, but non-sentient being like a tree can serve so many of its denizens simply by existing. And yet we humans go to such great lengths in pursuit of whatever vanities that strike our fancy only to find that they are less fulfilling than if we had simply carried out our purpose and passively existed like the Sentry.

    Today I will cut the grass, carefully avoiding the roots and briars about the yard. And the Sentry will stand guard over my efforts. One day, I will be no more, and will leave him to look over the folly of someone else.