Blue Highways: Fort Klamath, Oregon

Unfolding the Map

On this day of remembrance for the heroes and martyrs of September 11, 2001 I do a reflection on where the United States has gone since that tragic day and where it might go.  The opinions expressed are mine only.  William Least Heat-Moon's (LHM) quote is used only as a path to my own reflections.  I do not discuss much about Fort Klamath, but offer some links below for your information.  Feel free to leave a comment whether you agree or disagree with me, but regardless, let's honor the innocent victims of a horrible act of terrorism.  Here's a map to locate Fort Klamath.

Book Quote

"I don't know whether Oregonians generally honk horns or whether they had it in for me, but surely they honked. Later, someone said it was part of the 'Keep Moving, Stranger' campaign. I turned off into the valley at the first opportunity, an opportunity numbered route 62 that ran to Fort Klamath....

"....I stopped at a wooden cafe....In front sat an Argosy landcruiser with an Airstream trailer attached; on top...was a motorboat and on the front and back matched mopeds....I stood amazed at this achievement of transport called a vacation.

"A man with a napkin tucked to his belt came out of the cafe. A plump woman...watched from the cafe.

"'What's up, chum?' the man said.

"We went inside, and I heard the woman whisper, 'His type make me nervous.'

"....I got reviled by people who could afford life at six-miles-per-gallon....After all, they read the papers, they watched TV, and they knew America was a dangerous place."

Blue Highways: Part 6, Chapter 1

Historical photo of Fort Klamath. Photo at Legends of America. Click on photo to go to site.

Fort Klamath, Oregon

The quote today is a long one, and I had to do some manipulating so that it wouldn't be too long.  The reason I chose to have such an extensive quote has something to do with the importance of this day, September 11, to many of us.

On the morning of September 11, 2001 I was getting ready to head from my home on Grand Route St. John in New Orleans to the University of New Orleans to teach my class.  I was a graduate student, and as I ate and listened to National Public Radio, I heard the announcer say that a plane had hit one of the World Trade Center towers.  Curious, I turned on the television, thinking that I would see that a small plane, such as a Cessna, had flown into the side of the building.  The flames and smoke from the tower immediately told me that something much bigger had hit the building.  Like everyone else, I watched in rapt fascination as yet another plane hit the second tower, and when I tore myself away and went to school, I heard in the car that yet another plane had hit the Pentagon and a fourth plane had crashed in Pennsylvania.  At that point, the announcers were reporting that the United States was under attack through acts of terrorism.  At school, I fielded a call from a young woman who was terrified and did not want to come into class because she was afraid that terrorists might get her.  I excused her from class, and told her not to worry because terrorists usually attack large crowds or very well-known symbols.  Somehow, I knew that day that everything would change.

I was heartened when the world, in the aftermath of the attacks, turned out in force to support the United States.  My heart swelled when I read that so many peoples from so many other countries were expressing solidarity with the U.S. and, in the headline of the French paper Le Monde, "We Are All Americans."  Perhaps, I thought, the United States will use this opportunity to forge new bonds of friendship, cooperate with other nations, and work together with them toward a common, peaceful and prosperous future that we all seek.

But, it was not to be.  The people of the United States turned inward in fear of other terrors out there, and outwardly, the U.S. took a belligerent stance, striking out wherever it smelled the whiff of terrorism.  First it was Afghanistan.  I watched the cheers of a crowd at a prison rodeo in Louisiana when it was announced that the first cruise missiles had launched into Afghanistan.  Then, it was Iraq.  Our leaders seemed to have a lineup of countries that they planned to invade in preemptive moves to bring democracy.  Studying political science, I knew that tearing down nations and rebuilding them was hard work and could be impossible under certain conditions.  I was saddened to see the U.S. reputation suffer, and all the goodwill from most other nations dry up and blow away.

I have also watched as the U.S. has become a nation that seems to be increasingly looking without and within for enemies.  A column by Cal Thomas that I read in my local paper on September 9th, 2011 exemplifies this fear.  Thomas writes that Americans must observe 9/11 because it is a constant reminder of the countries and entities out there that "hate us," and that are "plotting to attack us again...and again." In the ten years since the terrorist attacks, American citizens are subject to new rules and regulations designed to keep them safe, but which have increased the powers and latitude of our country's law enforcement and military forces.  The U.S., in conducting its war against terror, has appeared to compromise some of the very ideals of democracy itself by profiling based on race and religion, capturing and renditioning suspects, using enhanced interrogation techniques such as waterboarding, and denying prisoners accused of terrorism basic rights under national and international law.

Why does all of this come to my mind with the above quote?  Feelings of being hated and persecuted are woven into the deepest and earliest fabric of this nation.  The original settlers arrived in North America with very recent memories of political and religious persecution in the Old World.  Even though the South was persecuting a significant portion of it population through slavery, the South always made the argument that it was the persecuted party.  Today, a white majority facing the possibility that it will not be a majority within a decade or two, now claims that it is persecuted by illegal immigrants taking jobs and racial minorities getting taking advantage of social welfare policies.  Businesses claim that they are persecuted by onerous government regulations.  What is overlooked is that often, those claiming the loudest about persecution have been persecutors themselves.

The 20th century international environment cemented in U.S. opinion that there were others out to get us.   Some of the threats were real, some were overblown.  If it wasn't the Hun in World War I, it was the Nazis and Japanese in World War II.  It was the Soviets and Chinese in the Cold War.  The enemies recently have been the Chinese, North Koreans, Iranians, Cubans and especially fundamentalist, Islamic Arabs today.  Supposedly, all of these entities are spending a lot of time and brainpower trying to bring down the United States.

All of this has coincided with a concern that within society, American are not safe.  Children are at risk from pedophiles, women endangered by rapists, ordinary folk by thugs, gangs, or psychotic mass murderers.  At the expense of social programs, enforcement has been stepped up and government has turned over the building and running of prisons to corporations to meet a perceived need to house all the criminals in our midst.  The most popular solution seems to be the notion that everyone needs to arm themselves so that they can shoot back if fired upon.  It's the same idea that drove the violent society of the Old West, with a civilized veneer.  If the United States could be encapsulated in one person, it seems to me that this person would be lonely and afraid, holed up in a house, gun pointing out a slightly opened window and ready to fire at anything suspicious but not quite sure that the house he is in is really all that safe.

Yet we seem to partake in actions that do nothing to increase our safety even if it makes us feel better for a little while.  We look with suspicion on those who are different, and distrust their motives even though we know little about them.  We have marked certain groups and people, in general, as being potentially dangerous and treat them as such.  Thus, every Muslim is a potential terrorist, and anyone who questions this generality is treated by some as at best naive and at worst a traitor.

LHM's quote, above, reminds us that we cannot, as a country founded on ideals of freedoms and rights, succumb to such falsehoods.  After all, LHM was a long-haired guy in a van that invited suspicion and contempt from an older couple, yet he wrote a piece of literature that is beloved by many today.  We invite nothing but polarization in society if we suspect everyone, and as Lincoln very wisely reminded us, "a house divided against itself cannot stand."

E.J. Dionne, also on September 9th, wrote a column that stands in stark contrast to Cal Thomas.  Dionne wrote that we should remember the heroes and martyrs of 9/11 on the 10th anniversary of their sacrifices, but that then we should, as a nation, move on.  He felt that it is dangerous to build a nation's policies around an horrific event in the past at the expense of the pressing problems that it faces in the present or looking toward the future.  He writes that our nation has never been in danger of falling to entities that wish to put a pan-Islamist fundamentalist empire in place.  Instead, we are more in danger from the mistake of not remembering what made the United States great in the first place.

I agree.  9/11 should unite us.  After all, the victims of 9/11 were a cross-section of American ethnicities, religions (including Muslims), political beliefs, and classes.  The terrorists of 9/11 did not warn Muslims to get out of the World Trade Center.  They didn't care.  We were attacked as a unified, diverse and free nation.  If all we learned from 9/11 is to be suspicious of everyone and everything and to always strike before we are struck, then we keep our world dangerous place for ourselves far into the future.  Instead, we should, as good democracies do, learn from our experience and take hard and sober looks at our actions.  We should honor the heroes and martyrs of 9/11 by being wise in our collective decisions and by continuing to uphold our democratic ideals of freedom, rights and justice.  Let's not be the old couple in LHM's quote, convinced completely that the world is a dangerous place, and that others must always be suspected and feared.

Musical Interlude

I was always taken by this version of The Star Spangled Banner, performed by Bruce Hornsby and Branford Marsalis.  Just let it wash over you on this day of remembrance.

If you want to know more about Fort Klamath

Fort Klamath Museum
Oregon Trail
Wikipedia: Fort Klamath
Wikipedia: Fort Klamath (unincorporated)

Next up: Crater Lake, Oregon

Blue Highways: Cedar Breaks National Monument, Utah

Unfolding the Map

Click on Thumbnail for MapWe are going to be cold and wondering about our own mortality in the Cedar Breaks.  William Least Heat-Moon (LHM) just gives in to whatever happens, and lives.  I reflect on what it means to face mortality, even symbolically, on this Good Friday, the most apt of days.  To see where we confront these important issues, click on the thumbnail of the map at right.

Book Quote

"At any particular moment in a man's life, he can say that everything he has done and not done, that has been done and not been done to him, has brought him to that moment.  If he's being installed as Chieftain or receiving a Nobel Prize, that's a fulfilling notion.  But if he's in a sleeping bag at ten thousand feet in a snowstorm, parked in the middle of a highway and waiting to freeze to death, the idea can make him feel calamitously stupid....

"....Perhaps fatigue or strain prevented me from worrying about the real fear; perhaps some mechanism of mind hid the true and inescapable threat.  Whatever it was, it finally came to me that I was crazy.  Maybe I was already freezing to death.  Maybe this was the way it happened.  Black Elk prays for the Grandfather Spirit to help him face the winds and walk the good road to the day of quiet...."

Blue Highways: Part 5, Chapter 3

Sandstone formations in Cedar Breaks National Monument. Photo on "bachspics" photostream at Flickr. Click on photo to go to site.Cedar Breaks National Monument, Utah

As I write this, it is Good Friday in the Christian tradition.  Most of us raised in the Christian faith know the generalities of the Passion of Christ, and even it weren't laden with so much symbolism that occasionally gets in the way of its message (depending on one's interpretation), it would still be a good story.  The narrative basically comes down to this: a much revered man, a teacher whose growing name and popularity is a threat to the established power structure, is betrayed by a supporter and is punished with the ultimate sacrifice - his life.  However, his fame and his influence outlast his death and a movement begins that will ultimately claim billions of people.

The part of the story that always interests me is the decision that Jesus of Nazareth made, amidst very human fear, to go ahead with his part in the story even though he knew it meant death.  I am a person who believes that at times, we all face fears about our decisions.  Even if we know the path we must tread, we might still have a moment of indecision, doubt and fear.  Jesus prayed a long time in the garden, and could have taken the opportunity when his disciples fell asleep to leave and save himself.  But he didn't.  He accepted his role come what may.

We are asked in any religion to compare ourselves with the important people who have made those kinds of decisions.  We are told to put ourselves into their places and do as they would do.  We are judged by how close we can get to following their example.  In my Christian tradition, we are exhorted to be Christlike.  Followers of Islam strive to live up to the ideals set forth by Mohammed.  Buddhists seek to reach the enlightenment of Guatama Buddha.  Nearly all of us fail in some way or another, but we are judged worthy if we continue to try.

But I believe that we all, at times in our lives, face that Jesus moment.  We look back at what brought us to the place that we are and question why we are there.  We look forward and maybe we see what's ahead and maybe we don't, and we are afraid.  It is in those moments, I believe, that we show our true courage as humans if we continue on the path before us.  Some of my proudest moments are the ones where I have taken the path ahead despite my fears, and some of my bleakest moments have been the ones where I have not because of my fears.  As I was thinking about this, I remembered a passage in On the Road where Sal Paradise turns back in a storm at the Bear Mountain Bridge, cursing himself "for being such a damn fool."

It is a bit of a stretch to put LHM's situation in the Cedar Breaks on par with a man who, the stories say, sacrificed himself in the name of humanity.  But in the Cedar Breaks, as LHM was faced with spending the night on a cold summit buffeted by lightning, wind and snow after not expecting such a storm, he confronts fears and demons and questions his path.  He can't move forward and he can't go back, as much as he would prefer to do so.  He fears his demons, symbolized by the bears he thinks are lurking outside and ready to tear him apart.  At some point, he gives in.  Whatever happens will happen.

Of course, LHM's story does not end with his ultimate sacrifice.  The storm abates, and he drives away cold but alive in the morning.  But when he went to sleep, he was somewhat afraid for his life.  Those moments, I believe, are some of the most important points of our lives.  We don't actually have to stand perilously between life and death like LHM did, but symbolically we will face decisions that may mean a kind of death: a death of our old comfortable life to something new and unknown, such as a new job or relationship; or a transformation of our old thinking to a new perspective; or perhaps the actual passing of a loved one whose loss leaves us empty.  In those moments, I believe that we are most fully human and most fully divine when we display that courage to step across our fear and doubts and go forward to wherever our path leads.  It is in those moments that our life truly changes, we take the risk to learn and grow, and ultimately, I think, we see the paradox of our lives: our complete insignificance in the the context of the forces greater than ourselves at work in the universe but also our incredible significance in whatever sphere of influence we occupy in this reality.

Musical Interlude

What would Good Friday and a post about sacrifice, fear, courage and transition be without Monty Python, particularly The Life of Brian.  Often, when life gets me down, I try to remember this little ditty, Always Look on the Bright Side of Life, which always makes me smile. With a wonderfully simple tune, it gently reminds us to keep our head up and laugh even when everything seems dark and absurd.

If you want to know more about Cedar Breaks

AmericanSouthwest.com: Cedar Breaks
Cedar Breaks National Monument
Scenic Southern Utah: Cedar Breaks
Utah.com: Cedar Breaks
Wikipedia: Cedar Breaks
Wikitravel: Cedar Breaks

Next up: Cedar City, Utah

Blue Highways: Franklinville, North Carolina

Click on Thumbnail for MapUnfolding the Map

Something spooky in the dark night bringing thoughts of death and demise?  In this post we take a scary walk in the woods with William Least Heat-Moon while he looks for...wait for it...a grave!  If you want to see where this creepy perambulation takes place, click on the map.  And feel free to comment, suggest or otherwise add your thoughts to this and any post you read on this site.  If you like it and want to share it, feel free to add our link to your own site or share us through your favorite social network.

Book Quote

"The smell in the pines was sweet, the spring peepers sang, and the trail over the first hill was easy.  Whippoorwills ceaselessly cut sharp calls against the early dark, and a screech owl shivered the night.  Then the trail disappeared in wiry brush.  I began imagining flared nostrils and eyed, coiled things.  Trying to step over whatever lay waiting, I took longer strides.  Suddenly the woods went silent as if something had muffled it.  I kept thinking about turning back, but the sense that the grave was just over the next hill drew me in deeper.  Springs trickled to the lake and turned bosky coves to mud and filled the air with a rank, pungent odor.  I had to walk around the water, then around the mud - three hundred yards to cross a twenty-foot inlet.  Something heavy and running from me mashed off through the brush.

"When I was a boy, my mother would try to show the reality of danger by making up newspaper headlines that described the outcome of foolhardy activity.  I could hear her:  REMAINS OF LONE HIKER FOUND.  She would give details from the story:  "...only the canteen was not eaten."

Blue Highways: Part 2, Chapter 3

Old mill in Franklinville, North Carolina

Franklinville, North Carolina

Walking through the woods as evening comes in brings up many memories for me.  If you couple it with searching for a grave, well, is it any wonder that LHM started seeing and hearing things in the dark?  While I touched on this a while back, when we were reading about LHM was driving through Tennessee, I would like to explore it some more.

The passage I quote above reminds me of walking in the woods both in my rural home in Northern California and at some property we use for a summer vacation place in a remote valley in the Coast Range about 35 miles from my house.  When I was a teenager one of the main ways I could bond with my father, who otherwise was both an alcoholic AND a workaholic, was by going hunting with him.  Our epic hunts often started about 3 or 4 a.m. and we walked sometimes 15 miles through the hills and mountains looking for a buck with 2 points or more.  Our more sedate hunts often took place in the evenings where we would leave at 3 or 4 p.m. and stay closer to our cabin, arriving back anywhere between 7 and 9 p.m.

I often noticed the difference in the types of darkness that I experienced while on these hunts.  The hunts in the early morning were much less creepy than those in the evening.  I believe it was simply perception and perspective.  In the early morning, the mind is set upon the coming of the new day.  I noticed the sky getting lighter and lighter as we traversed miles.  The darkness was more still, as if at 4 a.m. even the scary things had gone to sleep.  There was almost a magical quality to the air and the light, and as morning came and my eyes slowly adjusted to the increasing light, it seemed like the world was being born anew.  Even things that I saw at other times of the day seemed suffused with a wondrous newness.

In the evening, however, it could be downright scary.  Again, I think perspective played a part.  The light would slowly grow more dim, and as the sun set behind the mountains the shadows got thicker and the air seemed to crowd in closer.  As the light faded, things that were non-threatening during the day suddenly became things to fear.  Is that a bear standing by the side of the trail up ahead?  No, it's a burned out stump that looked like a bear from a distance.  Sounds magnified.  The noise of the evening insects picked up, and would provide some comfort, until all of a sudden they would completely stop and you wondered whether it was you or something else passing that caused them to go silent.  Distances seemed to lengthen, and a stretch of logging road or trail that seemed to pass by at an instant when we started our hunt seemed to take twice as long to traverse coming home.  Sometimes, especially as I got older and went out more often alone, I often would finish my hunts almost at a run, taking solace that there were the railroad tracks and around the next bend was our cabin and a warm fire.

I suppose there were dangers.  Mountain lions could be a menace, and an angry bear would also be a terrible thing to encounter.  But I never encountered either while hunting.  And I never worried about any dangers in the daytime when I was bird-dogging for my dad, high upon the hillside, tramping through the brush.  But at night, beyond the comforting arc of light where darkness got thick, my fears lay out there waiting.  That's all they were, - fears - but they felt real all the same.  LHM added the additional spooky element of looking for a grave, and reading further along this passage, one finds that he relates a murder story involving a young woman accidentally beating her baby to death, and the bloody sheet left hanging on a tree.  I'm sure he was thinking of ghosts and shades of ancestors past that roamed the dark woods.  In any case, his words remind me that most of us share those fears of things in the dark in unfamiliar places.

If you want to know more about Franklinville

There isn't really much to give you.  It's a small place.

Town of Franklinville
Wikipedia: Franklinville

Next up: Siler City, North Carolina