First Sunday in March

By Bill Pearse on March 2, 2026 • ( 0 )

I went back up Cougar Mountain for the first time in a long time. Back to Shy Bear Pass where the trail splinters off in many directions. There was Fred’s Railroad Trail to Clay Pit Road, the Cave Hole Trail by the abandoned mines, the Quarry Trail that dropped into a dark ravine. Many places with familiar names when I used to come here to get lost.

The spot off the trail where Ginger would always stop for a drink, the boulders where I took our kids before our trip to Europe years ago, posing for pictures and looking so small by the big rocks. The calm place in a clearing where I’ve often thought I’d like my ashes spread, or the place I once saw an owl. Off the Quarry Trail there was that tree that looked like it had a face but now it was so dilapidated it just looked like a tree. There was a large slab of bark on the ground that must have been a panel that slid off, face down. And lots of debris where it had crumbled apart in the middle.

I walked for a while to the sound of birdsong since it was just past sunrise but then put on a Kraftwerk record, perfect for rhythmic cardio, mechanical. The music inspired angular dancing and I hoped no one would see me moving like that in the woods, jerking my arms like gears.

When you go somewhere you’ve been a lot it’s tempting to re-immerse yourself in the past. Does it look the same or different? Can you trust your memory to know? I was pretty sure it was the same tree with a face, I had a picture and compared the two. Sometimes a whiff of marijuana but I couldn’t tell if that was real or imagined.

You could see your whole life unfold at times like these, reflections in the woods. It unfolded like the panels of a map with spots where the creases blurred the print.

Then on Sunday I went back up Tiger Mountain for the OSAT meeting that starts at 10, but took too much time fiddling about the house and had to hurry to make it to the summit in an hour.

I took a sack of mandarin oranges and my big puffy North Face coat and sat on the end of a log with the group. It’s funny, when you’re going up Tiger on a Sunday and pass other hikers you can try to predict who else is going to the meeting. Often it’s everybody. And they look just like me. They file in with a solemn attitude like people going to church.

I passed my oranges around and bundled up to keep warm. Then walked with a guy in his 70s on my way out, never exchanged names.

Sat in the restaurant waiting for my pager to go off and collect my bacon cheeseburger.

Went to another restaurant for dinner, with the family + my mother-in-law in a different part of town. Remarked about the moon coming up and the mountains and the water. There was light until six. And the rabbits have all just come out, maybe because it’s March.