A Duty Owed

The falls in 2025

It was time—the annual February trek up that iced-over creek that flowed through a frozen, indifferent ravine. A routine that began ten winters before to see the wonder of the natural ice sculptures, particularly the waterfalls, that only the coldest of seasons can create.

A pilgrimage that began with my faithful coonhound, Seth, ever at my side. The wintertime past, I made the journey alone after losing Seth the previous fall.

A purging of grief in the blustery cold.

While one of Seth’s pups could’ve accompanied me last winter, there are some paths in life where we must go it alone.

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Another image from last year (March 2025)--the logging road went it can get iced over.

This year, however, it would be this old man and Seth’s largest son, Tony, who would travel up that frozen, serpentined creek. (Regarding Tony’s size: You don’t need a leash for that hound—you need a saddle.) With his father’s jet-black coat, Tony is an odd mix of his parents’ personalities: sometimes embodying Seth’s quiet stoicism, while other times, displaying Annie’s playfulness.
 
This sunny winter day, the thermometer was approaching the mid-20s—a veritable heat wave after several weeks of single-digit negative/positive temperatures—when Tony and I headed into the forest. That young dog ran ahead (wearing a GPS tracking collar) while I ambled slowly behind with my new walking stick. During last year’s trek to the frozen falls, I broke my old walking stick that I’d carried for many years; I’m certain, especially in the forests of Painted Post, there’s some sort of symbolism in play, but I digress.
 
Getting to the creek following the old logging road came easy this year. Often, this narrow pathway is all ice (or worse, a hidden layer of ice beneath a veneer of snow) due to the seasonal freeze-melt-freeze cycle that can make the start of this journey a tad troublesome. This year, however, the weather pattern was more akin to freeze-freeze-freeze, so trudging through more than a foot of powdery snow posed no concern.

Leaving the logging road, we followed a vernal feeder stream on this decidedly not-springtime day. Nearly a mile from where we began, Tony and I made it to the creek and headed upstream toward the falls.

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A coyote that had traveled the creek before Tony and I this day.

It’s fair to call this creek a ‘highway’ this time of year. Oftentimes, fox or coyote travel over the ice for hundreds of yards. Makes sense. It’s easy traveling on the flat ice with the slipping hazard only slightly greater than crossing places where the creek’s gray slate bottom has become algae-covered during more temperate seasons.
 
Didn’t take long for Tony’s carefree pace to quickly outdistance this old man’s memory-burdened gait, and that pup was soon out of sight. But I knew that young hound was somewhere ahead just around the next bend. Further, Tony has the wonderful habit of “checking in” every so often, thus no need to look to my GPS tracker to find his whereabouts.
 
Surprisingly, several times the creek’s frozen surface groaned under my weight. “Surprising” considering I reckoned the staunch cold should have created a complaint-free layer of ice. But neither physics nor the forests of Painted Post suffer fools.

A lesson I’d soon re-learn.

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So I continued up that frozen hollow
—alone but not alone--
one slow step repeating the next
With only the sound of my walking stick
periodically stabbing the ice.

Coming up on the fallen poplar.

I came to the northern wall of that ravine where the cliffs are the steepest. Several years ago, a gray poplar had relinquished its hold to fall and lean over a deep waterhole with its top resting on the rock face. It was an obstacle easily negotiated, though, where one could normally pass under that leaning tree by hugging the cliff'.
 
I stopped there--an old, gray man--noting the thick ice, and how I’d have to stoop to make it under that old, gray poplar this day.
 
I stopped there--recalling one summer a lifetime ago. The memory of finding a 5-week-old Seth, who’d wandered away from his mother and littermates into the forest several hundred yards upstream from where I stood now. I must’ve smiled (pretty sure I smiled) recalling how that small pup had then bravely followed me along this creek until his tiny legs had tired, and I had to carry him back to his mama and siblings.
 
Then it happened.
 
The ice never complained. It simply collapsed. I fell through the tall ice then into the pool beneath. The drop couldn’t have been more than four feet, but my left shin caught the rocky edge of the pool on the way down.
 
Admittedly, that hurt. I didn’t curse (pretty sure I didn’t curse), but it’d be a lie if I said I didn’t want to.
 
It was more reflex than intent, clambering onto that frozen creek bank. Years of teaching combat first aid for the Air Force kicked in. I slowly felt down my shin, mentally prepared to find a broken tibia, already constructing a way to use my walking staff as a splint if need be. Although I couldn’t rule out a possible hairline fracture, there was no bone protruding. A good thing.

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So I closed my eyes.
And lie there in the snow.
In that blessed cold.
Waiting as the throbbing in my leg subsided.
 
Sometime later, I opened my eyes.
There stood Tony standing over me.
Not sure how I didn’t hear him near.
And as I stared at that ebony hound,
Tony stared back.
And through the son, I saw the father.

No matter how many assurances I gave that dog
—that I’d be okay--
Tony refused to leave.
That hound remained there, watching over me
until I stood so many minutes later
(walking without pain, no less)
with the dawning realization,
that the forests of Painted Post
do sometimes allow fools to pass,
but likewise provide a guardian angel
along the way.
 
We made it to the falls that day.
Partly out of stubbornness.
But mostly for a duty owed
to the past, the present, and the future.
It was a good hike.