On May 24, 2013 I arrived at Noname Lake, a fly-in-by-floatplane remote fishing cabin in East Central Manitoba with my Dad, and brothers Dan and Mark. I had wanted to bring a book with me to pass time in the cabin. Mark and Kelly encouraged me to find a book on their well stocked shelves in their North Eastern Pennsylvania home, but after scanning innumerable titles, I left empty handed. At the Toronto airport waiting for our flight to Winnipeg, I lingered in the bookstore hoping to be drawn to a title, but to no avail.
I had never gone on a fishing trip without a book to read.
On our first night in the cabin I was restless after everyone else had fallen asleep. Dad was on the bottom bunk of the bed adjacent to mine. The light of the later northern dusk was still filtering into the large window near my bed. Purples, pinks and blue to black hues ribboned across the horizon above the lake and tree line out of that window. In the corner of the bedroom between my bunk bed and that window was a never-installed section of kitchen counter and drawers. I quietly opened the bottom drawer. Empty. The middle drawer was empty as well. I pulled open the top drawer expecting another void, but it contained a couple manuals for the propane powered fridge-freezer and water heater, a deck of cards, a few brass coat hooks that had never been screwed to the wall and... a book.
Wild by Cheryl Strayed. This was the memoir of her solo hike along the Pacific Crest Trail in 1995. The book had only been published in 2012.
The very first page drew me in and inspired me like no other book has in recent time. Her writing was a descriptive masterpiece of her experience, scenery and emotions.
By the second night of my reading Wild, my path was clear - I would go on another bicycle tour to bring my life to a full circle from the bicycle tour in 1986 that had shaped my life in so many ways. I lay on my bunk-bed with my mind racing with anticipation, excitement and hope.
Thank you Cheryl Strayed for writing Wild. Thank you to whoever brought the book to the isolated Manitoba fishing cabin and left it for me to find - no coincidence and to me bordering on miraculous.
To go on another bicycle tour would be the healing that I seek - emotional, physical and always my continued spiritual seeking.
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