Trail of Tears and Blessings

While traveling the road to Newberry Caldera on a relatively warm fall day, I notice an uncharacteristic stillness. The natural world is exhibiting a strange, sullen mood: Paulina Creek is dry, the wind barely moves, and smoke from a prescribed burn chokes the blue out of the sky. In the human realm, all visitor centers and resort concessions are closed for the season. Few people seem interested in venturing into the area if they can’t camp, rent a boat, or get a latte. This is a time when the national monument can take a breather from all the tourist recreation.

I enjoy this quiet time before the road closes for the winter. But I’ve never experienced the creek without water or the air without wind in this mountain environment. My thoughts begin to chatter about global climate change, but I immediately put a stop to the unnecessary noise and continue the journey with a fresh perspective. It’s a new day, and I’m ready for less filtered experiences. The profound silence simply serves as a blank canvas for hidden possibilities, much like these quiet mountains appear to conceal their fiery origins.

Newberry Caldera is a place of fiery origins—and geological wonder. A shield volcano, collapsed in on itself, hosts two lakes separated by an obsidian flow, and everything is cradled inside a vast caldera; the remnant of an explosive past. Today, I am hiking the trail through that obsidian flow with Tarn and her brother Tor (talk about geology, look up those names). It is literally a gritty experience. The path is crunchy underfoot and is framed by diverse shapes and textures of obsidian, basalt, pumice, and other unidentifiable hard surfaces. We need to be mindful of our ankles and knees on the sometimes boulder-choked trail.

Although we are surrounded by desolation in a field that was once a flow of fire-melted earth, a few trees manage to sprout and grow. They take root on sparse mixtures of lichen and dust that have settled into the cracks and fissures—a sign of nature’s resilience. One large Whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis), a lone tree we know well from previous hikes, is now dead; the victim of a white pine blister rust infection (a Euro-Asian import). I am saddened by the death, but it is just another moment amidst the dryness, stillness, and roughness of the trail. The tree seems to be a sign that rebirth is just around the corner.

That birth appears in the form of a woman we meet who clings to a small stuffed bear. She holds it close to her heart and tells us the bear will hold her life stories for her grandchildren. She seems to know she won’t be a part of their life as they grow up. Then she shares the story of her terminal cancer diagnosis, and that walking this trail is one of her last experiences before she no longer has the strength to travel. She speaks of her history as a white woman adopted when she was a child by an indigenous Blackfoot family. Her adopted grandmother was a medicine woman. Growing up in two worlds, she often felt misunderstood.

Fortunately, she feels accepted by us—and seems noticeably lighter. I offer some words of my tradition; that we would do Medicine Buddha practice for her. I also speak of my personal connection with indigenous wisdom. I tell her many of our extended sangha will be holding her in their prayers, though they did not know her. She spontaneously exclaims, “That is the best kind of prayer!” We offer to take a photo of her and the bear sitting amidst his primal landscape and she is delighted to accept. Words of gratitude flow from her heart. She tearfully whispers, “You really see me.” We all feel something vibrant is happening in the space we share, and we quietly leave her to sit with our love—knowing she rests safely in the embrace of mountain stillness.

I meet the woman’s husband farther down the trail. He says he thought this pathway would be a good place to bring a smile to his wife’s face. I ask him how he is faring in these last days of his wife’s life. He simply replies, “Life just doesn’t get any better than this.” I sense he would rather be in silence, so I continue down the path while reflecting on his words. His expression could be interpreted as fatalist, but I prefer to think his journey has taught him to value every day as precious. This indeed is a precious day; life, death, and rebirth—within a single moment. Life doesn’t get better than this.

As we head back to our vehicle, I notice an indigenous couple, an older man and woman, offering prayers and collecting obsidian at the far end of the rock flow. Tribal members are the only ones allowed to remove material from the national monument as this is their ancestral land. I assume the stones will be fashioned into tools and ritual objects. Their presence blesses this place—and this moment. Unknown to them, they also bless us, and all who walk the trail. This is the best kind of blessing.