Kevin Wolf author: TRAILRIDGE
MY story, TRAILRIDGE, happens right outside my office window.
My writing space was supposed to be the third bedroom. I commandeered it when we moved in seven years ago. The space is cluttered. My wife refuses to enter. A stack of books I haven’t gotten around to reading takes up one corner, a telescope with its tripod sits at the window, the breeze teases the feathers of unused trout flies beneath my computer, and a cased Browning shotgun awaits our next trip to the trap club. Two Bibles and maybe six yellow legal pads with notes cover the floor.
But the window is most important. What’s outside fuels my imagination. In late September, great bull elk strut, bugle, and gather their harems of females right outside. In January, I’ve watched a lone coyote pad across the fresh snow. In the spring, a mama duck and her ducklings cruise the creek, and Broadtail hummingbirds hover around our back porch all summer. On any day, perhaps a deer, bobcat, bald eagle, or redtail hawk may distract me from my writing or inspire the next scene.
If I crane my neck just so I can see Longs Peak. Its summit is 14,256 feet above sea level, or nearly 7000 feet higher than my office window.
If summer tourists don’t clog the roads, in thirty minutes I can pretend I’m Guy Hogan (my novel’s protagonist) on the curves of Trail Ridge Road. It is the highest continuous paved road in the United States. It crosses the Continental Divide, where streams and rivers flowing east ultimately mingle with the waters of the Atlantic Ocean. The west side is the headwaters of the Colorado River. Its waters spill into the Pacific.
They say pictures are better than words. Perhaps this one is worth a thousand.