I write this on September 11, 2026, the twenty-fifth anniversary of the attack on New York City’s Twin Towers. I realize I have nothing to add to the many commentaries and memorials around the country. I decided to walk our trails through the boreal forest at sunrise in search of beauty and hope in the living world.
I put on my moose hide moccasins to walk the forest floor like the first people to inhabit this land. Walking in soft moccasins requires a toe-first stepping. Toes feel the varied textures of Mother Earth’s ground, searching for a quiet and soft landing. It is unlike the heelfirst striding of hard-soled, booted feet over modern, flat surfaces. One is of quiet questing while the other is forward determination.
In my moccasins I could feel plant roots, bare ground, soft moss and morning-dew-wetted grasses. Without looking, my feet informed me of the differences. Before I got too far, I was reminded how my usual hiking boots had left my feet more tender than those of the original walkers of this land. Careful, slow, and quiet progress was a gift this morning as the sun was rising on a clear and windless day.
In my moccasins I could feel plant roots, bare ground, soft moss and morning-dew-wetted grasses. Without looking, my feet informed me of the differences. Before I got too far, I was reminded how my usual hiking boots had left my feet more tender than those of the original walkers of this land. Careful, slow, and quiet progress was a gift this morning as the sun was rising on a clear and windless day.
We named the first trail I walked “Thanksgiving Trail.” My wife and I started it just before Thanksgiving Day several years back. Its development was interrupted by my wife’s sudden and serious diagnosis of cancer. After recovering from surgery and chemotherapy half a year later, she wanted to finish the trail herself in gratitude for the return of her good health. It is a path of thanksgiving from start to finish. A good start to my morning meander, looking for beauty and hope.
Thanksgiving Trail follows along two large beaver ponds on the creek. The growth of aquatic vegetation in shallow water is devoid in the actual creek channel. It is easy to see the original flow-age the beavers have dammed up. This morning there are no waterfowl as is typical, but there are three beavers working on the lower dam. To watch them undisturbed, I moved very slowly down the trail past mixed patches of thimbleberry, Saskatoon, and beaked hazelnut. I noticed those plants had been stripped of edibles by birds and bears. Birds don’t pull the brush down. Bears do.
The beavers were working on their dam. Even in our dry weather, they had raised the level of the pond to the point that grasses growing at water’s previous edge are now in the elevated water. It was so quiet watching them work that I could hear the gentle swish as they slipped underwater for more mud. They would surface at the dam’s edge to add their little handfuls of mud to an engineered marvel. They are manifestations of beauty and awe in Creation.
I had been standing quietly for some time when I decided to move on. Within ten steps, something large exploded out of the dense brush, greatly startling me. The hunter in me instantly identified the footfalls as those of a hard-hoofed deer rather than the padded paws of a wolf or bear. Anyone who has witnessed a deer stomp its hoof knows what I mean. I quickly moved back towards the pond to catch a glimpse of the running deer, which I couldn’t see. The whole commotion set the three beavers to slapping their tails in loud warnings. The resulting water geysers shot five feet in the air. My quiet toe-walking in moose hide moccasins had gifted me such a moment.
Thanksgiving Trail connects to Toothache Trail. It is named for the decision I made about a sore tooth years ago at Christmas time. Did I want to go back to St.Paul to the dentist or lay out a new trail in the leafless winter landscape? My clever wife offered the options, knowing what I would choose. Aspirin was an easy fix for discomfort. The new trail was laid out through a mature boreal forest of huge aspen, white pine, and spruce. It circumvented a black ash swamp of mature trees. This morning I was walking Toothache as the sun was illuminating the very tops of the trees. It is my favorite time of day. The sun supplies not only beauty but the promise of a new day. The epitome of hope.
I noticed a few leaves among many at the very top were gently waving. If it was a breeze, it wasn’t enough to move a twig. It looked more like a salutation to the rising sun. A greeting of gratitude for what the sun brings to the treetops as they make the season’s last chlorophyll-produced sugars for their host trees. Those leaves will soon fall to the forest floor, as did the dead aspen now laid across the trail in front of me. I don’t speak plant language, but I know they talk to each other. I think the small plants growing in the shaded lower levels of the woods are happy and grateful to receive the fallen leaves and tree trunks. Seasons and death deliver the sun’s blessing of nutrients to the residents of shaded ground. In that falling, mystery converts death and sacrifice to new life. Beauty in the Mystery.
Toothache connects across our drive to Raven’s Walk. It is our newest trail through mature forest. Big trees. We walk with ravens because they nest and fledge their clumsy young there. The trees are a cathedral of living, growing aspiration reaching skyward. The forest church bells are the spirited squawks and peeling bell-tones of the ravens. Angels on high ride the acrobatic aerial flight of those mischievous and magical birds. No wonder humans want to take flight. I love the look of the trees from terra firma, but I wonder what the ravens see. Perhaps they feel sorry for me with my limited view of the world. My thoughts return to fallen leaves and tree trunks. I know someday I will fall also. With my soul set free from earthly bounds, perhaps I will fly with those spirits of flight and see all that is to be seen.
The Twin Towers reminded us that death can come suddenly with tragedy large or small. Death knows no age, young or old. People die surrounded in love or with regret. Some deaths are public while others go unnoticed. The poet Langston Hughes wrote, “Life is for the living.” Many others have written and sung that message. By living today, we have time to take heart and find beauty. The sun rises every morning to deliver each of us the hope contained in a new day.
