At Lewis Lake, Yellowstone, Wyoming

On the shore of a lake.  A lake where Shoshone, Sioux, and Bannock rode near-by, hunting, setting down summer camps, and close to where Chief Joseph eluded the US Army by riding through the Yellowstone as he and his Nez Perce headed for the Canadian border.  Murphy and Sage drank from the lake, waded into the water, scanned the horizon listening for ghost horses, faint flutes, and the crackle of a campfire in the early evening.

There it is, the reason for taking the pups when I travel.  It is the imprint, the memory of the past.  From now on, each time I drive by Lewis Lake, or fish the North Fork of the Flathead, wade the St. Joe's, float Dry Falls, seek the cool water of the McLeod or Klamath, or stalk cutthroats on the Lochsa, I will see  Murphy.  She will be staring at a stick or ball, waiting for game, or among the ghosts, hovering near-by, watching me, protecting, waiting.  That is, of course, if she is not with me, next to me, barking to go into the lake.

It is always good to enjoy new places, get that stimulation from trying to locate myself in a new geography, find footing in unusual terrain.  But there is also adventure in places we have been.  Memories infused with time, with people and wildness we have never met.  Paiutes, Flatheads, Blackfeet, Yakimas, Salish haunt our places.  Lewis, Clark, Smith, Fremont, Jackson, Powell.  And someday, our voices, our spirits will join them.  Murphy, Sage, and me, sitting around campfires listening to stories about Lewis Lake.  

Murphy's day.