The Unknown Host

What’s in a name? Sometimes nothing…sometimes more. Now and again the universe produces through its random lottery a cosmic jackpot. Such is the case with the aptly named Dave Good. Good in so many respects, perhaps best at the art of the telemark, of which the skiing is but a part.

A couple of years ago Dave mounted me up some second-hand Kazama boards with a used set of Rivas that I’d bought in Berkeley: though it was all I could afford it was, nevertheless, my first telemark set up and I was keen to press them into service. “Why don’t you come with Ute and Mila and I? We’re skiing in to a friend’s cabin in the Sierra Buttes and we’ll ski out the next day.” An opportunity such as this cannot be turned down.

At the gate, I fastened crude “kicker skins” to my skis: short strips of old skins lashed down at the ends with silver duct tape. My friends had better gear than me, but gear is not what makes the man. “Gear is not what a man is, still less has, but merely uses” I told myself, “the man makes the gear.” A sound first principle and one with a much broader application as I would soon learn. It was still early in the season—late December and there hadn’t been a lot of snowfall. The road was covered with only a thin coat of quite slushy snow. We could see the pavement in places and the volcanic soil was still bare under the manzanita.

Poling and gliding, we traced the course of the closed road admiring as we went the rose-hued granite boulders through which flowed the rime-encrusted Salmon Creek and, crossing it, we began the ascent into the upper lakes. The skies greyed over and a chill wind kicked up. Dave led us to a cabin down the end of a spur. The cabin was boarded up and he tried his key but it did not work. “It’s not this one—that’s for sure,” he exclaimed, shaking his head.

We skied single file through some dense stands of lodgepole pine back to our ascending track. I knew this area fairly well and I asked Dave if he knew for sure which cabin it was. “It’s down to the right as you go up toward Sardine Lake” he said. A few isolated flakes trickled from the heavens. A cabin could be seen distantly through a cluster of aspens and we veered into the trees, howling coyote yelps as we gathered speed through the openings between the boles.

Crossing the swale of a small creek, there arose a stout lodge in a broad clearing. Well, we tried the key again and it didn’t work but “you know,” Dave said, “he probably gave me the wrong key.” In the gloaming the air temperature was dropping. We pried the plywood window shutter off the back window and lo! the window was unlocked and slid open. A lithe member of our party slipped into the dark innards.

Rounding the lodge, we unclipped our skis and walked up the steps onto the wide expanse of porch and, from inside, the front door opened. There we prepared our nests in the recesses of what turned out to be a grand summer lodge. We boiled down snow-water for tea, prepared an exquisite supper, and reclined in the yellow light of coleman lanterns humming from the tops of cloth-covered boxes.

We fashioned a teepee of kindling atop a mound of newspaper and soon had a fire roaring in the hearth. Another round of tea was prepared and we enjoyed some silence, letting our eyes follow the flames as they quickly licked split rounds of ponderosa pine, popping open pitch pockets and exploding coals. The ladies giggled in the loft as they bedded down while Dave and I enjoyed a fireside smoke.

In the orange light of the fire we breathed great blasts of purple smoke into the open-beamed room. “You know,” he said pointing the pipe stem at me and exhaling a sweet blast of smoke, “this isn’t our cabin.” In the hearth, the charred logs shifted and a small maelstrom of sparks flurried. Thinking through the implications of that statement, I was not surprised and replied, “we need not worry about that—good men need no invitation.” He laughed and a confidence-inspiring smile rippled across his face. His teeth gleamed white in the firelight.

In the flickering light I could see a bookshelf laden with stacks of old Sunset magazines and a row of books. Amidst that odd melange of Hardy Boy mysteries, Clive Cussler and Danielle Steele novels, a book of Gary Snyder’s poems caught my eye. Remarkable for their purity, these poems had long been a favorite of mine. I opened to a random page and read aloud:

The earth for a pillow

the sky for a blanket

that is true prosperity

Dave nodded his approval at that sentiment, and we both reflected upon our own prosperity. I made a few remarks about the goodness of a lean prosperity and then let it rest.

At daybreak the aroma of french roast filled the still-dark lodge. A pale light began to illuminate the window panes. About a foot of powder had fallen in the night and windblown spumes of sparkling powder lay spread across the porch. The ladies had decided to ski the lower forests while Dave and I chose to ascend into the upper bowls. Having cleaned our pots and packed our bags, we tidied the lodge, split some fresh kindling and hammered the plywood window shutter back into place—respectful to and thankful for our unknown host.