On a recent visit to a close family member in assisted living, I was so shocked by her appearance that I decided to take a week off and spend it with her. I wanted to do everything I could to let her know how much I love and value her. In case she was on the way out, I wanted no regrets.
So imagine my surprise when I arrived a week later to find her happy and gay and almost girlish! She had high energy and used the word "wonderful" repeatedly. All because she had a new friend - a gentleman who'd recently moved into the facility, a veteran and someone very interested in life. The boost that his attention and friendship gave her was miraculous to see.
What an incredible illustration of what love can do, and what the lack of love can do!
The Grand Teton Range has to be seen to be understood. Wiki photo.
Having clung to the shelter of our national parks for 20 years, I feel so much love fueled by even a memory of the places I've been. An atheist and a proselyte can both agree that in the parks we see something so much bigger and grander than ourselves, something that freely gives us the cosmic gifts of light and heat, and stimulates trees to grow up. We see that the processes upon which all life depend go on independent of us, that we are so fragile and yet so beloved.
In my campaign to return us to love, I think the only place that can do it -- indeed the place that was created to do it -- is our indescribable, world class National Park System. If the idea sounds preposterous, talk to the American writer Wallace Stegner who called them the "best idea our country ever had," or Ken Burns who used that title for his groundbreaking series. (Today in the New York Times my friend Michael Allen revisits the Reconstruction Era through the lens of national parks.)
The agonizing state that our country is in shows that the majority of leaders and citizens neither feel love for ourselves nor for the world. You cannot love anyone until you first love yourself, and the place to discover a healthy helping of self-love is in our national parks.
This week we take the 40 Congresspersons from our last virtual trip to tour the wilds of Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks, through the portal of my memory. The leaders are from both political parties, a cross section of members of natural resource and other committees, and members of ethnic caucuses. My goal is for them to feel the pull of nature on their souls so that it can influence their future decisions.
Flying into Jackson Hole, we see grand vistas of snowcapped mountains from the air. As we disembark I see eyes bulging among those who're experiencing the magical views for the first time.
"You can see all this from inside the airport? What's outside going to be like?" one asks.
"Just wait," I say, coyly thinking about the explosion of shock that is about to happen when she sees the Royal Tetons. Known as the "Oh! My! God! Mountains," they elicit that response from just about every person who sees them.
Who can believe a wall full of snow-capped mountains, seven peaks in all, the highest point of the middle peak encircled by a cloud? Wow!! Is this for real? To see this view in summer when the mountains cool their feet in the river and smile at the acres of yellow and purple lupine flowers bobbing in the meadow, is to feel like you're in heaven. (On one of our tours a member of our group finally fell back in her seat saying, "All this beauty is wearing me out!")
Arriving at the luxurious Jackson Lake Lodge, I'm prepared for jaws dropping as people walk through the sumptuous lounge and find themselves looking at the Grand Teton Range framed through the windows like the grandest living art on earth. Cocktails on the deck outside with desultory conversation; watching the meandering moose feeding down below and enjoying the great outdoors before we move inside for a gracious dinner. We'll take a leisurely exploration of the park next day and visit the site where volunteers are taking down barbed wire fences impeding passage for the pronghorn antelope.
By afternoon we'll get on the scenic John D. Rockefeller Jr. Memorial Parkway to Yellowstone National Park. I expect to see the most venerable among us recapture their childlike spirit as we experience the smorgasbord of massive wildlife along the way. Grizzly bear, black bears, moose, elk, wolves, coyotes, bighorn sheep and foxes, we've seen them all in this area along with the massive ever present herds of bison. "Who needs to go to Africa on safari when we can do it right here?" is the statement I hear over and over.
During their 1896 excursion from Fort Missoula, Mont., to Yellowstone National Park, riders of the 25th Infantry Bicycle Corps, led by 2nd Lt. James A. Moss, at top, pose on Minerva Terrace at Mammoth Hot Springs. (World History Group Archive)
We stop at Mammoth Hot Springs and talk about the African American Buffalo Soldier Bicyclists who were there in 1896, and who continue Yellowstone, first time visitors are shocked to learn that there's not just Old Faithful, but actually half of all the geysers in the world in this park. We check in at the iconic Old Faithful Inn, and hurry out to catch the first explosion of Old Faithful while we're in the park.
What can I say except that I see the awe in the faces of these legislators moving inconspicuously among the thousands of other visitors, marveling at the mud pots, the aquamarine pools, the sounds of elk bugling in the evening like a flute coming over the mountains.
It's the same look of awe on the faces of the 10 year olds. Oh! What a great thing it is to be an American and to have this bounty bequeathed to us!
Follow us next week as we begin to see what love can do!