The Solace of Open Spaces, by Gretel Ehrlich
In July 1998, I walked into the Jackson Hole Booktrader on Broadway in the downtown historic district, not knowing I would find within the dusty shelves there the book that would change my life and shape my writing forever.
Searching for a home to meet my own wide open spirit, I stumbled into Jackson broken hearted and broke to open up this book and read this: “the detour, of course, became the actual path; the digressions in my writing, the narrative.” I had met my literary match.
If the world ended and I had to grab a handful of earthly possessions, I would cling tightly to my tattered, highlighted, underlined copy of Solace. I devoured the book at night when I was alone in my cabin, reading by oil lamp and listening to the Hoback river running behind. No other author, much less woman, had ever come close to documenting my own thoughts and feelings about nature, loneliness, heartbreak, and landscape – the landscape we both loved: Wyoming.
In her descriptions of ranchers and the dust that settles over the west, I felt at home, for I could look out my very window and see this very scene, “Dust rises like an evening gown behind his truck. It flies free for a moment, then returns, leisurely, to the habitual road – that bruised string which leads to and from my heart.”
In her narrative, we seemed to be living the same life. I was living in a one-room cabin without running water, and my only companions were 180 Alaskan Huskies at the sled dog camp where I lived. For those who’ve never seen a Wyoming winter, it is an overwhelming beauty, a force extreme. During those times, I’d stoke the wood burning stove – my only heat source – and read: “days when the temperature never rose above zero my log cabin felt like a forest pulled around me. Outside, hard wind-packed snowdrifts grew, flanking the cabin like monstrous shoulder pads. Rusty the dog …was my only companion. I played Scrabble with him every night and he won.”
I can still smell that wood burner when I open this book. I can still hear that river, still feel that loneliness and heartbreak and the sense that I had found myself alone, but at home. When I open this book, I remember the wild roaming spirit inside of me – the Americana that proudly, fiercely clings to the culture of all of those who endure despite challenges, who persevere despite adversity. I am connected and inspired by the strength of that west, of those who are hardened from an unforgiving landscape and hard work, but soften at the sight of a rolling prairie or a lone sheep in a winter storm.
In July 1998, I walked into the Jackson Hole Booktrader on Broadway in the downtown historic district, not knowing I would find within the dusty shelves there the book that would change my life and shape my writing forever.
Searching for a home to meet my own wide open spirit, I stumbled into Jackson broken hearted and broke to open up this book and read this: “the detour, of course, became the actual path; the digressions in my writing, the narrative.” I had met my literary match.
If the world ended and I had to grab a handful of earthly possessions, I would cling tightly to my tattered, highlighted, underlined copy of Solace. I devoured the book at night when I was alone in my cabin, reading by oil lamp and listening to the Hoback river running behind. No other author, much less woman, had ever come close to documenting my own thoughts and feelings about nature, loneliness, heartbreak, and landscape – the landscape we both loved: Wyoming.
In her descriptions of ranchers and the dust that settles over the west, I felt at home, for I could look out my very window and see this very scene, “Dust rises like an evening gown behind his truck. It flies free for a moment, then returns, leisurely, to the habitual road – that bruised string which leads to and from my heart.”
In her narrative, we seemed to be living the same life. I was living in a one-room cabin without running water, and my only companions were 180 Alaskan Huskies at the sled dog camp where I lived. For those who’ve never seen a Wyoming winter, it is an overwhelming beauty, a force extreme. During those times, I’d stoke the wood burning stove – my only heat source – and read: “days when the temperature never rose above zero my log cabin felt like a forest pulled around me. Outside, hard wind-packed snowdrifts grew, flanking the cabin like monstrous shoulder pads. Rusty the dog …was my only companion. I played Scrabble with him every night and he won.”
I can still smell that wood burner when I open this book. I can still hear that river, still feel that loneliness and heartbreak and the sense that I had found myself alone, but at home. When I open this book, I remember the wild roaming spirit inside of me – the Americana that proudly, fiercely clings to the culture of all of those who endure despite challenges, who persevere despite adversity. I am connected and inspired by the strength of that west, of those who are hardened from an unforgiving landscape and hard work, but soften at the sight of a rolling prairie or a lone sheep in a winter storm.
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