Dozens of times I have begun a posting in this blog-series with an explanation of “the gap.” A year’s gap. Seeing how I have run out of novel descriptions and rejecting any recycling of the old, let’s take a break from that obligation, eh? Sordid details lurk at scottdmclean.com.
We have been off the grid for a few days. With luck we have dropped into Port Angeles to check all of our inane text messages and the latest assassination attempts. I have uploaded a few pages of a short story to my writing group, the Veterans’ Writing Collective at Gemini Ink, and have downloaded my friends’ latest work. I am making good progress reading Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham, ever more deeply impressed by how great writers tell the story. Paula is reading Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese and wakes me up in the morning, after she has been reading for an hour, to tell me about Ethiopia and the drama of humanity and circumstance.
We have good coffee in the morning. Last week we stayed in a small clearing in the woods near Ranier, the town, and not the town closest to the dormant volcanic mountain. Dean, an engineer by trade and temperament, was our Harvest Host and also a coffee bean roaster. I have something short of a pound of his Columbian beans, medium-roast, and capable of a nice bloom at the pour-over at dawn. Fully aware of the sacrilege, I add half-and-half and sucrose.
Milton, the campervan, continues to meet criteria for awesomeness during his sea trial. A few days ago we were camping at Wynoochee Lake. On the advice of the Coho Campground host – Al, from Edmonton – we took Forest Road 2270 up the eastern shore and followed the river north to the falls. This was the class B RV’s first try at a steep, unimproved, pot-holed forest road with no options for turning tail as the rocks to the right and the sheer drop-off to the left meant the driver was able to enjoy a bit more adrenaline than usual and Milton used his all-wheel drive, Eco-boost engine, and generous clearance to splash some mud on the fender cladding. I’m hesitant to wash it off.
In Chapter LXXXII of Of Human Bondage, the protagonist, Philip Carey, is visiting a poet he has known since his time in Paris. They are now in London, and the poet, Cronshaw, is old and quite ill and it seems increasingly clear that his life has had a greater share of failure than success. Cronshaw opines. “The only way to live is to forget that you’re going to die. Death is unimportant. The fear of it should never influence a single action of the wise man.” And a bit later, this:
“D’you remember that Persian carpet you gave me?” asked Philip.
Cronshaw smiled his old, slow smile of past days.
“I told you that it would give you an answer to your question when you asked me what was the meaning of life. Well, have you discovered the answer?”
“No,” smiled Philip. “Won’t you tell it me?”
“No, no, I can’t do that. The answer is meaningless unless you discover it for yourself.”
Scott D. McLean, MD 