A Long Winter’s Nap

How many times can summer turn to fall in one life?

Charles Wright

“It feels like fall.” That is what passes for small talk this time of year when commenting on the cooler temperatures, shorter days, or the brilliant reds and golds that mark the season. I mark this time of year with a variety of chores which are happily spent outdoors: draining and putting away the hoses, bringing in the outdoor furniture, and most important of all, inspecting and putting away my backpacking equipment for the year.

It has become a kind of ritual for me. I make a list of items that will need to be replaced before next spring. It is not a time consuming job, for most everything will remain in my pack during the long winter. That makes it easy to get back on the trail when the days are longer and the flowers are once again in bloom. When the job is done I place my pack in a plastic bin to prevent mouse damage. I well remember what it was like to retrieve my pack many years ago from the garage and find that it had been chewed to pieces and was beyond repair.

I admit I engage in a process of magical thinking, as if by taking the time to put my gear away with intention the winter will be less dark, maybe not as long nor as cold. I leave my old plastic teacup out on a small table where I see it everyday. It would be a shame to hide away something so precious that routinely returns me to happy memories whenever I glance at it.

This process is not unlike another ritual I developed over many years of lengthy backpacking trips. On the last day, usually just two or three miles from the trailhead, I would seek out an isolated location off trail. Often I would make a final journal entry, or sometimes I would just sit and ponder the journey I was about to complete. After ten days or more alone in the wilderness I felt relaxed and content. Life was just the way I wanted it to be at that moment.

The one to which I would soon return would begin at 4:30 the next morning with an alarm clock. Getting up early allowed me to tend to the day’s chores before getting my girls off to school and myself off to work. My life as a single mother never seemed to slow down except for that one long backpacking trip every summer, and on that last day I took some precious time to cherish the world that surrounded me. Often I would sit by a small stream or on a river bank and listen to what Aldo Leopold called the “song of a river. . .the tune that waters play on rock, root, and rapid.” This song was comforting, and I was convinced that if I sat there and savored the experience for just awhile longer I could somehow take it home with me.

The temperature dipped to well below freezing this morning, but my sunflowers and nasturtiums do not seem to mind, and neither do I. My backpacking gear is put away for the year and will enjoy a long winter’s nap. I no longer feel that familiar regret over the turning of the seasons. My summer was a full one. The old green plastic cup sits on the table by the window. It holds new memories, still warm and simmering.