Category Archives: Guardian Wilderness Guide Program

Down the Trail

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Guardian Yearlong blog post originally posted on 8/18/13

Down the Trail:

We are going down the trail

Through brush and bog

Crossing meadows climbing hills

We are going somewhere!

Northwest with canoe

East with packframes

South to the fishing lake

And west for that is where

The river leads up north again.

Back were we started or finished

Or back were we shall once again return

On the trail that is.

Climbing the hill of fear

Swimming in the lake of surrender

Lost in a bog of confusion

Caved and trapped in our own minds

We’re walking in circles!

I’m reversing, backing up; returning.

Stumbling over some roots

Face first to the earth I hit my head

Lose conscious for a moment

Aho! These are my roots! Our roots.

Wandering from dawn to dusk in the big bog to the north

Through Alder, Cedar, Spruce, Balsams and Tamarack.

And up on a little bog island where bunch berries grow in abundance.

I lay down on this soft forest floor of sphagnum moss

Just for a while

Join the seemingly enternity of ancients

“Ah! I wonder what is for dinner!?”

I dip my fire making stick, that I made without tools, in water

And still manage to make a fire.

It is an achievement!

I rip my trousers on some raspberries

and go for a long nap.

Nothing was accomplished

In my mind

We are all walking

It is the thought that we are going somewhere

That keeps us sane.

“We make the path by walking

You walker there are no roads

Only wind trails on the sea” – Antonio Machado

Ask me what I am doing, and I’ll say, “This is what I’m doing.”

Sure we are setting up tarps with sticks only, using packframes we made out of wood and learning to carry our homes on our backs, making fire by friction without knifes or tools, learning to read the stories of a feather we find, making waterproof birch bark bowls for easy travel, learning tracks and signs of wild animals, to navigate in a big bog, tan hides, and make raw hide containers, learning to have an inner compass and how to run and walk like water flows and see how a river is formed

But really

We are just on the trail.

Storytelling

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Guardian Yearlong Blog originally posted 8/6/13

Tamarack arrives at camp to the Seekers sitting in a circle. He sits down, and this is what was shared…

Tamarack: Well, what’s new?

Firebeard: Everyone made it back alive. But you haven’t heard the story about how.

Tamarack: Whoa. Sounds like a story. A fireside story.

Firebeard: Just sharing it now. We’re on the edges of it.

Tamarack: Continue, please.

Blondie: So, there was this Cedar forest where I slept. When I got there, just as I described before, there was this huge piece of wood, how do you call it again?

Big Eyes: Burl.

Firebeard: Burl.

Blondie: Burl. Right. In the tree. Right about the height where the second green leaves are growing, there’s a huge branch, and then another one, small, which has leaves on it, about this height — it looked like a face was watching me. So I was walking around and gathering a little firewood — it was cloudy and a little rainy, moisture in the air. I set up my tarp,  had a little fire, nice dinner, and went out to explore a little. I walked in a little circle. It was already getting dark, so I decided to cool myself down and relax for a little while. I sat down at this spot — the bottom was shaped with huge, mossy rocks, a lot of sharp edges, and there were also holes in the ground with water from the bog, which was from the river, I guess. So many trees were standing, not straight, but bent, in one direction or the other. Roots wove around the stones and it looked like they were grabbing them.

I sat there for awhile and watched; I recognized how different the Cedar forest is in comparison to this forest here. Somehow the atmosphere was magical.

So I was in my sleeping spot, which was pretty close to the shore, where I had a drink. After that,  there were clouds, and then I was looking over the bog, over the open surface, and I saw these stars, like the stars flying on the ground, like these little—how do you call them again?

Laughs Loud: Shooting stars?

Blondie: No. Fire.

Seeker: Fire Flies.

Laughs Loud: Fire Flies. Oh, wow.

Blondie: And they were all over the bog. I went back into the forest and waited until it was dark, and at the time where it was  dark dark, there were, I don’t know, thousands all over the bog.  It was a great moment. And I was thinking about you guys here and I actually wanted to bring everybody there to see that beauty. And at the same time, I felt comfortable with being there alone.  It is definitely an awesome spot.

It was rainy when I began to turn back, so I waited until the rain was gone and rested for a little while longer until I started the journey back. Must be about high sun, something like that, when I started, and there were a lot of Zagime. I was on the river again. I felt my arms, which were tired from last sun, and I looked around again. I could see dark clouds, and I was looking through the forest for a place to shelter.  I thought, there are actually more places than the sun before, everything’s there. I could see there, or there, that might probably be a good site too; here’s water, I can drink here. I have my shelter with me all the time. All I need is a little food to travel further.

It was just a great feeling. I felt like I was home, and I still feel it. I want to be there, all the time, and I want more opportunities to do that.  I was even thinking about staying there longer, for a quarter moon, maybe. Maybe with someone else, and we can go together.

The way back was so much faster; I would say it took a third of the time I spent to get there.  I saw the tracks of two people. I looked around, and saw, oh, it looks like there were canoes here before. I went closer, and I saw footsteps going through the forest, which was very tight and bushy; it’s not easy to go there. And then I continued. Finally came back here. My mind was here way before I actually got back here with you. I was thinking, hey, is that the shore? Hmm. That might be the shore where they are. I got there…Oh, it’s not the shore. I continued the pattern maybe three or four times. That’s the story. Aho.

Group: Aho.

Tamarack: A couple of observations: This is just what happens when the Guardians come home and tell their stories of what they’ve discovered, what might be there for the clan, what might not be there. And an inspiring story like this is going to get the whole clan excited about going. This is how life is. This is how life used to be, and how life can be again. It is how life is here for you now.

As  you get more adept at this, you’re going to be going out and exploring this and that and that, and all the stories you’re going to come back with, you’re going to assess these stories: “Well, is this good for us? Is that good for us? How about that? And are we ready to go? Let’s prepare.”

This is our beginning. This is how we are living. It’s how we’re going to continue living.

A Rite of Passage

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Guardian Yearlong post originally published 6/30/13 

I just left the Guardian trainees’ new camp, which is on a wooded bank overlooking upper Eagle River. While I’m here in the wilderness, I’m taking advantage of some time alone in my canoe by voice recording this first blog entry. However, just as I begin, a whirlwind whips the water right in front of me into a fierce lather. At first I can’t make sense of it—all I can imagine is several fish flopping around like crazy. And then I see that some other energy is spinning it in a tight counterclockwise circle, with a sound like a fan on overdrive.

As soon as I realize what it is, it dissipates and transforms into a cool gust of wind that passes over me. And then it is over.

I witness waterspouts when there is magic afoot. And that is surely the case today. It all began in the deep black of the predawn, when I arose, grabbed my drum, and felt my way up the trail to Mashkodens (Little Prairie Camp). Mist rose in soft swirls from the surface of the pond that I skirted quietly by so as not to disturb the nocturnal animals returning home to bed down for the day. As well, the first of the diurnal (daytime) animals might already be stirring.

I arrived at Mashkodens just as a couple of the trainees were waking up. Giving them some time to rouse their comrades and get ready, I walked out on the meadow. The frosty night air had transformed the vegetation into a crystal-covered carpet that shimmered ghostly white in the faint starlight.

It must have been about a mealtime before first light, because Robins and White-Throated Sparrows, the first voices of the dawn chorus, were just warming up. Before that, it was just frogs and the occasional honk of a nervous Goose. Next I heard a Chickadee, and then another and another, spread out around me. From high on a dead branch a Mourning Dove joined in, followed by a Hermit Thrush, a Wood Thrush, and a Veery. Then came the Warblers, and finally a Red-winged Blackbird heralding the first light creeping over the horizon.

But that was hardly the end, for then followed “the bedlam of other singers,” as Aldo Leopold noted in A Sand County Almanac. There was such a plethora of whistles, shrieks, quacks, and assorted voicings that it was impossible to distinguish most of them from each other.

It was cold for a mid-June morning, yet I was warm from the walk and glowing inwardly with anticipation for the coming rite of passage. I passed the time reflecting on how the sequence of birds joining the dawn chorus can vary with time of season, and from one place to another, depending on species composition, geography, and forest type.

Last evening the trainees finished their pack frames—a noteworthy event, as these were no ordinary frames. The Guardian Training is a completely nomadic experience: once the trainees leave Mashkodens, they will not see another camp for the entire time. On those pack frames they will be carrying their shelters, clothing, bedding, tools, and craft supplies—everything they will need for their wandering life. For them, no two days will be the same. They will be in constant training to adapt and adjust to whatever lies around the next turn of the trail. Aware of the significance and symbolism of their pack frames, they turned out some of the best I have seen from any group.

Soon after my arrival, the drum called everybody together and the pungent smell of burnt hair filled the air. Whether it be graceful locks of long blonde hair, wavy shocks black as raven feathers, or sandy colored dreadlocks, they all burned off the same and lay in piles beside heads encrusted in charred stubble. Glowing-hot rocks and coals gripped in wooden tongs were deftly run over heads, along with flaming sticks to set small patches of hair afire. Handfuls of wet moss stood at the ready to immediately snuff out flare-ups. Along with this singeing, they blackened their faces with charcoal.

You may be wondering why such self-defacement. The trainees actually saw it as the opposite: they planned and conducted the ceremony as a symbolic release from their attachment to images of self that were not authentically them. They wanted to consciously break from that past and create space for their essential selves to shine forth.

With faces smudged and hair reduced to bristle, they left Mashkodens in silence, never again to set foot in the camp where they met shared many fond moments while preparing for their wandering turn of the seasons in the wilderness. Hiking to the nearest stream, they took to their canoes, paddled for a mealtime or so, and stopped to wash themselves clean and ready for their awakening.

After having fasted for two days and gotten up in the predawn for the ceremony, they were more than tired when they found a campsite in the early evening. With relish, they roasted fish, greens, and bear fat on an open fire, and then slept soundly under a canopy of stars. The next day, those who needed more rest stayed around camp to gather firewood and forage (escargot was on the dinner menu), while those with passion and energy organized scouting missions to find canoe routes through the wilderness that lied ahead, and to assess the difficulty of upcoming rapids.