A creek winds through Yellowstone’s northeast corner year-round. Soda Butte Creek, to call it by name. Despite sub-freezing temperatures, a couple feet of fresh snowfall and winter only weeks away, it flows continuously, supporting many facets of the Lamar Valley ecosystem. It’s accompanied by the most brilliant and variant hues of willows, towering spruces and snowy peaks. Running water, the soundtrack to it all.
I took a walk along Soda Butte Creek a few mornings ago, to meet the moose that reside there; two rather impressive bulls. As I approached, they foraged, glancing over every so often as if to keep tabs on me. I was not a threat; I never am. I laid in the snow, about a knee’s height of it, taking photos and admiring one of the more remarkable situations I had ever found myself in. Time passed easily, and before long, only a shallow creek separated me from 2,000 pounds of wild animal.
Others have written lots, perhaps even entire books, about the emotional experience one endures when a wild animal accepts you into its presence. It’s truly a feeling like no other. For at any moment, either one of those bulls could have taken no more than a few full strides, crossed the creek, climbed the bank and charged its antlers through me, or at the very least, fled to the other direction. Had I been holding a rifle, maybe they would’ve. Instead, we went about our own. The bulls clashed antlers a few times, shoving one another back and forth before pausing for more shrub consuming. I laid there in awe, freezing cold and alone, sporting a smile bigger and brighter than the sun. It was simply beautiful. A dream. Fifty minutes or so elapsed before the moose loped away ever so freely into the woods to bed down. By then my frozen fingers and snow-covered camera lens were glad it was quitting time.
If I were an author, and maybe someday I will be, I would pencil in a chapter about this particular day, and these particular moose. Experiences like this, and I am creating quite the list, mold me as a being. Although part of me wishes I was not human, and that I was oblivious to the damage and destruction we have left this planet and its perfectly evolved ecosystems to deal with, the greater fraction of me is glad that I am. For if I can’t someday muster up the written words and photographs necessary to make a noticeable difference, I can at the very least advocate for the components necessary to have moments like these.
Wild places, wild animals.
I’m sure I’ll meet these bulls again, perhaps further down the creek this time. I imagine they’ll be sparring away as usual, nibbling on the willows between rounds. Maybe I’ll bring warmer gloves.
Until then, my mind wanders.
