A Miracle of Birches

"At once, the birds began their son, and Betushka and the Lady danced. This time, they stopped before sunset, and the lady twined the bundle of flax around a slender birch. In no time at all, the spindle was filled with thread, and Betushka ran home happily." – from "The Birch Fairy" a Czech Fairy Tale










I remember a long
path as my first
encounter when a
young man near

the Kickapoo
River in the highlands
of the drift less coulee
region as the closest

to such a miracle
as is when there
were children to small
to small to walk

and packed in some
such backpack
where all from side
to side along the trail

were the bone bright
stands of birches
they stood deep into
the understory and seemed

a pattern by which
we could sense
a navigation of safety
similar to travel by stars

moments like these
breaths of time really
that stand inside the mind
as though they always

belonged or maybe
we have just recovered
and I now think
of the wonderful tale

of the Czeck girls
who loved to dance
in the afternoon among
the birches

as one day she met
the old beautiful lady
who asked if Betuskka
liked to dance?

to be asked to love
among love is once
in a lifetime but that
is what the birches

have always come
to say in their jagged
white bark which
is always its own song

and I seek them
for the only solace
for I have known
no birch fairies

of my own and walk
in wait for my
thousands of old
birch leaves to someday

to turn to golden
thread and fly off
onto the lush ground
as gold coins to gather

Riverside Drive

"I'd like to see him. Mamma would raise hell if she found it out, but I'd like to see him.
'Well'?
'He's not where we used to live, on Riverside Drive, and he's not in the phone book book or city directory.'" – Dashiell Hammett, from The Thin Man









You turn your detective agency into an at home business when you are quite ready to no longer receive an offers for work. It had taken a life time to figure out that that racket really wasn't for me, and turned my attention to carving out lashes and sewing together birch bark canoes for neighbors at a hundred and fifty a pop. At that fine price, I kept busy, held onto my sanity, and didn't have to rove the underbelly, so to speak, for lost kittens of every kind. Until the phone started to do its buzzing bit in my back pocket. Where else do you put it? Keep it in the house while you're working away and you feel guilty when you walk in a few hours later and see that one of your three daughters have left the only voice mail in the last month and you weren't there. And, let's face it, in case a call came from someone left out there who still actually dialed up the services of a sleuth.
"Emerson it's me." I knew the voice but not the familiarity. As I've said, business had been purposefully thin. My birch slabs were calling my name.
"This isn't Chance?"
"You picked the right name out of the hat," he said, a thin, raspy sort of voice, as always the tinkling of glasses and the setting of silverware sounds in the background. Chance was a maitre d at the finest French restaurant a mile west, near downtown over looking the lake. That's what he'd be looking at right now as he called. Too early in the morning for customers, the lake calm, blue, and prepared for a canoe caravan, just as soon as Emerson had fixed a few more of these up and sold them.
"It's mildly nice to hear your voice," I sputtered, hoping to install a hint at my new side profession.
"I know, I know, you're laying low and figuring out ways of sliding through the next ten years without a minor injury. But you are the best of the best you know."
"That's because I am literally only one left, you know?" Chance had a lot of ears out on the street. One in the restaurant, but he had also held a city government job simultaneously in years past, and so knew all the small time crooked stuff of suits and ties and the woman on the street. I was sure this going to be a tail a cat kind of call. Long nights in car listening to smooth jazz and mindful meditation recordings.
"Lay it on me, then."

The New Bark Canoe

"It is five-fifteen in the morning, August 12th, and Henri is up splitting cedar. The lake is smooth. The far shore is indistinct in rising mist. A loon, attracted to the sound of the axe, cruises near. When the axe stops, the loon laughs." – McPhee...Bark Canoe








Nov. 2


Henri had limited space to work with in the morning. The roll of the cartwheels and deep rumble of the bus which passed by here every other hour started only just before he awoke at 5. It crossed his mind that the noises he made from behind the walls of the courtyard here in the neighborhood of the city, across the street from the river and at the lip of the lake, might sound a bit much in the morning. He was not the type that wasn't aware of his unusual craft – just one week ago he had unloaded two 16 foot slabs of cedar into the courtyard. Picture this: a densely carved, two-way, old narrow city street. A lumber truck backing into a slab driveway barely wider than the haunches of the truck itself. Long screeches of the disk breaks and then an exaggerated crane picking timber up off the flatbed and setting timber up and over the courtyard walls. There are many people at home in the neighborhood, out walking small dogs which peak up from fire hydrants. These are good and likable people and their curiosity is tamed by an attitude of 'whatever works for them, just don't harm others' property.' Henri appreciated this, although Gracey was not sure what to do. Gracey was twelve and sharp as most forty year olds. "Will the neighbors mind that we have trees back here," she had asked. We had mentioned Henri was conscientious, which he was, but there were certain tenets of do what must be done inside of him. He had put off bark canoeing not long enough. He had been in the city for two years, taking care of his only granddaughter. There was much work to be done and he had done it. Now it was time for the timber in the courtyard. "Here is what I would say – if they can just hang on for a moment, than they will greatly rewarded. They will be the ones who receive the canoes." Gracey pictured the same thing that Grands, as she called him, had: it was a perfect scenario, a business plan, so to speak: the neighbors who could easily carry their light canoes across the street and set them into the water with ease. "These canoes can take a beating Gracey. No other wood quite works like the birchbark. It doesn't get sodden with water. It can take hits like no other. It will last a good ten years if the craftsmanship is correct." Grands stood tall but slender. His eating habits had become sparse but healthy. He cooked for Gracey with a different attitude. She was too thin, nervous, and he would look out for fatty foods to cook, but his own metabolism had outreached the need for so much. It slowed him down. They had this conversation the night before the timber came. The timber truck was the symbol of beginning anew and they both knew it. It would be happened next that would take them on their most unusual next path.

Italian Wedding Soup

"Contrary to popular belief, the way to a man's heart is not necessarily through his stomach.  His nose can be equally susceptible..." – Peter Mayle, from French Lessons






One brief step into the house of where a good soup is being made reveals much much more than the house with no soup.  The house of the soup has been transformed for at least one evening, until gradually, perhaps overnight, the memory, along with dynamic smells, disappear, and the eaters (smellers) must wait for the next hopeful batch.  This last week I went on a good soup cooking frenzy: Hunter's Minestrone (from Tyler Florence's very useful home cook book Tyler's Ultimate) sunday, and later in the week a pot of Italian Wedding Soup.  Of the two, the Minestrone was a heartier,  more

Wedding Soup

stew-like concoction, stocked full of sausage and very robust rigatoni pasta.  The Italian Wedding, on the other hand, was surprisingly pungent and filled the house, for at least a night, with a dreamy European pizazz.  I picked this recipe because the chief trio of components – the cheesy turkey meatballs, the wonderful ditalini

Ditalini

pasta, and the escarole – would literally "marry" well together and would be eaten by adult and child alike.  The recipe asks for meatballs that are made of ground turkey hand mixed with a 1/4 cup ricotta cheese, some pesto, and another 1/4 cup of grated parmesan.  These ended up an excellent choice.  The heaviness of the cheeses were nicely supported by the lighter type of meat.  There is no doubt that any fully marbleized beef could have sufficed, but the soup kept some lightness about it because of the meat choice, and then further, the short pasta, and then the head of escarole that dominates in a very

Escarole

good way each spoon full.  The base of the soup is a standard mixture of onion and garlic, but with a solid dash of Italian seasoning and salt to taste.  It was at the point where the "upper" and the "lower" portions of the soup merged that created the very marriage that the Wedding Soup is named after.  The title doesn't really have anything at all to do with the ceremony that one might assume, but instead it refers to the very thing that the cook finds out: the meatball, greens, pasta and broth serve as a wonderful meal in one.  This fine marriage is the nose of the soup, at once cheesy, green, meaty and enticing.

New Bark Canoe

"'Where the crooked knife was, the bark canoe was,' he said. 'People from Maine recognize the crooked knife. People from New Hampshire do not. All they knew was the drawknife. The God-damned drawknife–what a bummer.'" – McPhee, ...Bark Canoe







Nov. 1

Vaillancourt said he wanted to see every birchbark canoe still existence. He had read of them up in Quebec, one that the author had seen hanging on a wall at a resort in Maine, and said it was on his list to see and that they should embark on a spring journey. The author, McPhee, a canoer since childhood, swooned, as he said, like a drunk at the prospect. Part of it all was the dedication to the craft. Henri might be seen by five in the morning out there chipping away some potential piece, looking out over the lake, a loon in the distance making its eerily ancient cry. He did much of his work by whim, this art, and simply eyeballed like a great painter certain measurements because he knew and understood the potential elasticity of the materials. Part of it was to serve as a corrective to misinformation about many of the existing canoes. That had to be part of it. Any thing that is a native craft is subject to the possibility of limited true and traditional instruction, understanding, so that many canoes might be out there in the world incorrect information behind it, wrong tribe, wrong distinguishing features, so why not get it right. Another part is the investment in the canoes themselves as they become, we learn, something like family members, part of a great chain legacy of care and creation. Wouldn't you want to see the three cousins you never met? You read of Henri, and you read for the style of McPhee, and it is a revelation in considering the difference between this entire life dedicated to the process of laying hands on trees for the sake of things that will live along while and that are useful, and all the things that we spend our hours on nearing 2020. As real crafts and trades do disappear, it must be remembered that it is far easier to make claim that they are outdated, hokey, silly, and tag down the phrase onto them, 'who has time for such things?' As we get far enough away from being capable of uniting time and purpose in culture, the equation becomes sheer irony. The more urgent question becomes, 'who doesn't need, more than ever, the time to put something together?' The difference between these two responses is only one thing, just like any other...do it, then it becomes the thing you want to do.

The New Bark Canoe

"When he can, in his travels, he visits his canoes. This satisfies his longing to know how they are doing. He is pleased to get one 'back in the yard,' so he can touch it up, repair it, perhaps even improve it in the light of continually rising skill." – McPhee, from The Survival of the Bark Canoe







Oct. 30

The birchbark, a light, beautiful, entirely natural hand-handled boat. Living across the street from a river that flows into a lake which then flows into another river and ends at a final lake, the vision of setting one of these glowing white and light 16-footers up on the shoulder and walking across the street to drop it in any time of day is very alluring. There are any number of vessels that show up along this strip of the beach, itself lined by enormous quarry stones used as perfect landing zones. Old fiberglass canoes, clearly left outside under a house window in the leaves, are seemingly the most common. Because they are from directly in the immediate neighborhood, many are walked down on wheeled contraptions, then paddled off upstream toward the lochs. All kinds of varied colored kayaks, the bright blues and the sharp dandelion yellows all over the place. Once these are dropped into the Yahara River, they are picaresque at least as jut out from under the nearly hundred year old cobblestone Rutledge Bridge. The river here is often, unfortunately however, of a milky green cream color, as phosphorous is churned up at the lochs only a mile away and flows to expand itself along the northern shores of Monona. I picture the white birchbark gliding over the green, outrunning, if you will, its flow out into the middle of the lake where apparently the water clears up. It says in the book that Vallencourt, the skilled creator of the birchbark described in the books, spent all of his days working, repairing and testing his creations at 'his yard.' That each one, first and foremost, were artistic possessions, honed with skill and wisdom. That the split wood of the birches is far more strong than anything sawed, but therefore needs the patience of shaping. Once assembled the tensile strength of the unsawed birch is close to unbelievable; Vallencourt might very well punch the bottom of the boat with all of his might and that nothing more than deep thud occurs. He had spoken of rowing over stumps at a local lake and that it was the stump that took the worst of it. All that strength, a lightness of navigation, a pretty boat, handmade so that every fiber has been cared for technically and each shape and dynamic a deep homage to an ancient art. I have read recently that folk art craft and trade schools have taken on a very significant upswing in popularity in the past few years. We can see so many reasons why when we give ourselves a moment to see what it is that actually tends to gobble up our days, our time, and assess that with the same exact criteria of building a canoe, as just one example. The digital trades can easily take care of one half of the equation of time: it does indeed keep us busy; but has a much more difficult time holding up to the second halves of satisfaction: is what we staying busy doing have meaning, depth, lasting promise? Maybe most obviously, for those of us who have a strong spiritual leaning toward the outdoors, digital busy-ness can virtually never promise that a connection other than mind to digital can be achieved. In other words, in the end, there is no there there. No lasting substance. And you begin to wonder if the making of canoe should should show up at sixth hour school right after computer class? At the end of the day, a field trip to the local lake.

How to Read and Live McPhee's
The Survival of the Bark Canoe

"When Henri Vaillancourt goes off to the Main woods, he does not make extensive plans. Plans annoy him. He just gets out his pack baskets, tosses in some food and gear, takes a canoe, and goes." – McPhee, from The Survival of the Bark Canoe









Oct. 29

You might think that after reading the ways of Vallincourt above, about not making any extensive plans, just get out there, that the last thing a series of journal entries about the process of creating something would be a long term plan. Not planning is the ideal of things; its once you have all of the other things handled, so to speak, that you are allowed to simply wake up in the morning, peak out the sliver in between brown curtains, catch a nice shard of sunshine, and just head out to the river with birchbark lightly over the shoulder. Problem is you have to have the birchbark. I do have one-mans, and I do have the river. As for the sunshine between the curtains, well, it is Wisconsin, and that is about as unpredictable as the future success of my undertakings. It is quite fascinating though, isn't it, how long a man or woman might spend planning certain things just so that they might experience no planning. I'd say in many ways this is the very crux of the idea behind the writings here. My idea to personalize the reading of the great McPhee's work stems from a seed of recognition that has grown inside my bellow for virtually ever. It has now sprouted at mid-age and is trying to find some ways grow outside of my ears or wherever else it can find some sunlight. It is this recognition: I, as I sense just about every other American (adult or young), need some more constructive stuff to do than sitting inside our minds and we watch our minds even more than ever as it usually sits right in front of us as a lap top or in our hands as a phone. I happen to love both of these, so this is not by any means an anti-tech screed. It is, however, a final acceptance that the being we call human has a lot of impulses and abilities inside it, formed over a considerable amount of time, that simply are not getting proper exercise in these modern times. I always ask myself the most rudimentary philosophical / lifestyle question in the world: would a day go by better if I were able to both look into my self-styled mirrors (computer, phone), and create something by hand all the while? A favorite move and historical character comes to mind, Ghandi, who was often shown throughout his day both handling the political foment of his country while sitting or lying down at the weaver's box...making something. I think to the farmer's trade and craft, the original back to nature work, but that also had things to do, create, offer, share, make a living. As we've all rapturously escaped the farm, we'll notice we have also rapturously escaped collective sanity. I'd give every cent I earn from all endeavors, if our current group of political class had to farm on the side. Every one of them. Make something. Do something. Get to know a tree, they're neat! What happens when your farm water gets sick? Help it out with sustainable solutions! Maybe show the country some leadership in how to ... govern! Point being, the modern has figured out a way to unconsciously skip over the raw material of being human and we live inside bright and seemingly always gratifying mirrors. It's a land of narcissism, but that, if not detected, goes on as a cultural mantra and has fewer wise detractors left to say, hey, wait a minute, take a look inside another kind of mirror, one that is either right at the end of your own arms, your hands, or the woods, or the rest of the world which holds some folks out there that might not be exactly like you. Whoa. This may be the beginning of something. I sense I'll read the book. We'll just have to see if I ever get around to crafting my canoe.