Embracing Caution

"Bright Angel Trail" by Tom Tackett

Here's the introduction to my National Park Collection:







Embracing Caution
When I was growing up in Southern Michigan I roamed the ravines and woods around our house without fear; observing the seasons, enjoying the wildflowers, thrilled with the wild creatures. As I became older, my life definitely became one where I spent nearly all my time indoors, first with school and working and later adding a family that kept me confined in the house with chores that consumed my free time. It got to the point where the only significant amount of time I spent outside was watching the kids play sports and the occasional family picnic.

So, a little over twenty years ago when we finally got the opportunity and time to begin exploring the national parks, it felt like I was coming back to my true nature. Unfortunately, it was a more cautious nature than I remembered.

When Tom and I put together a book of his photos and some of my writing in 2009, a friend read my essays about travelling with my family and mentioned that she liked the image of me standing vigil over the children while we were in the wild. When I reread my own writing with her comment in mind, I see that she was, of course, correct. Each essay I wrote about travelling with any of my children is filled with the ghostly presence of me, hovering, ever vigilant, as they navigate the wilderness.

I’ve been reading the work of Terry Tempest Williams, a naturalist and writer who is my age and lives in the one place on the face of the Earth, besides Michigan, that Tom and I have taken into our hearts – the red rock canyons of Southern Utah.

She writes about hiking into the distant canyons, barely escaping flash floods, boating on the Colorado River, bathing naked in warm mud pools, all while fighting the good fight to save these wild places. She is spiritually connected to the land and the mystical beliefs of the native people there. Although we have only met through her books and we live nearly fifteen hundred miles apart, I feel we are almost kindred souls.

Almost, except for one major difference – although she also has been married for a long time, she made the conscious decision to not have children.

While she devoted her life to nature and spiritualism, I made a pact with a different kind of muse – the kind that delivers mounds of laundry, fussy babies, worrisome teens, empty bank accounts. And, like a mother bear protecting her cubs, caution was woven into my soul, and there it stays.

When I wrote a poem for this collection called “Boys on the Edge” about two young men acting foolishly at the Grand Canyon and my gut reaction when I saw them, I found myself thinking later about how Terry would have reacted to the same scene.
Without that maternal quirk ingrained in her nature, would she have felt as protective? Or would she, a woman who has taken a few tumbles into canyons herself and lived to write about it, think that they had the right to enjoy the canyon as they wished, no matter how dangerous?

So, I'll continue my journey to explore and absorb the mountain and canyon country that’s so different from this place where we choose to live. I’ll do this despite all my limitations which include: being from the Midwest, having tricky knees that keep me firmly on main roads and trails, but most of all, having an over-riding sense of caution in a place that’s still wild, still dangerous.

I know with all my heart that there’s room for both of us: Terry, the thoughtful, adventurous, naturalist; and Denise, the slow, careful, observer. And we can meet in the middle on the page, where we both write about the land we love.

Denise Kalin Tackett
March 16, 2010

Harvest Moon

Here's an example of one of my full moon essays from the collection my writing quartet is pulling together and will publish the end of July. We wrote one for each month of the year.

Harvest Moon of October
On a beautiful, crisp October evening I pulled on a red sweatshirt and headed to the stadium. Dodging excited teenagers, perky cheerleaders and well-armed trombone players, I made my way to our reserved seats right on the 50-yard line. I settled in and got my bearings by taking attendance: husband on sidelines with camera – check! No. 1 son milling around with the rest of the football team – check! No. 2 son and daughter ensconced with friends and ignoring the fact I exist – check! check!

I sat back to relax and saw a bright orange Harvest moon hung low in the sky behind the visitor’s stands. I knew this would be a magical night. Going to a football game at Lakeshore is an event full of band music, cheerleaders, pompon girls, boys with bodies painted red who run up and down the sidelines carrying huge flags and fireworks whenever the home team scores.

But all of that pales in comparison to how I feel when I watch my children play sports. All three of them played a variety of things when they were growing up, but by the time they got to varsity level in high school, they each settled on one sport to concentrate on - our oldest son played football, our second son played soccer and our daughter played tennis. All of them were very good at their sport, but none of them were superstars, for which I am very thankful.

Until I had children I never knew how proud of another person I could be. I was happier and more excited about their achievements than anything I could ever manage to do myself. I would sit and watch them on the field, the pitch, the court, and I would try to contain myself; after all, modesty is a much-valued Midwestern trait. But inside I was bursting with a mix of anxiety and pride and I watched their every move like a stalker.

I didn’t really care if they won or lost – although truth be told, winning was so much more fun for all of us. What I loved was to see them practice those values that seem so out-of-fashion these days: good sportsmanship, trying their hardest, supporting their teammates, grace under pressure. All of them managed to do this throughout their years of playing sports and I think that’s a fine base on which to build the rest of their lives.

That night I sat in my stadium seat watching my first born and felt both happy and sad while the frantic activity swirled all around me. I couldn’t imagine it would get better than this and I didn’t want this time to end. But the truth was, we would have many more of these times in the coming years as our children grew up – month after month, year after year, doing us proud under the Harvest Moon.

Denise Kalin Tackett, October, 2009

Gracie the Nag

Here's Gracie. She's actually our daughter's cat, but she has attached herself with a bond known only to cats to me. Here's a poem I wrote about her last year, but I'm reminded of it because she's been up to her old tricks lately.

Gracie the Nag
I have a cat who’s a bit of a nag,
and four o’clock is her hour.
She runs and prowls, jumps and scratches
and ignores each glare and glower.

She’s out and in, she’s down and up,
there’s no use being sour.
She meows and growls and purrs and chirps,
and four o’clock is her hour.

She just insists that I get up,
she ignores my every warning.
She walks up my legs, sits on my head,
did I mention it’s four in the morning?

The Day Nolan was Born

I have a new grandson who is two months old now. Here's a poem I wrote the day he was born.




The Day Nolan was Born

The day Nolan was born,
there was 18-inches of snow on the ground,
it was 17-degrees on the car thermometer;
as we drove into the night,
the wind blew hard and wild off the lake.

The day Nolan was born,
we grandparents stayed at the hospital until 3 a.m.
then, leaving our children to labor on,
tottered home in the bitter cold,
taking baby steps across the icy pavement,
to rest a little until it was time.

The day Nolan was born,
the final call came at 7:37 a.m.
We rushed around the house getting ready,
scrambling for boots, coats, gloves;
we used a push broom to sweep snow off the car.

It was quiet in the hospital, that day Nolan was born,
not that it mattered, for he was all we could see.
A new generation delivered in a 7 lb., 11 oz. package
with strawberry-blond hair and dark eyes.

The day Nolan was born,
I sat in a rocking chair and met him for the first time.
He stared at me intently and yawned, not at all impressed.
He wrapped his tiny, tiny, tiny fingers
around one of mine and gripped it firmly.

Outside, the sky was a shaken snow globe.

Denise Kalin Tackett
Jan. 3, 2010