Afterword

The Wild

Who can know the mind of another being? Who can even know their own? I watch the horses. There is a power and a grace we recognize as beauty, a beauty we want to be a part of. And if that means thousands of years of human intervention, of domestication, to capture even a small part of that beauty, we do it. And the horses let us.

I watch Wayne. There are aspects of him I’ll never understand. One is how he stays so optimistic about places like the Muskwa–Kechika, how he continues to believe that wilderness areas can be kept from human industry. But then again, it is Wayne who says you can’t be an environmentalist unless you are an optimist. The way Wayne thinks is a mystery to me. It’s one of the things I love about him.

I watch my dad. It seems that what’s disappearing is his consciousness, as if his body can no longer absorb it. Maybe awareness is leaving my dad’s corral, returning to the cosmic plain from which it came. There is so much about our brain, our bodies, our minds we still don’t understand.

There are things I never thought I could do, but I did them. At first, the shock of it felt impossible to overcome, but then, the realization that I’d survived built a new and more solid foundation inside me, a foundation that gave rise to infinite possibilities, an endless rolling out of What next? And Why not?

Like other beings, the natural world keeps me alive, both physically and metaphysically. The Muskwa–Kechika is a place that still feels pristine, exuberant, healthy, still filled with its original potential, its infinite possibilities, its mysteries. When I am there, it restores me. I breathe better. It fuels my curiosity, my desire to always be thinking and in that thinking, to experience the wild. I hope it can stay that way.