There’s a Apache story about a man that woke up one morning and saw a hawk on the wind. Walked outside and never returned. After he died, he met his wife in the spirit world. She asked him why he never came home, he said “Well, the hawk kept flying.”

–Samuel (“The Missing” 2003)

I made my first post in my series on seasonal change during March 2025 and now, a year later, it appears that the lion and the lamb are fighting again. Then, I wrote about a young orphaned deer struggling through the snow. I wondered whether she understood that winter would soon be over. It’s times like these that I ponder that same question for myself.

This is the final summary and seventh post of the series. While I’m no longer religious, due mostly to people who are, I remember that seven is the number of completeness in the Bible. I didn’t plan it that way, but it seems that I’ve said what there is to say. Yet, in reality, I’ve only written a tiniest percentage of what I’ve observed over the past year. I guess I realized that when I wrote my post on winter and had no trouble finding enough material despite being outdoors a small fraction of what I was in the fall.

I tend to write what matches with certain stories and themes. These themes I have learned from others and, especially, reinforced through personal observations an hour or two at a time as an amateur outdoorsman. Often, I’ll see something that doesn’t match with my theories. That’s not surprising. If you’ve known many people, you know that they don’t behave the same and that even the same person can be unpredictable even after you’ve known him a long time. Why should the outdoors be different? Well, it isn’t. Nonetheless, when I see something that doesn’t match with my preconceptions, it sticks in my mind. I start to look for it again. Often I don’t find it and eventually I forget about it. In other cases, I see it more the more I look. In that case, my understanding changes.

So the key themes of these posts are my current understanding of the wilds of Michigan. These have changed somewhat over the year and will change again over the next. But I think they are worth reading.

1. The survival of life in the outdoors depends on adjusting to seasonal change.
2. Seasons are prepared for months in advance, and really the year as a whole.
3. Every plant and animal has its unique strategy for enjoying similar opportunities and for overcoming similar challenges.
4. Each season is often a paradox between what is and what is happening.
5. Life in the outdoors follows a seasonal rhythm.

My writing style changes often, even within paragraphs. To some extent, at least, this is strategic. Often I can be matter-of-fact while at other times I use figurative language. I might even use a stronger term and say I resort to figurative language. While factual writing is best for providing knowledge and accurate descriptions, it often risks that the reader will miss the point. My use of figurative language helps prevent that from happening.

So what was the point of writing this? There were a number. One was to encourage other people in the outdoors to be more observational. I’m not naturally an observational person. Often, I would rather spend time in my own head and ignore what’s going on around me. And for everything I notice, I have another blind spot. I tend to focus on the things I care about. I rarely pay attention to insects, wild flowers, or song birds. Maybe I’ll notice these things more in the future. Maybe you will. A lot of what I’ve read has influenced me to observe more. I’ve learned to notice many more details in the outdoors. If I can influence one more person to do so by reading these posts, then they will have achieved that purpose.

The gift of observation isn’t just missing from my former self. What I’ve noticed about many outdoorspeople is that they don’t really notice anything. Some urban people have turned the outdoors into a place for physical exploits. You ask them about their trip away from town, and they’ll regale you with tales of how many miles they went, at what speed, and the height and steepness of the hills they climb. (That’s when they aren’t infatuated with the gear they bought or how they use it.) Sometimes I wonder why they left the treadmill. I think that exercise and physical challenge are great and the outdoors is a wonderful place to get these things, but if you’ve reduced the outdoors to a place to get exercise then maybe you’ve missed the point. If you don’t know anything about these places beyond the physical rigor of their trails, it’s hard to be a realistic proponent of them.

The more you observe and understand the natural environment, the better friend you can be to it. A lot interest in our natural resources is exploitative and wasteful and it has been since the dawn of time. However, apparently genuine concern for the environment based on an understanding you’ve gained from the TV, social media, or self-promoting interest groups or even speed hiking the local trails might not be as helpful as you think it is. It’s true that people intimately acquainted with the outdoors can have different opinions on different issues. But many so-called environmentalists wouldn’t know the environment if it bit them on the rear, and it shows from the causes they rally behind.

One of many authors that have influenced my view of the outdoors is the bear biologist Benjamin Kilham. This is not to say that we are similar people. Kilham has made a career raising and studying black bear and he has a learning disability. I’m an amateur outdoorsman who did well in school. Yet, I’ve come to many of the same conclusions that he has. Kilham emphasized learning inductively by observing animal behavior as opposed to deductively through experiments and the scientific method common in universities and academics.

In my mind it’s not that science and higher academics are bad or wrong and I believe they certainly serve a purpose. However, these things and these people should never have been elevated to the highest source of truth that they occupy in the minds of many. For starters, I can tell you as someone that has had a lot of experience with academics and academic research that they are far from perfect in terms of capability or character. Certainly no more or less so than anyone else. Further, many of these people who consider themselves experts actually have no practical experience in these fields whatsoever. If nothing else, being seen as the highest source of truth is almost always the downfall of that truth. It’s never long after you become a source of truth before people with money show up to buy what that truth will be. And it only takes so much money and so many corrupt people to undo years or generations or trust and reputation built by honest men.

Kilham has another insight, however, that the behavior of bears can teach us a lot about our behavior and our evolutionary history. While Kilham has a special connection with black bears, I personally expand this notion to many other animals. To caveat, I’ve said many times in these posts that different animals have different behaviors and different strategies to overcome nature’s challenges. We shouldn’t think that humans behave exactly like another animal, regardless of how similar they may appear in some situations. Humans have larger brains and a propensity to use tools and we obsess over material things. We also posses advanced language skills and, unlike some animals, are social in nature. We have used society and civilization to achieve things we couldn’t on our own. However, animals evolved to solve similar problems that we’ve had to solve. Large mammals, in particular, have a lot in common with humans. I must say that a lot of extremely ridiculous notions regarding human biology and behavior have become popular over the decades often originating from universities, political movements, organized religion, and other somewhat detached portions of our society. I need to wonder if we’d be as susceptible to these notions if we were more observational of animal behavior including but not limited to our own.

Now, I would like to progress from what the outdoors can teach us about itself and what the outdoors can teach us about our behavior to what the outdoors and seasons can teach us about our life itself. I said above that every season is a paradox between what is and what is happening. For instance, in the fall food is more plentiful than any time of year yet vegetation is dying away. The fall trees are adorned with the brightest hues, only as they are falling away to reveal their drabbest colors. In the late winter and early spring, animal mortality is higher than any time of year. Snow melts only to freeze again as ice. Eventually, the ground is uncovered only to find that the food is gone. But what is actually happening is that temperatures are warming the trees and the seeds of other plants are awakening and coming to life again. During spring and summer plants bloom and animals are born leading to more plentiful life than any other time. But what is actually happening is all of nature is preparing with greatest intensity for times of scarcity and death.

As the seasons of my own life progress from summer to fall I’m reminded that, while the seasons repeat themselves, not everything does. When I was a young adult, I had to run three miles for my military physical fitness tests. Often, we would run half way out, turn around, and run back again. At this point in my life, I feel as if I’ve reached the turn around point and it’s time to start running back to where I started. I like to think that everything will continue forward, but I’ve known enough people who have lived the last half of their lives to know better. As I’ve written before, when you’ve seen something repeat enough times, even something as myopic as a human can foresee the future. The only thing likely to get better from here on out is my sense of perspective and ability to cope with whatever happens.

And so, the rhythm of the seasons is not the rhythm of the circle but the rhythm of the breath—breathing in and breathing out, breathing out and breathing in. Empires rise only to fall. The runner runs out, turns around, and runs back. An object thrown upward slows until it reaches its peak, only to fall to earth at the same rate it rose. The maple tree in spring brings up sap from its roots during the heat of the day only to send it back down to the roots during the cool of night. The geese migrate north in the spring only to migrate back to their wintering grounds each fall. Ancient humans in lower Michigan traveled to northern beaches, only to return again in the fall. The forest is adorned with every form of leaves, foliage, and vegetation, only to be stripped bare again. The temperatures rise only to fall. The snow accumulates only to melt away. The rivers rise in the spring only to slowly recede throughout the summer. One thing is for certain, without the downhill there cannot be the uphill. Without winter there can be no summer, at least world-wide. We cannot mature unless we grow old. And we cannot live unless we die.

Likewise, through life, I’ve heard of extremely rich celebrities that so many would love to be. It seems that they have no shortage of money, possessions, popularity, friends, and lovers. Yet, many suffer from loneliness, addiction, mental health issues, and even suicide. Those that don’t suffer from these things, still face disease, loss, and, eventually, death. Then I’ve heard others win the lottery and become richer than they could ever have imagined. Then many end up worse off than they had started, with even their finances in ruins. Still, I’ve seen the deer and the grouse, animals with neither money nor shelter and whose lives, if they are lucky, number a few short years. I’ve seen the excitement in the deer as she trots from one dandelion to the next green weed during the spring. I’ve also seen the grouse on a cool October morning walking across the fallen leaves in wide-eyed expectation for what treat the fall bounty will hold for him next. In the end, I don’t think there has been a man so rich to have been spared the cold winds of winter or an animal so insignificant to be deprived the sun of a summer day.

One such insignificant animal was my friend George. George was a chicken I bought a few springs ago from a woman who was culling roosters from her flock. She told me that he was days away from meeting the butcher, but for $15 he was mine. George was probably the finest chicken I’ve ever had. He would lead his hens across the yard on summer days searching for food. When he bored with that, he led them down the road sneaking into the yards of neighbors who weren’t around. One time some of these neighbors, who were home, surprised him by walking out their door. I happened to be driving by at the time and, noticing the bewildered look on the neighbor’s faces, I did my best to pretend not to know George as he strutted around and cackled at them.

George was usually friendly, but he’d go beserk if he thought something was endangering his hens. He had a long time feud with my dog Kit. Kit could have easily killed George, but I yelled at him and forbade him from biting the chickens. Kit’s restraint only encouraged George until one day he flew onto the dog’s back and started pecking the back of his head while Kit glared at me unhappily. After that, I let the dog bite only when the rooster was pecking him which typically brought about a quick end to the feathered assault. And, in the end, there seemed to be an uneasy truce and understanding between chicken and bird dog.

This spring, George took ill. It wasn’t easy to find a veterinarian that would see a chicken, let alone on short notice. Most seemed perplexed that I was willing to spend money on a rooster I could replace for $15. I was even more perplexed to learn that no amount of money was going to save George. Driving back from the vet I took a road that turns from paved to dirt to paved again. This road has a lot of history, as it follows one of the main trails used by Native Americans going north and south. Until last century or so, much of the travel around Michigan was by water, but I’m sure this trail saw plenty of use for several centuries. Like migratory birds, many would have traveled north in the spring to summer along the coast of Lakes Michigan and Huron only to travel south to their winter villages and trapping grounds along flowing rivers in modern day Southern Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois.

I looked at the once strong George sitting in a blanket on the passenger seat of my truck, now anemic, weak, and dying. Glancing back to the road, I thought about the people who traveled here long ago. Many would have chatted among themselves. Friends laughed and joked. Lovers walked along and flirted. Families mourned recently lost loved ones and others spoke with warmth of the memories of those long past. Some discussed the meaning of life and did their best to make sense of it all. As they traveled north in the spring, they might have spoke with excitement of the trees they recently tapped, the fishing that will fill their stomachs, the crops they will plant, and the summer adventures they will have. As they returned in the fall, they spoke of preparations for winter, the sufficiency of their stores, shelters that needed to be set up, reinforced, and repaired, and food that would need to finish preservation.

My attention reverted back to the road I traveled as I watched a pine squirrel scurry across the road, only to dive back again in response to my vehicle. Not long after, a ruffed groused flew from the ditch on the left side into the trees on the other. Then I watched as a group of three deer faded from the roadside into the forest. It seemed peculiar to see so much animal activity. My logical mind tells me that they were out enjoying the warmest day so far this year before more winter storms hit. The other side of my mind tells me that maybe they had a message for me; or maybe they just wanted to pay a visit.

It would seem the names of the people who traveled that road are gone now, along with their words, their memories, or anything about them. Other than, perhaps, the spirits that still bid their presence in the form of animals along our path. Likewise, George is gone. But I sit here now remembering him and our drive south along that ancient road. As time goes on, I will think less and less about George as the rest of my life supersedes him. Finally, the last of my memory will fade with age and death and the last of George will disappear for eternity like the memory of those who traveled before us. Or, maybe I will learn that my friend was still there all along. Either way, one thing is for certain: we were not the first to travel along this road and we won’t be the last. And so, at least in some way, the hawk keeps flying.

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Epilogue and Dedication

My seven part series on seasonal change is dedicated to my late grandmother Margaret Smith. She passed away just before I started this. While I had considered this series for awhile, the event of her passing no doubt influenced the beginning and some of the themes I have addressed.

Grandma Smith was a woman of quiet resolve and her own form of patience. What she did lack in patience for staying one place or resting too long, she more than made up for with her patience for outdoorsmen in her family with their absenteeism, muddy boots, and, especially, stubborn ways. I remember how she’d watch us as children giving up her own retirement activities to allow us to enjoy our summers several days a week. She’d take us fishing to the neighbor pond just long enough to make progress on her crossword before she’d get bored. She was constantly active, and she’d plan many projects and activities for us. She was there for us more than anyone could have expected, but seemed to shed the limelight with natural grace. In the end, my regret is how often she escaped my attention and the only thing I can fault her for is letting me do it. Our childhood would not have been the same without her, and our lives would have been left lacking.

As I watched dementia take hold of her life year by year, I watched her life itself fade way taking the last of my own youth with it. I realized that memory is life itself, or as close as I can figure it.