the Reflecting Pool

This book is a celebration of life as seen through the eyes of a man who spent two astonishing, often difficult, and always formative years as a "mountain man" in the Rocky Mountains of Idaho and Montana.



Here are the words of a man who has done what few others have chosen to do in modern times, who has experienced life differently, deliberately, primally - forced to consciously recognize his utter dependence on everything and everyone around him, eventually realizing that everyone and everything in life is a teacher, a master, a guru - if only we open ourselves to the learning.



A person's view of things changes fundamentally after spending months eating little other than rattlesnakes, ants, and mice; dry-camping high on mountainsides on pitch-black nights pierced by the shrill unearthly shrieks of rutting bull elk; facing the perils of rivers, trails, weather, and wild animals while utterly alone and without the benefits of modern technologies; living without electricity, refrigeration, radio, TV, telephones, newspapers, computers, iPods, music, news, libraries, medical aid, 911, cars, motorcycles, bicycles, running water, toilet paper, extra clothes, grocery stores, groceries, or anything else you yourself couldn't make, grow, forage, catch, or kill by your own hand.



Perspectives change. Beliefs change. People change.



Here are the thoughts and words of a "mountain man" reflecting his own unique, personal experience of life.