Uintahs

With the tree moved, we easily traveled to where we park the truck. I’ve never been in the Uintahs this time of year. It’s always either been early, in June or later, mid-October. I worried about the hike but I made it up the trail easily.

I’m almost certain my husband stopped more often, not for himself, but for me. A breeze tangled in my hair. My sweatshirt was just enough. The quakies held just enough color to cast the forest in a bit of a golden haze. We made it to the tree and paused.

I’d been trying to get there for more than a year. It overwhelmed me a bit. The whole journey through this illness had been life changing-mostly in small ways, but—one big way is that I feel such gratitude for every small gift. I took a minute just for that.


We carved—Goodnight, Irene—in the tree.

I know it doesn’t show up very well, but eventually it will.

Why this tree? Why feeling the way I do about nature have I carved in this tree? Years ago, my husband found this tree back in the forest on a hunting trip. It had his father’s name in it and a date. His father had been dead several years and he knew his father wouldn’t have done it. He hadn’t believed in that, but where and when and how and who nagged us.

A few years later, we found out one of my husband’s cousins had done it while on a hunting trip with my husband’s father, Mel. The boy had lost his father very young. Mel often took him on hunting trips.

It felt like a whisper of the past, a nod to Mel. We took pictures of our family members by the tree. When Annie died and we had her cremated, I thought of that tree. Annie loved the area so much. We buried her ashes beneath the tree and covered it with rocks.

The next summer when we hiked up to the tree, the grave had been dug up, the box with Annie’s ashes broken by bear, her ashes scattered. Probably fitting. I liked that, maybe, she was set free. We gathered up what was left, reburied and covered it with more rocks. It’s never been disturb again, but each time we're there we stack more rocks at the base of the tree.



After we carved Irene’s message, we placed a few more rocks at the base of the tree. My husband pointed to the sky said we better be getting off the mountain, a storm was coming. We got down off the mountain just in time and as we looked back and the clouds lifted, again there was snow at the summit where we’d been.


As a writer, I have learned to get the most from any outing. I go prepared. Notebook, camera, pen and mind set.

The Unitahs have tucked into my heart. They stir my emotions in so many ways. When I was sick, it was one of the places I grieved about missing. I wondered if I would ever get there again. Since then, I embrace everywhere I go more. I try to notice details, record them, look beneath to emotions, feelings of a place. How each of us let a place affect us. This is setting.

Setting is a character in a poem, essay, story or novel. Do what you must to learn a place, love or hate a place.