9-2-14 - “Soup Du Jour” - You could be nestled in your sleeping bag while camping within the Yukon Territory in Northwest Canada listening to the howls of a gray wolf pack.....on a sailboat anchored for the night amazed by the songs of the humpback whales...or with a small group of Maasai warriors armed only with spears crouched at an evening fire listening to the growls of the big cats in Africa... OR you could be out paddling on an Adirondack lake in the early morning....one of those lakes where the wails of the loons evokes that same primeval emotion from deep within....radiating outward....passing through every organ....oozing out of every pore....a fear the first time you hear it...no way a bird can make that sound...a fear that becomes warmth once you realize loons eat fish..Ha ....but it always is much more than that...it is the warmth of knowing you are there...in the wild....in a wilderness that has seemingly ignored both time and man. A place humans have yet to modify that much...polluted that much...or claimed entirely as their own. Paddling on one of those pristine lakes where my Dad would have explained away an empty creel by declaring, “The loons are as thick as pea soup.”..a smile on his face. Ah yes....if you are ever there in both body and mind...drinking in nature’s menu....I hope the “loon soup” is served hot and steamy..that’s the way I love it best.