pine forest Archives - NorthStarNature

Discipline of an Explorer

October 1, 2023 by Denise Brake 4 Comments

We’ve all done it. We have walked the paths of those who came before us. Few of us are ‘novel’ explorers—we are more like ‘re-explorers.’ What seems new to us may very well have been the experience of our relatives, of our ancestors, and surely of those who lived in the generations before us. In no way does that deprive us of the immense learning experience and spiritual well-being of re-exploring, but it adds a depth of meaning to the steps we take.

So it was with our third hike at Savanna Portage State Park. After our first night of sleep at the park, we planned to get up early, eat a ‘hearty breakfast,’ and hike the 5.3 mile loop of the Continental Divide Trail. One of the qualities of an explorer, according to exploreratlarge.org, is discipline. When it comes to an early morning routine, there is hardly one more disciplined than Chris. My own discipline gets dragged along behind his due to his steadfastness, his determination, and thankfully, his humor. Even though the dripping rain, that had chased us into the cabin for supper the night before, had continued with faint-heartedness through the night, Chris was up before the first glimpses of daylight. The Coleman stove whooshed and banged metal on metal as he prepared coffee and readied the ingredients for breakfast. The late-nighters who tented nearby may have been annoyed by the early bird, but we were coming precariously close to ‘burning daylight’ in Chris’ mind. After our hearty breakfast sandwich and fruit, we packed the backpack with water and snacks, slipped down the hill, and began our morning hike.

Everything was dewy and wet—thank goodness for waterproof boots—and the sun shone horizontal through the trees. The early morning birds sang songs of delight as we began to ascend the ridge that divided the water flow. On one side, the water would flow east into the St. Louis River, the Great Lakes, and the St. Lawrence Seaway to the Atlantic Ocean. On the other side, the water would flow west to Big Sandy Lake, to the Mississippi River and down to the Gulf of Mexico.

This height of land was an obstacle for the people who traveled the ‘water highways’ before roads scarred the earth. For thousands of years, by the Native Americans, by explorers, and by fur traders, a trail connected those two water highways, a trail now known as Savanna Portage. We walked a portion of the old trail that was packed by millions of historic footsteps.

We wondered what ‘dragons’ they had seen and slayed in those six miles between rivers.

We would return to a portion of the Savanna Portage trail on the last leg of our hike, but we continued north on the Continental Divide trail to an overlook of Wolf Lake and the Tamarack Lowlands. On the way, we would occasionally see wolf tracks in the sandy soil.

From the overlook, a trail continued north for a couple of miles to a remote camping site—the trail was named Jacobson Trail. The last leg of our hike was on Anderson Road Trail. After the Native Americans and fur traders, there was obviously a Scandinavian presence in this place. Were any of them my ancestors? A settlement of some kind was close, as the south heading trail was named Old Schoolhouse Trail. We passed a stump with a story, some Red-berried Elder, and an odd sinking ‘dead space’ in the forest where trees had fallen into it and few other plants grew.

We turned again to the east on Anderson Road Trail, the last leg of our triangle loop. The Savanna Portage trail ran alongside Anderson Road and at times merged with it. There were many huge Pines along the path, likely hundreds of years old. One ancient tree had tipped over, pulling up a section of earth, roots, and vegetation that must have stood twelve feet high! It was such an unusual sight to see! And the fallen tree had branches as big as old trees and spanned and sprawled through the forest and across the trail with its impressive now-horizontal height. How many travelers had this old great-grandfather tree seen in its day?

After we passed a small Tamarack bog, the last part of the trail was through a Pine forest. The wind whispered and softly whooshed through the tops of the trees. The undergrowth changed in the Pine forest that had been thinned by loggers—young Oaks and Maples grew along with the ruby-fruited Wild Rose.

At a certain point, another instrument of music joined the whispering Pines—the louder, more jubilant fluttering of the Aspen trees. We were nearing the end of our three-hour hike and still going strong with our hearty breakfast and the invigorating experience of exploring.

A couple hours later, we drove to Wolf Lake to see it from water level. It was a beautiful, wild-looking lake encircled with wispy Tamarack trees in the lowland bog. Wild Celery grew in the shallow water by the boat dock, its flat leaves floating on the surface of the water, green against blue.

But when I turned towards the sun, the floating leaves turned silver and glittered in the silver water. A shining transformation in the wild Wolf Lake. Not far from the shore, I found the silvery leaves and flowers of Pearly Everlastings—priceless treasures of our journey of exploration.

During the fur trading years, Savanna Portage was divided into ‘pauses’ in order to transport the heavy freight of furs and trading goods (not to mention the large canoes that carried it all) over the ridge from one river to the next. The men would carry 160–180 pounds of cargo at a dog trot to the first pause, unload it, stop for a smoke (according to the signage!), then trot back for another load. When everything was transported to the first pause, they would begin again to the second one. Savanna Portage had 13 pauses (so basically a half mile per pause.) It takes discipline and persistence to portage canoes and gear, and in their case, freight. As Chris and I traveled the high ridge, the Tamarack lowlands, the Pine forests, and the old Savanna Portage trail, we walked with the ghosts of Native Americans, fur traders, and explorers. We carried the discipline that had been passed down to us from our relatives. We persisted mile after mile with the encouraging music of the forest. And we discovered treasures that Mother Nature so generously offers to us all.

Curiosity of an Explorer

September 17, 2023 by Denise Brake Leave a Comment

I’m a homebody in many ways—I love being home and even eschew the idea of leaving for an evening activity once supper and dishes are done. I am usually content with my routine. But I do get an explorer’s thrill when we plan to go to a new place in Nature! The Latin root for explore is ‘explorare,’ meaning to investigate or search out. We had heard that Savanna Portage State Park was a beautiful and interesting place, so Chris had gotten reservations for us weeks ago. He loves the anticipation of a planned trip even as I get a bit nervous about leaving home. But once I’m in the car with a map in hand (sorry Google Maps), I forget about leaving home and look forward to exploring and learning about a new place.

In just over two hours, we pulled in to Savanna Portage State Park, which is in the middle of the expansive Savanna State Forest. Commence our journey of exploration of the Wilderness! There are a number of characteristics according to exploreratlarge.org that define the mentality of an explorer, the first of which is curiosity. What will we see? What will we experience? I was hoping for a chance encounter with a Moose—will I see one? Our first hike was around Loon Lake trail. Loon Lake is a designated trout lake, just a mile or so in circumference, and the trail hugged the lake shore. Come explore with me!

The lake was calm with the slightest breeze occasionally rippling the mirror-like water. Autumn had begun—the Maple trees were beginning to turn color, red reflected on water and leaves falling on the trail.

Large, old Pine trees, White and Red, gripped the ground with their massive roots. A frog was our first creature to be found.

I was delighted to see Wintergreen growing beside the trail, its berries beginning to turn red, its leaves pungent with the flavor we associate with chewing gum or toothpaste. (It was the original source of that flavor which is now mostly synthetic.)

One Pine tree embedded in the lake now reflects arrows that point the way.

Along with the Wintergreen, a number of different species of Clubmosses grew and flowered like little evergreen trees.

The rooted trail led us to, then past a collection of golden-morphing Ferns—so beautiful!

Form and shape, color and contrast, reflections and realities all help us appreciate the diverse plant life in any given environment.

Many of the branches and trees that had fallen into the lake had become floating ‘treeariums,’ growing with mosses, ferns, shrubs, and other plants. Each created its own little environment, some used by the swimming creatures as a resting place.

Along with curiosity, an explorer must use discernment and logic. What are these white piles of dried-up scat from? Looking more closely, the white pieces were bones and pink-tinged shells, probably from crayfish. My guess of otter scat was substantiated when we saw a grass-flattened ‘slide’ from the hillside into the lake! We saw many slides and many piles of territory-marking ‘spraints,’ as otter scat is called.

A very industrious and disillusioned Beaver lived here some time ago. The tree was working to heal that gaping beaver wound.

At times along the trail, a small grove of Pines bordered the lake and path. What beauty in the bark of a mature Red Pine!

Balsam Firs were the other evergreens of the forest along with the Pines. Most were younger and content to grow in the shade of the canopy trees. An orange fungus was a colorful surprise!

Another rather startling discovery was a dead Snapping Turtle, upside-down, over a log. I wondered how he got there. Adult Snappers are sometimes attacked by otters, bears, or coyotes, so that was definitely a possibility. But then we saw a live monster-of-a-turtle swimming in the lake and wondered if the males fight one another.

More ‘treeariums,’ golden ferns, and red leaves decorated the Loon Lake trail as we circled around it. (No Loons to be seen, but we did find a beaver lodge.)

Towards the end of the trail, a large White Pine had tipped over into the water. The root ball was covered with Otter spraints, and we imagined they used the tree as a playground. Playfulness is another quality of an explorer, as expertly embodied by Otters running and sliding, swimming, rolling, and playing.

I fully embrace being a homebody and an explorer of Nature. Each of us has these seemingly opposing qualities in one way or another. Yet I have always lived my life with curiosity and wonder (another quality of an explorer). It has been the foundation of my learning, schooling, and being a scientist, as well as being an explorer. In my next posts, I will share other trails we hiked at Savanna Portage and other qualities of being an explorer. Until then, what kind of explorer are you?

Walking Out of the Old Year

January 8, 2023 by Denise Brake 4 Comments

It was particularly apparent to me this year—perhaps because we were staying the night at a cabin or because it was exceedingly quiet and contemplative: we were ending the old year at exactly the same spot that we were beginning the new year. Obvious, right? But we don’t often think of starting over or being a ‘new you’ or taking a ‘leap of faith’ as happening from the exact same place as ‘old ways’ or being ‘stuck’ or even ‘routine and repeat.’ But I actually liked the idea.

Chris and I, along with our daughter Emily from Texas, ventured to Itasca State Park on New Year’s Eve. It was cloudy, foggy, and frozen as we drove north and west. We checked into our two-room cabin, complete with indoor plumbing, and rented a pair of snowshoes for Emily. There were only half a dozen people or so who had had the same idea as we did. After unpacking, we set out to snowshoe a loop called Dr. Roberts Trail, but even with map in hand, we promptly ‘got lost’ and took a trail we later figured out was the Ozawindib Trail. There was so much snow and frozen haze, closed-down log cabin buildings, and new-place-disorientation that it took us some time and exploring to ‘get our bearings.’ The trail we found ourselves on had been groomed for cross-country skiing with snowshoeing on the sides. It was so very quiet that the noise of the snowshoes on the crisp snow seemed loud.

Itasca is the oldest state park in Minnesota (established in 1891) and protects over 32,500 acres of forests and lakes, including a large area of old-growth Red and White Pines. They have seen many decades of old years go and new years come in their long lives.

Even in the winter season, there is evidence of the sloughing of old ways—leaves, opened pine cones, and peeling birch bark—and the promise of new things to come—millions of tiny, protected buds of new growth.

We trekked to a larger road closed to vehicle traffic for the winter, and there we discovered Mary Lake, which helped us get our bearings, find our place on the map, and turn around when we saw we were nowhere near Dr. Roberts Trail.

Old growth forests have been protected from catastrophic disturbances such as logging or forest fires for over a hundred years and provide a complex biodiversity of plants and animals in all stages of development—from new life to maturing to declining.

We snowshoed back to the empty lodge area and followed a road past the fish-cleaning house, under a walking bridge, to a parking lot with a huge tour boat docked on land for the winter. We walked out onto the lake ice that was covered with deep snow, confident in our safety when we saw the ice road, ice houses, and trucks of ice fishermen.

We climbed a hill up to the walking bridge where we joined the trees mid-height for a different perspective far above the ground and close up to a colorful Red Pine.

Our first snowshoe trek was orienting and invigorating as we explored our surroundings, but we also had plans for a luminous walk that evening. We returned to the cabin for a toasty crockpot supper, rest, and warmer clothes. The illuminated walk was three-quarters of a mile around the Bear Paw Campground. The only vestiges of a campground were the snow-piled picnic tables that were occasionally seen in the background of the strings of lights, but even those looked uncommon and foreign in the foggy, frozen landscape. One young couple with a small child was finishing up their walk when we arrived; otherwise, we had the place to ourselves. It was so incredibly quiet and still. We stopped at various points along the trail, suspending our talk and halting our crunching footsteps to soak in the silence. It was a bit disorienting to be in the dark, in the frozen fog, and in the noiseless forest, but as time passed, it became more comfortable and peaceful. From far away, the lights looked contiguous, but as we walked, we realized there were sections of light and sections of dark. The illuminated spots were light enough to get us through the dark places.

That’s how the old year was—stretches of grief, heartache, and worry, then periods illuminated with joy, fun, and laughter. The dark times came from death, illness, and disharmony, and much of the illumination came from our grown-up children spending time and energy with us. At the end of an old year, we can honor the past, whether we considered it difficult or wonderful, for in reality, it is both. It is helpful to explore our interior landscapes in order to get our bearings after a disorienting event. Seeking and soaking in the silence can mute the noisy self-talk that often undermines our well-being, and we can return to peace. Winter strips away many of the distractions—the noisy and beautiful distractions—that sweep us up in the rest of the year. Allow the illuminated times to get you through the dark spaces, and allow the quiet and beauty of Winter to bring you peace as you walk out of the old year.

Addition and Subtraction

December 11, 2022 by Denise Brake Leave a Comment

Have you seen that commercial where the man is stoically and rather cheerfully walking around with a enormous bear trap on his foot? It will be alright, he says. No big deal. He can handle it… Well, I can relate. Stoicism has its merits, including self-discipline and perseverance, but it can also become ridiculous. There seems to be a fine line between stoicism and self-inflicted suffering, and I have walked that line. I have also voluntarily veered into the suffering field and set up camp there. In fact, I was pretty comfortable in my suffering. But not anymore. I see the bear trap I’ve been dragging along on my foot—it’s heavy, and it hurts, and there’s no reason for it anymore.

So I have made a decision to subtract some things from my life, starting with that bear trap. I am taking away a few things I dearly love and fervently believe in, but I have realized that I can get so wrapped up in them that I neglect other things I should be paying attention to. My decision-making took long swaths of time and lots of angsty jumping back and forth across the line—should I or shouldn’t I? The process became as long suffering as my stoic self. But I finally feel like I’ve shaken some things off, and I’ve got to say, it feels….strange and rather exhilarating (in a stoic kind of way.)

Saturday was a day right on the line of freezing, give or take a degree or two. The air was heavy with humidity—at times it sputtered as snow, other times a misty sprinkle. Would we add snow or subtract it with rain? We hiked at the Little Elk area—it was a pretty spot where the Little Elk River opened up and flowed into the Mississippi River. But now both Rivers were iced over—the shallow parts had strong–enough ice for sleds and tent houses used for ice fishing. Each cold day and night adds ice. Each day above freezing deteriorates it.

Large White Pines and Oaks lined the River trail, along with little patches of prairie grasses in open areas.

For a pretty picture: just add mushrooms and a cap of snow!

We soon saw evidence that a beaver had been busy subtracting the number of standing trees along the River, and I wondered if the slushy footprints belonged to him.

I think beavers must be stoics considering their impossibly hard job of gnawing trees down in order to build their homes and make their dams. Try, try again and again and again. Perseverance and self-discipline.

As we followed the River, I began to wonder how many beavers were actually working in the area, especially when we got to this (de)construction site. Many of the trees were young Oaks—very hard wood to chew through, but what a sturdy structure they will make!

As in any forest, time, weather, insects, and diseases can subtract the number of large trees that make up the forest. Their loss is impactful. Their death and downing makes a cracking, crashing wail of letting go of what was a beautiful, productive life.

And yet, as those old beauties die, the young ones are sprouting up to take their place. Subtraction and addition.

At a point by a curve in the River was a fenced-in area that had been excavated by an archeologist in the 1980’s and 90’s. He found three dwellings of a French fort from the mid 1700’s. The area is listed with the National Register of Historic Places as the oldest European outpost in the Mississippi River headwaters region.

Logs were floated down this section of the River back in the logging days of late 1800’s/early 1900’s to local saw mills. Log jams were common and would take weeks or even months to clear. Interestingly, some of the logs sunk, caused a jam that didn’t get cleared, and created an island over the years! Addition of islands!

We left the River trail and circled into the Pine forest that followed a ridge. Red Pines joined the old White Pines, both towering above our heads. It was such a good feeling to be walking among them!

Nature is all about addition and subtraction. Birth and death. New things and old, failing things. Mother Nature also shows us how old things can be transformed into new things—downed trees into a new island! Humans seem to resist these natural transitions and transformations. At least I do. But when one is closer to the cracking, crashing wail of the end of life than to the sprouting vigor of a newborn, it is easier to let go of the things that feel like subtractions to our lives. Why carry around the heavy things just because we can? I know that I am strong enough, persistent enough, and disciplined enough—all good qualities of stoicism. But I also want to add loving enough (to myself), empowered enough, and peaceful enough. Subtraction and addition—it’s simple math.

Peace of the Pine Forest

May 29, 2022 by Denise Brake 5 Comments

I’ve been crying a lot lately—not for me and my station on this good, green Earth, but for other people. I cried for the victims of Putin’s war—the mothers and children who fled their homes, the fathers and brothers who stayed behind to fight, the old and infirmed who couldn’t flee and were bombed to death, and for every lost life and destroyed city. The tears escape my eyes when I watch the news or see the headlines—it is my knowing that what I am witnessing is antithetical to Goodness. Last week it was for the grocery shoppers in Buffalo, New York who were targeted and killed because of their skin color. This week, the tears flowed again for the young students and teachers at Uvalde, Texas. It could literally happen at any school at any time. Even the mass shootings happen so frequently that the mourning for the one before has hardly begun before it is ‘lost’ to the coverage of the newest one. Not to mention all the other, pervasive deaths by violence. Not to mention the perverse political rhetoric around the ‘reasons’ for the deaths. It is soul-crushing.

I know for sure that the fallout from each one of these violent losses of life is far-reaching and will be long-lived. Many of the victims, the families, the first responders, and the witnesses will carry the burden of trauma with them for their lifetime. The price we as individual persons and as a society pay for violence is unbelievably staggering. In the midst of a political culture that is not doing all it can to help prevent such tragedies, an individual person can feel overwhelmed and impotent in the face of it all. What do we do? Let me begin with a story that presented me with an important lesson.

Seventeen years ago when my father-in-law died, my brother-in-law sent a message to us that ended with “Peace be with you.” I was already in a state of activation—death, grief, loss, change—and I remember exclaiming rather indignantly to Chris, ” How can we have peace at a time like this?!” I did not understand at the time that my brother-in-law was offering a gift to each of us individually—that in spite of our loss and grief, we could have the comfort of peace. I did not accept that gift at the time—I didn’t know how—but since that time, I have not forgotten that offering. I have tried again and again and again to find peace within myself in the midst of my own pain and loss and of that of the world’s. A substantial part of finding peace in a time of crisis or a reaction to it, is learning to calm down our activated bodies—and when a person has an ingrained trauma response, it takes lots of practice to change. One of my practices to calm down and find peace is to go to the woods—I did it intuitively as a child, and I do it intentionally as an older adult. I find peace in the Pine forest.

So we went to Warner Lake County Park where I left Chris and his healing hip to sit beside the lake. He could see the Pine forest across the water. He was in the midst of the noise and exuberance of young adults who were already free for the summer and were anxious to sunbathe and swim in the chilly lake water. I tried to appreciate their exuberance even as I gladly walked away from their noise. Come walk with me into the forest.

According to florgeous.com, Violets symbolize honesty, protection, dreams, healing, and remembrance. May it be so. Peace of the Pine forest be with you.

Snow Chasers and Bear Bias

March 21, 2021 by Denise Brake Leave a Comment

We left home last Saturday with a bare yard—bare of snow, that is, except for a withering pile on the north side of the trees. As Winter was slipping away, I was in search of snow. Earlier in the week we had an overnight dusting, but I saw the Brainerd area had gotten five or six inches. So we headed north, hoping the sun and temps hadn’t gotten to the snow before we did. About ten miles or so south of Brainerd we began to see snow on the ground. We saw large piles of packed wet snow that had been plowed from the roads. I was hopeful we could snowshoe once we got to Northland Arboretum. We slipped into our snowshoes and began our hike on a south-sloping hill. Hmmm.

Birch tree catkins caught my eye, along with a golden patch of ice in the stream. Was it from pollen, a fungus, or sawdust?

Whatever it was, it made for an interesting piece of ice art.

After a short stint on the snowshoes where we pecked our way around too many bare spots, we returned them to the car and resumed our hike on foot, or ‘boot’ rather. Monet’s pond and stream were just beginning to open up; the bridge was not quite as picturesque as when we saw it in the summer.

It was a beautiful blue-sky day! The pine–birch–oak woods held a beauty beyond the brilliant sky and snowy background. There was an ‘aliveness’ about them, like an anticipation of things to come.

A wandering deer was camouflaged in the brush, her slow meandering movements showed no concern for us noisy neighbors.

The Spring sun was working on the exposed places…

while other places in the shadows and in the hidden nooks still had inches of snow.

Our destination this time was to get to Beaver Pond—our last time here we were so inundated by mosquitoes when we got to this part of the trail that all we did was swat and squirm. In our misery, we turned around at the Pine Plantation. In the Winter landscape, we could see the source and homeplace of the hungry mosquitoes—a large shrub bog and wetland.

Pussy Willows were beginning to bloom in the wetland—Spring was here, ready or not.

It was a day for appreciating the amazing clusters of white-bark Birches against the sapphire blue sky—something that gets lost when green foliage covers all the trees.

As we hiked farther north along the Johnson Plantation trail where the only human form of tracks were from cross-country skis, all of a sudden I noticed a trail of very large tracks. When we were at Northland in the summer, there had been a black bear sighting on the day we were there, and on this warm, almost-Spring day, perhaps a bear was coming out of hibernation! Bear tracks, I exclaimed! The palm of my hand fit neatly inside the tracks, a full six by four inches.

The tracks followed the trail; we followed the tracks. In one clearing where the sun had melted the snow, a large pile of fur-filled scat lay among the pine needles.

It was a perfect place for a bear to live—remote, wooded, plenty of food and shelter.

Even though the tracks looked a day old with the melting, refreezing, and melting again, we joked about giving a hungry bear the nut bars in my backpack.

I wondered aloud what had caused these moon craters in yesterday’s slush, and it wasn’t until I was further along the trail that I knew—a plop of wet snow fell on my head from high in the trees. I needed a little personal evidence to figure out my question.

Deer and Wild Turkey tracks intersected the ski trails, and soon the bear tracks left the trail and disappeared into the woods.

We arrived at Beaver Pond where a large lodge poked up through the ice on the far side.

When we circled the pond, we saw an inlet the beaver used and kept free of reeds and rushes so he could swim to the shore and float fallen logs back to the lodge.

Looking back across the pond, we could see the Pine forest, not just the trees.

The ring details of a striking amber-hued cut Oak log revealed the slow-growing and evenly nourished life of the tree that was.

Spring was showing in small, subtle ways in the snow-ice-water where warmth had penetrated the frigid layers of Winter.

Had a bear ripped the rotting wood from a standing Birch to get at insects?

Snow was melting away from Wild Blueberry shrubs on the rocky hills—a delicious bear food for summer.

It had been a beautiful, warm, nearly-Spring day in the wilderness of Northland Arboretum. I was quite thrilled to see the large bear tracks, and had even wished for a glimpse of the critter at a distance. But…here’s the thing…

they weren’t bear tracks. When I uploaded my pictures to the computer a few days later, I looked at the tracks and thought “That’s not a bear!” I looked at pictures of bear tracks compared to mine and said “That’s not a bear.” I looked up animal tracks and animal trails and dimensions of tracks—it wasn’t a bear. My mind was so focused on the bear that was there last year, on signs of bear, on food for bears that when I saw those huge tracks, I ‘knew’ it was a bear. I was bear-biased, even when I should have known the tracks were a canine of some sort—a really large canine.

It never occurred to me that it was a wolf. I thought wolves were only in far northern Minnesota, but I looked at the DNR wolf map, and sure enough, they are in the Brainerd area. My bear was a wolf. A bias or prejudice is a strong inclination of the mind or a preconceived opinion about something. I had both—I wanted it to be a bear, and I had previous information about a bear living there. My mind even over-rode my eyes and the knowledge that I have about what a canine track looks like! And I was closed-minded about a wolf even living in this area of the state.

We have tricky minds. We see what we want to see. Even though I am a scientist and an observer, I fooled myself. The information we feed upon can make up our minds for us. The things we want to happen can obscure what is actually happening. It can make us see things that aren’t there and aren’t true. It can make us blame people who deserve no blame. It can make us hate people and things for crazy, petty, obscure reasons. So how do we not fall into the mind tricks? We slow down. We ask questions. We compare notes with others who may not think just like us. We gather information. We trust our guts, even if things on the surface look great. We look at the forest and the trees, and we watch out for what falls from the top. I asked Chris what he thought the tracks were, and in his skepticism of it being a wolf, he said “Yeti,” and he’s sticking with it.

Changes in the Light on Any Given Day

August 9, 2020 by Denise Brake 2 Comments

It’s on the strength of observation and reflection that one finds a way. So we must dig and delve unceasingly. –Claude Monet

What influence painter Claude Monet has had on public gardening that up in the Northwoods of Minnesota in the little city of Brainerd is a Monet garden! Last weekend Chris and I went to Northland Arboretum, 500 acres on the outskirts of Brainerd. A beautiful log visitor’s center sits on the hillside with a little waterfall garden situated on the other side of the parking lot.

We were invited to discover the Monet garden on the way to the hiking trails. We crossed the curved Japanese-inspired bridge like the one that Monet originally built on his Giverny garden and pond. As we circled the pond, we passed by Arrowheads, Cardinal flowers, showy red Monarda, and of course, the famous White Water Lily!

It was the wildest looking garden I have ever seen—literally wild, as opposed to manicured, following Monet’s idea of not liking organized or constrained gardens. And from the other side of the pond, we viewed the Northwood’s reproduction of Monet’s most famous scene from his Giverny garden.

We hiked on and soon found ourselves in a Jack Pine savanna. The soil was sandy, the terrain rolling, and Jack Pines and Bur Oak trees grew side by side. Prairie grasses like Big Bluestem and Indian grass lined the trail and were in full bloom along with other late summer flowers.

We noticed Wild Blueberries growing on the sandy hillsides and lots and lots of Hazelnut shrubs, most of which were already void of their husk-protected nuts. I commented to Chris that this would be a good place for bears to live with all this food!

The terrain changed again as we continued north—there were more Maple trees, more undergrowth, more ferns—and then the mosquitoes started finding us. We hiked on a ridge between two wetlands, ferngullies on either side of us. The trail was definitely less traveled and no longer mowed. We had yet to see another person since leaving the Monet garden.

We swatted mosquitoes as we persisted to the Red Pine forest and an old homestead site, which turned out to be only an open area of the woods with a patch of raspberries bushes.

The mosquitoes persisted and called their friends, so we turned around before making the complete loop. It will be a great place to see in the fall or winter!

We returned to the visitor center area for our picnic and were greeted by a family with three young children who asked if we had seen the bear. The mom explained that the naturalist at the center had told them a mother bear and her cubs had been seen in the park! It is a good place for bears to live!

The arboretum map showed other gardens that we hadn’t seen yet—the Gazebo Garden where weddings have been held, the Secret Garden started by the Girl Scouts, and the Memory Garden—so after lunch we hiked to find them. It was a sobering scene. The once-beautiful gardens were neglected—granted, early August is tough on any garden—but shrubs were overgrown, the ground was dry, the grass and plants were browned, the weeds too prolific. Nobody would want to get married here at this time. Our disappointment was tempered by the reality that both of us, particularly Chris, knew: It’s hard work to keep a garden looking good. It takes many man-hours to keep ahead of the weeding, watering, trimming, planting, thinning, and replanting that is required for any public garden. It’s hard work, and it takes money. We did not see any gardeners and wondered if they relied wholly on volunteers, which of course has many challenges baked into that. We saw and appreciated the original ‘bones’ of the gardens—a beautiful terraced rock wall, a little pond, some wonderful plant specimens, and the enclosed walls of the Secret Garden, and at the same time we knew how much work it would take to get the gardens back to their original glory.

The only picture I took at the neglected gardens.

And now, back to Monet’s garden at Giverny. Claude Monet built his gardens in the late 1800’s—as he became more famous as a painter, he was able to spend more money on his plant material and help. At one point he hired seven gardeners to carry out his vision. In essence, he created his art over and over again—once with the creation of the garden and then with his method of painting where he painted the same scene many times in order to capture the changes in the light on any given day and the myriad changes that occur with the seasons. But after Monet died in 1926, things changed. His step daughter tried to keep the place going, but after WWII, the house and gardens fell into neglect and ruin. The bombings had shattered all the windows in the main house and the greenhouses. The floors and ceiling beams rotted away. The gardens were overgrown and wild. Restoration of Monet’s gardens began in 1977 with the help of many generous donors. The house and greenhouses were restored. The pond was re-dug, the gardens replanted, the famous bridge re-built. It took ten years to do so.

We found our way around the Northland Arboretum, from the newer, more cared-for buildings and gardens at the entrance to the wild Monet Garden to the even wilder trails into the deep woods and back to the neglected, older gardens. Life is like that. We have those beautiful shiny places that find their way to a post on social media, we have those shaggy places that show up in our everyday life routines, we have those often untraveled aspects of our lives that are bothersome and beautiful at the same time, and we have those once-beautiful but neglected places that need attention and care. And sometimes a bear shows up. “So we must dig and delve unceasingly.” Restoration is possible, no matter how overwhelming it seems. Each one of us can find a way to create our lives over and over again.

A Picture of Calm and Quiet

March 15, 2020 by Denise Brake 8 Comments

Yesterday Chris and I had a mission: to explore strange new lands, to seek out new sites and old civilizations, and to boldly go where no coronavirus has gone before (us). We headed north to Crow Wing State Park near Brainerd, Minnesota. We actually had been to this park in August of 2014 for a short camp-out and hike. We chose a trail we hadn’t been on before, and of course everything looks different in Winter! The Red River Oxcart Trail follows the Mississippi River as it bends around this peninsula of beautiful forested land.

There was no walking across the Mississippi River like we had done a couple of weeks ago. Ice still covered most of the River, but a couple of ribbons of dark, flowing, open water burgeoned forth towards Spring and St. Paul.

This site is the confluence of the Crow Wing and Mississippi rivers. The Crow Wing River splits before entering the Mississippi, creating an island in the shape of a wing. Early French explorer accounts had translated the name into Crow Wing. This area of land had long been a favored hunting and meeting place for the Dakota and Ojibwe nations, and it became a famous fur trading location.

The snow on the trail had been snowshoed and walked, so the path was packed down and rough. The snow pack to the sides were mostly hard enough for us to walk on, but every once in a while our foot would break through the surface snow and sink in to almost a foot deep.

We walked between the ice-covered River and the forest of towering Pines and ancient Oaks. It was exquisitely beautiful.

We came to a clearing where we learned we were walking on a boardwalk of the old town road. This was the site of the old village of Crow Wing where the fur trading post had developed into the foremost trade, travel, and political center of the region. By the 1860’s, it was hostel and home to over 600 people, with stores, warehouses, saloons, hotels, and churches.

Fur trader and developer Clement Beaulieu and his wife Elizabeth built this house on the hill in 1849. The booming town of Crow Wing began its decline in the 1870’s when the railroad crossing was built up-river where the town of Brainerd grew. The Beaulieu house was moved in 1880 and occupied until the 1980’s, when it was donated to the Minnesota DNR, moved back to its original location, and restored to its original design.

We continued along the Red River Oxcart trail and came to the place where the oxcarts would ford the River. At that time, cargo was brought from the north by oxcart, then transferred to wagons for the rest of the trip to St. Paul and vice versa.

Our trail brought us around the peninsula to Chippewa Lookout, then into a Pine forest.

The forest and the River beyond were a picture of calm and quiet. The sun and hiking had warmed us from the original chill at the beginning of the trail. The last two hours had felt like we were explorers in the wilderness…

…so I was surprised when we suddenly saw a stone chapel in a clearing! The Father Pierz Chapel, named after the first Catholic missionary of the area, is now in its third or fourth iteration from the log structure that was his first church.

For our late lunch, we sidled into the snow-enveloped picnic table, careful not to slide on the ice beneath our feet, and munched our veggies, nuts, and fruit. It had been a good day.

For over two hours we had hiked the woods without seeing anyone else. Thoughts of the burgeoning Covid 19 virus and its wake of disruption and destruction evaporated from our minds. There is a whole world beyond disease, the stock market, panic hoarding, and anxiety that waits for us to explore. Nature offers us a calm and quiet place to rest our fears and jitters—seek it out. This, as in any other time, is when a confluence of knowledge (both past and present) and compassion can create an island of security. Go boldly with those virtues. Nourish yourself. Say a prayer. Walk the walk. Mission accomplished.

Untying the Knots

November 10, 2019 by Denise Brake 4 Comments

Remember when you learned to tie your shoes? Or when your children did? How long it took to learn all the loops and over and unders and pulling it tight and even? How it took concentration and practice and patience and determination? A plethora of life lessons in the learning of a simple task.

We planned an after-work hike this week. Our destination was the mesmerizing pine forest that has a way of lifting our spirits into the treetops and grounding our feet into the carpet of pungent pine needles. I was surprised to see snow on the ground when we got there, though I shouldn’t have been—the temperatures had stayed below freezing all week since the scattered snowfall.

As we neared the bridge, I noticed a beaver dam—straight and expertly pieced together with the chewed-off logs and sticks. Wouldn’t it seem like quite the impossible task for a little beaver to be standing with stick in mouth surveying the river before him? (The lodge is on the edge of the bank in the upper left corner of the photo.)

As much as we wanted to ‘get away’ from the stresses plaguing us, we still needed to figure some things out, so resolutely began our discussion as we walked. It quickly fell apart as Chris brought up a hot button issue prefaced with “You’re not going to like this, but…” I should say, I fell apart—my hackles raised in defense, I stopped in my tracks—like I couldn’t think and talk and walk at the same time. That wound that had scabbed over and re-opened time and time again. My voice raised in pitch and volume and intensity. (As much as I try to be reasonable about this, at this time in my life I don’t have the bandwidth to be very reasonable.) We tried to talk about it a little more, but my stomach and chest were tightening. I stopped again and said, “I came here to untie the knots in my insides, not to make more.”

So we walked on in silence, and the trees began to loosen my tightness. I thought about knots, these knots in my stomach, how I work every day to ease them—and yet here they are again.

And when we got to the Pines, I realized I was surrounded by knots. Every branch of every tree becomes a knot in the wood.

With the self-pruning Red Pines, the knots are more obvious as the lower branches fall off and the darkened scar or knot is left behind.

We walked on a trail that we hadn’t been on before, and we found a small, three-sided log shelter. I sat on the log bench with my back against the back wall of logs and looked out at the forest. An orange glow of Oak leaves shone through the branch-bare trunks of the near Pines.

I studied the structure around me—the knotty log walls, the knotty ceiling planks, the less-knotty heartwood timbers. I guess we’re all made of knots.

Without growth, we wouldn’t have the branches and wouldn’t have the knots.

The sun was getting low in the sky as we walked the snowy, leaf-strewn trails back towards the car, and the woods got darker.

The moon was shining over Warner Lake in the dark blue sky over the dark blue water with relief and reflections of black silhouetted trees and branches. I breathed a sigh of untying

We begin our lives by learning to tie the knots—we grow and develop, sending out branches of discovery. We tie the knots of relationships—family, friendships, and marriage. We tie the knots of learning by piecing together facts and making connections. Looking back now, that part seems easy.

Have you ever stood in a lumber yard selecting boards for a project? I was taught to choose the boards with the least knots. The knots are hard to nail through and often weaken the wood. As the tree grows and gets older, there is more heartwood with less knots. As we grow and get older, we learn the loops of life, we practice the overs and unders, and we begin to untie some of the knots that no longer serve us, especially those that form in our insides as we stand before a seemingly impossible task or unwanted situation. We’re all made of knots—hard, curled places that often make us feel weak—like my old wounds that make me unreasonable at times. But I’m thankful for the trees, the forest, and the Pines that help untie the knots inside me, and I’m thankful that I’m building heartwood.

The Next 364 Days Through Shadow and Light

May 26, 2019 by Denise Brake 6 Comments

When we were young married kids, I remember the anticipation and excitement of an upcoming special day—Chris’ birthday or our anniversary or Christmas. I planned ahead making gifts and cards, cakes and surprises. Fast forward a dozen years to after we had three kids, and I remember, as I’m sure Chris does, that I was sick for his early January birthday for years in a row. I had planned gifts and cakes and cards for our three children’s December birthdays and Christmas and was just worn out by the time January arrived. Once everyone was in school, the same thing happened with our mid-May anniversary—the end-of-school busyness preempted the anticipation of our anniversary—wait, how many years has it been now? Luckily we followed the belief system of Ruth, Chris’ Mom, who declared that one special day meant nothing compared to every other day of the year. Mother’s Day? Treat your Mom with love and respect every day. Anniversaries? Show your love and respect to your partner daily. I know there were special days when we endured some disappointment, for whatever reason, but we had the next 364 days to show that person what they meant to us.

The week before last, we celebrated our thirty-seventh anniversary. No more end-of-school busyness with kids, but this time it was LIFE that took away the energy and excitement of a celebration. We were slogging through our days—too many things felt heavy and out of control. So we went to the woods, to the pine forest, to the place we’ve been before, where we knew the healing balm of Nature would give us respite for a little while. One of the first things we saw along the trail were bright yellow Bellworts with their hanging, nodding heads.

We walked through deciduous trees with their newly-emerging leaves, passed by Cedars and blooming Elderberry shrubs…

until we got to the Pine forest, in all its glory.

The first towering evergreens were Scotch Pines with their peeling bark towards the top of the tree that exposes butterscotch-colored trunks. Only the mature trees that had peeled away the onion layers of carefully crafted bark revealed the rich, golden treasure of color that identified the tree.

Red Pines made up the majority of the forest with their scaly, gray bark that ‘reddens’ with maturity. Evening sunlight streamed through the trees, striping the pine-needle-covered trail. We walk through shadow and light all the moments of our lives.

At times, it really is hard to see the forest for the trees. The trees are up-close, obscuring our sight, demanding our attention. Our lives shrink down to a narrow focus, often fear or survival-driven—it is the way our mammalian brain works.

So what do we do? We notice there are other things in the forest besides trees. Growing up through the old pine needles, cones, and twigs is a shade-loving Columbine that will soon show its intricately-shaped flower to those who notice.

I stop and touch the warm bark of a tree. There is sap coming from a wound—it has become thick and sticks to my hands. But it is fragrant with the very essence of the Pine, as are the layers of shed needles that we walk on. The living, breathing, fundamental essence of the Pine tree fills our nostrils with the most delightful perfume. I breathe deeply, and my headache slips away.

We notice and become aware of the future. A decaying Pine stump exposes the interior structures that built and maintained the tree during its long life. It really is a marvel of engineering—thank you, Creator. I like the dense, twisted wood where a branch was, where a knot would be if it was planed down into a board. That spiral of wood is often the last part to disintegrate back into the soil.

We take a closer look at the shadow and light bands of our lives. We have been through tough shadow times before, remember hon? We have been in this place before. We came through those shadow dark times to light once again.

Then, as we walked along, there in the forest, I saw a burning bush! A young pine was lit in sunlight, burning with brightness!

Here I am, on holy ground.

Not wanting to leave the luminosity of the burning pine, I wondered where we should go next. What path? How? Why? We continued to slowly walk the pine-cone-strewn path—those old fruits with new seeds. We saw vibrant young pines growing at the foot of the wise ones and the sun shining on them all.

We could see the forest, the hallelujah forest, with the old ones, the young ones, the sunshine, the bark, and the needles, lifting a song of life straight up to the sky.

But then we heard a crow cawing us back to our bodies, back to our lives, back to our headaches and questions. What do you see from your vantage point?

We saw footprints that led us back to the bridge that returned us to our car, to our real and present lives. What do you know from trekking the path before us?

It was an anniversary to remember. It was a path we had walked before, yet as always, the same things bring new things. I had bright flowers and sweet perfume—that soul-filling pine perfume. Some of our wounds were temporarily clotted with the thick sap of it. It is a fragrance that makes a person know they are alive. I was grateful for the relief. We had stillness and singing, stillness and movement as we walked together through the cathedral of Pines.

In thirty-seven years, we have peeled back quite a few layers of the carefully crafted bark of our previous years. It’s a gift to craft and a gift to peel back the parts that are no longer needed. What a privilege to see the golden treasure underneath. So here we are. Standing on holy ground. What does the luminous voice from the burning bush tell us? Where do we go? What do we do? Where is this land flowing with milk and honey?

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