Building a New World for Myself

October 20, 2015 — Pat Bertram

When a writer builds a world for her novel, she can either begin with the known earthly world and add details to make it her own, or she can create a world from scratch, building the world from the outside in. First, the broad view of how the world looks, smells, feels. Second how the inhabitants make this world their own with cities, farms, and designated wild areas. Third, the infrastructure of this world — the basic divisions of society including cultural, racial and governmental . Fourth, the creatures of the world and how they relate to their environment and each other. Finally, the minutiae of life in this special world — how and what the inhabitants eat and drink; how they deal with bodily waste, move around, survive, find comfort.

heavenI  frequently think about a writer’s need for worldbuilding now that I am carving my own world out of the known world. I’ll be leaving in a couple of months for a road/camping/hiking trip, and though the first three steps of worldbuilding are already in place (I am going adventuring to see what is there, not creating the environment itself), I hope to find new ways of relating to the world and its creatures. To this end, all the minutia of life in this new world has to be thought out.

For example, when some people take off on such a trip, they acquire a recreational vehicle, a home away from home that is larger and more luxurious than the places most of the world’s population live. Other people go minimal — taking just what they can carry on their backs.

Me? I’m far from wanting the conspicuous consumption of the monster RVs, or even the convenience/inconvenience of a camper, but I’m also not yet ready for a minimalist adventure. I will have a car (though my automobile is rather minimalist, now that I think about it. An ancient VW Beetle is about as minimal as you can get and still be driving an enclosed vehicle). I will stay with friends occasionally or in motels when inclement weather so dictates. But for the rest of it, I have to create my own world. What sort of shelter will I use? How will I stay warm? What will I sleep on? How will I deal with body functions in the middle of a frigid night? What will I wear? What will I eat? How will I cook? How can I create a modicum of comfort?

So many details!

I’m not going off on an expedition to a remote corner of the galaxy, where I need to bring everything for survival. I probably will never be more than an hour or two drive from civilization, where I can rectify any oversight or under buying, but still, the point is to be as self-sufficient as possible. Or maybe not. Maybe the point is to prepare as best as I can and see happens.

One of the things I want to seek on this expedition is darkness, places that are far from the light pollution of cities, where stars are so numerous you feel as if you are falling up into the sky. Last night I had a vision of myself in a lounge chair, lying under the stars, and letting myself fall into the infinite sky. Romantic, I know. The truth is probably more dangerous and uncomfortable — frigid temperatures, no protection from the small creatures of the night, and none from the large bidepal ones. But still, I’ve been searching for a strong and comfortable folding lounge chair to make my vision a reality.

Other details I still haven’t worked out, such as disposal of body waste. I had planned on getting a portable camp toilet since I’m not sure I have the muscle tone to squat for as long as I would need to do to my “duty,”  but so far I haven’t found one I like. Maybe plastic bags and kitty litter would work. And maybe I am stronger than I think.

Some people find my preparations amusing, and to be honest, sometimes I do too. But I also find the mental exercise a challenge — rethinking every part of life to see what the alternatives are.

In this, too, my preparations reflect the way a writer builds her world, because isn’t writing about rethinking life as we know it to see what the alternatives are?

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

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Pitching a Tent Without Pitching a Fit

October 11, 2015 — Pat Bertram

A while back, I ordered a backpacking tent, but since my first camping trip will be more of a car camping expedition, I searched for a second tent. It didn’t need to be big, but I wanted more than just a waterproof coffin to sleep in. I liked the idea of being able to stand up and maybe move around a bit, and I didn’t want to have to scramble out of a miniscule door when I was half-asleep to answer nature’s call. (To be honest, I wanted room so I could set up a camp potty so I wouldn’t have to go scrambling outside in the middle of the night.)

I found what I thought was a tent taller than it was wide (which is how the picture looked) but it turns out the tent is hexagonal and the angle of the photo was deceptive. It turns out the tent was about 10 feet wide and six and a half feet tall.

Still, despite incredulous questions as to why I would want such a large tent (this from people who own humongous RVs), I ordered the tent. Because it was a discontinued model, it was cheap, so if it doesn’t work out, I don’t lose much. In fact, all I have to do is sleep in the tent three or four nights instead of at a motel those nights, and the thing will have paid for itself.

I was worried about setting up the tent — most 6-person tents have more than one person to help with set up, and all I have is me — but the tent it
self was easy. The rainfly was a different matter. I think anyone would have had a problem getting that rainfly up and over the top of the six-and-a-half-foot-tall tent without it sliding off, so I don’t feel bad that my first two attempts didn’t work out. It will be easier in the future because now I know how to toss it over the top of the tent, what the fly actually looks like, and what side faces out.

I’d be sitting in the tent enjoying my accomplishmet if it weren’t so hot in there at the moment. (Almost 100 degrees outside and not a hint of a breeze. Eek.) One good thing about the height of the tent
— if it’s too hot to sit inside, I can always enjoy the shade it provides. (I’m wondering if I slip a space blanket between the rainfly and the tent if it will deflect some of the sun’s heat. Or not use the rainfly, but attach a tarp on the sun side for clear days.) But the tent is mostly for nights. And mostly to keep me from thinking about bugs and small animals pestering me — and festering me — while I sleep.

The tent will fun for a while at least, like the playhouse I never had, and it will give me an idea of what — if anything — I can handle when it comes to intermittent nomadic living. (As much as I can plan anything, at the moment, I am planning a couple of months on the road, then coming back here for a couple of months if I can find a place to live, and then . . . who knows.)

I’ll air the tent out for a bit, then fold it up and pack it away. I have a hunch putting it away is the real challenge! (If the tent looks amateurish, all loose and wobbly, it’s because I didn’t staked it out. It’s hard to pound a stake into concrete.)

It might not seem like much of a step toward adventure, but by such small steps, a new adventure begins.

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

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Mini Adventure

October 10, 2015 — Pat Bertram

Note to self: Do not take empty backpack to grocery store.

I needed a bit of adventure today. Since I don’t seem to see the sense in driving somewhere to walk, I decided to do a sort of hiking tryout starting from the house I am currently sitting. I donned my new hiking socks, new hiking shoes, grabbed my new pacerpoles. At the last minute, I decided to take another campingpair of shoes in case I happened to encounter issues with the stiffly new shoes, so I stuffed the old ones in my backpack (not a daypack) and headed out. The only unpaved area to walk around here is a vast field with paths leading to a shopping center, so I figured while I was there, I would pick up a couple of things at the grocery store. Those “couple of things” turned out to be an assortment of oranges and apples, eggs, a couple of canned goods, a few protein and fruit bars, and various other things my hungry/thirsty self seemed to think it needed. All fit in the pack, but eek. It weighed at least fifteen pounds.

The 2 1/4 mile hike to the store was downhill, and with an empty pack and my new pacer poles, I just skimmed along the pathway. The way back, obviously, was uphill, and with all that weight on my back and hips, I did more plodding than skimming, though I can’t blame it all on the weight of the pack. By the time I headed back, the moderate temperatures had blazed into the high nineties. (I don’t often finish a bottle of water on such a short hike, but I’d drained the whole thing before I got back.)

It turned out I didn’t need the extra pair of shoes. The socks did what they promised and kept me blister free. The pacerpoles also did what they were supposed to, kept me upright, shoulders relaxed and back, and distributed the weight more evenly. The only problem is, now my whole body aches, not just my feet!

I don’t suppose this is much as adventures go, but it satisfied something in me, smoothing out my sorrows, giving me a chance to use the hiking gear I’ve been assembling. I hadn’t planned on starting out walking with a fifteen pound pack — I’d thought eight pounds was more of a beginning weight — but I managed to get back all in once piece and uninjured. Always a good thing!

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

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Keep On Trekking On

September 27, 2015 — Pat Bertram

I’ve been following a few women’s hiking groups on Facebook, one each for the Appalachian Trail, the Pacific Crest Trail, and the John Muir Trail. I joined these groups when I thought there was a chance I would be thru-hiking one of the trails, but I really don’t think I have the strength, stamina, or will to attempt such a massive project. (The food planning alone is staggering, considering that you have to plan for six months, and in some cases, have to send the food on ahead and hope you get to it before desperation sets in.)

WANDERLUSTThough I’ve set my sights on a smorgasbord of shorter trails, working up to multi-day backpacking trips, I’ve kept up with the groups, because you never know where life might take you. (At least I don’t where life is taking me. You might have a better concept of your path than I do of mine.)

I’ve paid particular attention to discussions about gear. The trouble is, the advice is so conflicting, it’s almost impossible to sort out what would be best for me as opposed to what is suitable for younger, fitter, thinner women. Most of the gear I have purchased I found on my own, though I still don’t know if it will work for me. The tent I got is a backpacker’s dream, lightweight and easy to set up, but a bit claustrophobic for general use, so now I’m looking for something a bit larger for car camping, where perhaps I would have room for some sort of folding lounge chair. Conversely, since the sleeping pad I got is a bit heavy for backpacking, (though that’s what it was intended for), I’m looking for a lighter pad. And a warmer sleep system.

Recently I’ve been researching trekking poles since I need new ones. (I only have one that’s about worn out, and my hikes in the Redwood Forest proved the necessity for two). I’d just about decided to get a couple of the one I am now using when I noticed a brief mention of Pacerpoles in one of the groups. I immediately went to the Pacerpole site, watched the videos, read the theory, and was sold. Oh, my. These poles are completely different from regular hiking poles — they work to keep you upright, better balanced, and better posture, as well as allowing for a normal arm swing. Although the poles are not ultralight, apparently, the way they work, they don’t demand extra strength or energy. But they are only available from Britain.

No problem. They ship anywhere, and shipping costs are included in the price. And PayPal so kindly sent the euros to the Pacerpole folk so I didn’t have to worry about currency exchange. A few minutes ago, the Pacerpole folk emailed me. The poles are coming via Royal Mail. How cool! My first international mail! Well, my first overseas mail — I have had Christmas cards from a friend in Canada.

What cracked me up is the Pacerpole people sent me homework to do while I’m waiting. Videos to watch, information to read, proper body form to practice. Now I just have to wait a couple of weeks until they get here.

Meantime, I’m preparing for my road trip across the southernmost part of the country. I’d hoped to be more spontaneous, just stopping upon whim, but I know me — if I didn’t make plans to stop, I’d get into the car and drive until the car needed to be filled with fuel and my bladder needed to be unfilled. And then I’d just keep driving to the next pitstop. Since that is not what I want on this trip, I am researching various National Parks and Monuments with campgrounds and hiking trails along the way. I might not visit any of those places, but at least I’d have shorter driving goals, with a hike to look forward to if whim doesn’t stop me anywhere else along the way. (For those of you who like to plan, you’d be so proud of me — I have a notebook with maps, camping information, hiking trails, and any other information that would be helpful, such as food storage tips to keep from attracting mountain lions. Eek.)

I’m hoping by the end of the trip, I’ll be a seasoned camper, maybe even backpacker, and then . . . who knows. Probably back to dance class for a while to unkink and restore myself, while I replenish my supplies and get my car tuned up for whatever comes next.

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

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A Lifetime of Adventures

September 17, 2015 — Pat Bertram

I spend a lot of time looking at maps — world maps, US maps, state maps, road maps, national park maps, national trail maps, short-trail maps, loop trail maps. Maps.

trailsI’ve never been much of a traveler — I always get sick whenever I’ve taken more than an hour airplane trip. Nor have I ever wanted to travel outside the United States. There is more here than I can ever see in a lifetime, especially since I prefer to see things on foot. I’ve mostly given up any idea of walking across the country or thru hiking one of the national trails, but there are hundreds, maybe thousands of trails in this country all for the taking. (And I can always walk pieces of the long trails. Have already hiked short sections of the Pacific Crest Trail, the California Coastal Trail, and the Oregon Coastal Trail.)

One trip I would like to make someday is a trip to Australia and New Zealand. Not only do close friends live there (friends I have yet to meet in person, but close for all that), but oh, the adventure of it! Going walkabout. Hiking some of the best trails in the world. Coastlines.

And another good friend who I plan to finally meet in person in a few months, has recently told me she is hypnotizing me by osmosis so I will join her on her overseas trip to Baku, Azerbiajan next year. It must be working. I’m looking at maps again. And one thing I noticed is that Baku is about a third of a way around the world. So are Australia and New Zealand.

I’ve been playing around with a trip planner site, one that helps plan complicated world trips. I started out with the US – Baku – Sydney – Dunedin – US. The trip planner kept telling me I could add certain other cities for the same cost. So now it reads: US – London – Oslo – Moscow – Baku – Bangkok – Sydney – Dunedin – US. (I don’t know where my Australian friend lives, maybe not Sydney, but I don’t need to know yet because this is all just a game.)

Would I ever do such a thing? I don’t know. I still like the idea of a freighter to New Zealand and Australia, and I hate the idea of all that air travel, to say nothing of being sick for months at a time while doing it, but to travel around the globe? What a romantic idea!

Meantime, I’m back to taking dance classes and planning a southern trip for this winter. Or rather, letting my friends plan it for me. It does my heart good to know that people are so excited to meet me, they are planning all sorts of delights to entice me. Camping trips. Night sky viewings (I am truly enamored of the idea of dark sky parks, where light pollution is at a minimum and the stars don’t have to compete with ambient light from distant cities). Canoing. Feasts. Friends.

If you live anywhere along Interstate 10 or within a hundred miles or so (since it will be winter, I don’t want to go very far north this trip) let me know, and I will add you to my itinerary.

People have called my redwood coastal trip an adventure of a lifetime, and it was, up to now. But there are other trips, other adventures — a lifetime of them.

And in between, there will be dance classes to bring balance to my life.

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

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Lure of the Trail

September 7, 2015 — Pat Bertram

It’s hard to believe I’ve been here in this idyllic place of vast trees and vaster water bodies for eight weeks. Harder to believe my summer adventure is coming to an end, but it is — I’ve already purchased my ticket back to the treeless, waterless desert.

Hardest of all to fathom what I experienced.

I have seen ponds, lakes, lagoons, bays, brooks, creeks, rivers, and especially the ocean. I have seen tiny Douglas fir seedlings and gargantuan coastal redwoods. I have tramped more than a hundred miles through various forest terrains, and almost as many miles along the ocean shores.

I’ve meandered through some of the creepiest places on earth — dark forests with gargoyle-like tree trunks, mouldering stumps of long-dead trees, and moss hanging from blackened branches like the wispy green ghosts reaching out from the centuries.

I’ve wandered through cathedral-like groves of redwoods, the sun shining through the canopy like stained glass.

I’ve traversed ghost highways and long-forgotten logging roads, and though these were not “est” trails — not the longest, shortest, showiest, hardest, or easiest and the trees weren’t the tallest, oldest, biggest — these were some of my favorite hikes. Just pleasant strolls in the woods.

And through it all — dog bite, spained calf muscle, bruises, aching feet, sore muscles, and mosquito bites galore — I never lost the lure of the trail.

This summer adventure might be over, but there are other days, other places, other trails.

And so the adventure continues.

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

***

(The heart is a shell fragment I found on the beach yesterday. Maybe the ocean was telling me it hearts me.)

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I Hiked in the Woods

September 5, 2015 — Pat Bertram

My summer adventure is nearing an end. Just a few more days of ocean and trees before I return to the desert. Since yesterday’s forest hike has to last me for a while, I stayed out most of the day, following one trail after another until I reached the site of my very first hike up here. It was an odd sensation, coming out of the forest to that very spot, as if I’d spent all these weeks wandering in the trees without a break. It certainly felt like weeks, though it was only six hours uphill, downhill, along rivers and creeks, picking my way on gnarly trails, tripping over roots, feeding myriad mosquitoes. (Apparently the mosquito-repellant bracelet I wore was effective only in areas without mosquitoes.

I didn’t make it to the touristy Stout Grove as I intended — the bridge across the creek came down on the 1st of September — nor did I find the trail to a secret grove where some of the forest’s biggest and oldest trees hold court, but I did find one lovely grove of giants among giants. I would have taken a photo, but those trees were so large, all that showed up in the viewfinder was a part of the trunk.

And that grove was only one of the wonders of this final redwood journey. The trail went through a tree trunk (the photo looks like light passing between two trunks since I couldn’t step back far enough to get a photo of the single tree). The trail went under a floating forest (all sorts of trees and plants grow on fallen tree trunks, and this fallen tree never had reached the ground). It passed through a bizarrely awesome tunnel with a fallen redwood creating a 300-foot wall on one side of the trail and deciduous trees on the other side forming a canopy over head.

I saw the green of the Smith River far beneath me, and when I came out of the forest onto the riverbank, I took a photo of the forest from which I had emerged, and I find it impossible to imagine myself hiking in there, a speck compared to those gargantuan specimens. Apparently, although my mind registered what I saw, it cannot acknowledge that I was physically present.

And it is hard to acknowledge. In my mind, I am the eternal bookworm, sitting comfortably and safely, reading about other people’s adventures. In one place, the trail was nearly vertical for two or three yards, and though I know I scrambled up that bank, I don’t exactly know how I did it. Such a strange activity for a bookish woman.

All these experiences seem as hard to believe as my years of profound grief. I sometimes wonder if that woman was really me, that woman who loved a man so deeply that his death all but shattered her. Now I wonder if this intrepid woman is really me. Since neither of these traits — deeply emotional, ardently adventurous — fit with my view of my prosaic self, I suppose it’s time to reevalute my view of myself. Or not. Perhaps I really am just lounging on some cosmic couch, comfortably and safely imagining this life.

But such a vivid imagination is not something I credit myself with, either, which then means I am imagining myself imagining myself . . .

Still, however it happened, whether I believe it or find it impossible to fathom, I hiked in the woods, and I have the photos to prove it.

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

***

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I Got to the Point!

September 4, 2015 — Pat Bertram

So often, I have searched for the point of life, trying to find meaning in its pitfalls, and pinnacles. In fact, as has been pointed out to me on various occasions, I have a penchant for littering my conversations with, “the point is…”

Yesterday, however, I did discover a point of sorts — Chetco Point.

My hostess had business in Oregon, so I drove up the coast with her, and she dropped me off in town. I had no plans, just thought I would see what I could see. After about a half hour of wandering, I saw a sign for Chetco Point. I followed the road, figuring anything that leads me to the point is a good route to follow. Turns out, Chetco Point State Park is a reclamation project, probably sponsored by the bordering waste treatment plant. There was a lovely little picnic area with a view of the ocean and a large sea stack (a remnant of an ancient coast line, too hard to wash away with the softer and sandier part of that old shore).

I took a pathway off to the left of the picnic area and discovered a trail leading up to the very point of the sea stack. A sign warned of danger, but after a brief hesitation, I ignored it. I saw nothing dangerous. I’d been on decidedly more treacherous slopes, though I admit I stayed few feet away from the crumbling edge of the very windy point. Adventure is one thing. Foolhardiness another.

I followed all the trails, took photos of every point of view, enjoyed the headiness — and aloneness — of this spectacular rock capped with lush vegetation until the arrival of a couple of young men and their selfie stick broke the spell.

There doesn’t seem to be a point to any of this wandering and wondering I’ve been doing of late, and yet it all matters because it’s experience. Which, in the end, I suppose, is the point of life and everything else — experiencing it.

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

***

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Never Changing. Never the Same.

August 26, 2015 — Pat Bertram

I went for a three-hour beach walk yesterday. It was perfect timing, with low tide at the mid point of my hike so I mostly had hard wet sand to walk on. It was also a perfect ocean day, cloudy and foggy, and so cool I needed to wear a windbreaker and a scarf around my neck.

For all those hours, the scene never changed — the sea on one side of me, the grass-covered dunes on the other, the sand in front of me, all narrowing to a single point in the distance. It almost seemed as if I were on a treadmill, going nowhere. And yet the scene was ever changing — birds came into view and left, waves of various intensities broke on shore, an assortment of shells and gravel littered the sand.

This never-changing / never-the-same view made me think of us and how we always seem to be the same and yet we are always changing, at least our view point is changing. I don’t know how much we can change fundamentally. At rock bottom, beneath our emotions and our mental chatter, we are awareness, and awareness simply is. But our viewpoint changes with every new challenge, with every widening of our horizons.

I feel as if I should add to this piece, fill out the thought, add a pithy comment or a bit of wit, but apparently, this is the totality of my insight.

Never changing. Never the same.

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

***

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Oregon Coastal Adventure

August 24, 2015 — Pat Bertram

Yesterday I hiked what was supposed to be a four-mile section of the Oregon Coast Trail, but turned out to be only two miles. Apparently, the distance for that particular hike was calculated as round trip rather than one way, but since the description left out that salient point, when I emerged from the woods into the parking lot after only an hour, I was confused. I wasn’t lost, of course, but I felt lost since I didn’t know where I was exactly, and I didn’t seem to have a phone signal to contact my ride in case I had to notify them of a change in plans. So I continued on down the trail, hoping that the next turnout would give me a better idea of where I was.

The sections I hiked were not really difficult except in spots where steps up or down were more than I could handle. (Like stepping up onto or down from a slanting, very narrow backless chair.) Sometimes I could pull myself up with the help of a trailside tree, other times I had to clamber up on my knees.

After I left the little parking lot, the trail became steeper and narrower. The footpath as a whole was narrow — often only about a foot wide — but sometimes this additional trail section was only six inches wide. And there were more parts that were hard for me to climb up or down. Still, I managed to get to where I could see the next parking area though I couldn’t figure out how to get there from where I was. One unmarked trail led to a creek. Another unmarked trail led to a marshy area.

I did figure out where I was since I was high enough to see that the terrain matched my map. I also figured out that the mileage on the trail description was off. So I headed back up to the first parking area, assured that was my rendezvous point.

Going back up was easy. Or rather easier. (Downhill is much harder for me than uphill. Balance is off; footing is different; and if my left shoe is tied snug enough to keep my foot from sliding forward and squishing my big toe, it pinches a nerve on the the top of my foot.)

I ended up hiking four miles after all. Ended up where I was supposed to meet my friends. Ended up learning something, I am sure, though I don’t know what. Maybe: take things as they come. Perhaps: do whatever necessary to accomplish the next step no matter how awkward or inelegant. Possibly: don’t get so caught up in the doing you forget the being.

Mostly I learned that there is a pub in Oregon with the absolutely best hamburgers ever, made with beef grown and pastured four miles away.

***

(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”)

***

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