Oil Creek State Park: 6.5-Mile North Loop

Oil Creek State Park seemed almost...majestic…from high up on the Gerard Trail, where it followed  the eastern valley wall in the winter.  Our aim was maybe a little too ambitious.  We were going to camp out at the Wolfkiel Shelter Area in 10 degree temps.  This time my companion was an old former backpacking buddy from previous times, a fellow clergyman who hadn’t been out on the trails in three years. As the night grew closer and the weather got worse, we found ways to talk ourselves into a simple day hike, coupled with a night at my place nearby—tucked into warm beds. It totally defeated the purpose of the trip, which was to camp out in the cold with a bright, crackling fire in our shelter. But it was good, maybe even good enough.

This friend? He doesn’t impress easily. You take him to beautiful overlooks, or river gorges, or quaint little towns, all he can say is, “Huh.” He just doesn’t really take an interest in things—aside from music and ideas. How do you move to Pittsburgh from Texas and never research the place where you’re taking your young family? He took a job here, moved here, bought a nice house, and settled into the local music scene—to a degree—but he couldn’t find Pittsburgh on a map, much less the nearby places where we hike. He always, always lets me pick our hiking destination because they’re all the same to him. He looks at the beauty of this place, and all he sees is trees, and he grieves that it’s not Texas. 

Failing a winter camping trip at the Wolfkiel Shelter Area, we did a long day hike from the northern terminus of the Gerard Trail clockwise to the vista in the top photo, then backtracked to the Boughton switchbacks, took the swinging bridge across the creek, hiked up the western valley wall and took the Gerard Trail north again and back to our car. It was close to 7 miles. It was a glorious day in the winter woods. Ice cleats were very much needed. By the time we got back to the house, I was too tired to start a fire out back…so maybe it’s good that we didn’t try to camp out that night.

A Birdwatcher’s Lament

If there’s one order of animals I kinda hate, it’s rodents. I mean, I can never get enough of porcupines, though they quickly get their fill of me.  And beavers*, chipmunks, and squirrels are all pretty cool in their place, but they don’t seem to understand where “their place” begins and ends… (Actually, I love squirrels. I just wish I could hold a conference with my local gray squirrels to explain a few things, like private ownership and my desire to feed titmice and juncos, not them.) Other rodents you can keep. Mice, rats, raccoons, groundhogs. The Allegheny wood rat is endangered, and several states are trying to stabilize their populations. And while I recognize their place in the created order, I really don’t want them around. What I want is nuthatches, chickadees, downy woodpeckers. I want to feed the birds all winter. But the messy little creatures scatter the seed on the ground, and it attracts mice… The mice come into the house, which sits unoccupied most of the time. They die in traps that I set in the basement, but which I only have the opportunity to check once a week. I can often go two or three weeks without an opportunity to check the traps. (Which is gross.) Worse than that, squirrels lay waste to seed balls like the one pictured here. Baffles barely slow them down. I found an old set of wind chimes that I’m hoping will scare the squirrels away, but not the birds. Is that even possible? I guess I’ll find out the next time I go north. If this bird seed ball is still untouched, I’ll know that wind chimes work to keep both birds and squirrels away—which defeats the purpose. Wish me luck.

*See how quickly I forgive the little rodents who tried to drown my friend in an icy pond in the post below?

 

“Colonel” Edwin Drake

This is the monument to “Colonel” Edwin Drake, who drilled the world’s first oil well near Titusville, Pennsylvania, in 1859. The well still stands in a park at the southeast corner of town. The monument and grave are the focal point at the end of an alley of graceful trees, which lines the entrance to Woodlawn Cemetery in Titusville. It’s a dramatic bit of landscaping. I had gone there looking for an ancestral grave.

Look at this lovely American holly tree. Why are there not more of these beautiful trees in my life? Maybe I’ll need to plant a few. 

By all accounts, Drake was a humble and kindly soul. The engraved panels on both sides of the central statue, seen above, rave a bit much about how he had no interest in material gain, how his only interest was in bettering the human condition, how he was “the friend of man.”

There’s no reason to doubt the truth of all this. But if Drake’s motives were entirely altruistic, then why did “the friend of man” use the military title “colonel” when he was no such thing? All it takes is a single lie—just one lie!—to discredit your entire character and cast a shadow of doubt over your life’s story and achievements. I mean, I want to like Edwin Drake, but why did he use a false title that he never earned? That’s not even a single lie; it’s consistent, ongoing deception… Maybe there’s a reasonable explanation.

I was at Woodlawn Cemetery by mistake anyway. I read that my great-great grandfather was buried in Union Cemetery in Titusville, so I made for the only cemetery I’d seen in that town, which turned out to be the wrong one. Ever notice how cemeteries usually have one of the following names? Union Cemetery. Woodlawn Cemetery. Melrose Cemetery. Oakwood Cemetery. Fairview Cemetery. Why do cemeteries have such predictable names? How about Shallow Pond Cemetery? Or Blooming Crocus Cemetery for a change? Fern Hill Cemetery? Pumpkin Vine, Song Sparrow, Virginia Creeper? Sunny Hill? Woodsedge? Owl's Nest?

The chapel at Woodlawn Cemetery was added in 1998, which seems like the day before yesterday to me. It’s a sterile little structure under bleak skies—third photo from the top. I tried “entering that place to wait upon the Lord and renew my strength,” but it was locked tight as a tomb… 

Anyhow...I truly see no use in embalming and burying bodies, then keeping them filed away for future generations. What are they gonna do with them? Cremation, baby. Cremation is the way to go. But cremation does complicate tasks like the one that took me to Titusville, searching for a grave.

The Old Family Bible—Or Maybe Not So Old…

Until about the middle of the 20th century, most homes in the English-speaking world had a family Bible—often the old “King James Version” of 1611 with its poetic Elizabethan speech. It was often the only book in the house. In theory, it would be read aloud during morning and evening family prayers, which usually consisted of a Psalm, a passage from one of the gospels, and the Lords’ Prayer, followed by a sung doxology. In reality, it was not read very often, but it remained a place to keep genealogical records and important documents, like marriage licenses, birth certificates, and certificates of baptism, as well as deeds, important letters, and contracts. Barnes & Noble sells this cool-looking family Bible pretty cheap on its “classic editions” table, along with other culturally significant works like Aesop’s Fables and the Complete Fairytales of the Brothers Grimm and…the Star Wars Trilogy. (Do you see a common thread here? Pick your meaning-making meta-narrative!) I bought this one a few years ago because I liked the look of it, and also I wanted a place to keep a brief record of our ancestors… 

Another thing I like about this B&N Bible is the classic illustrations by Gustavo Doré. If you want a Bible for actual reading, this is probably not going to be your first choice. Of course you could read it, but it’s huge, and the language is outdated, and there are no footnotes, or glossaries, or appendices to help with historical contexts and cultural interpretation. (People misunderstanding the Bible is how you get fundamentalists and haters, as current history is proving.) Mostly, this edition is for show—a family heirloom for occasional reference, and perhaps a place to hold documents, and most especially a place to write out your family tree. Like all the big old family Bibles, it has a few pages at the front where you can make note of births, marriages, and the names, dates, and locations of grandparents and great-grandparents. 

That was mostly what I wanted: to write my family tree out in cursive and to have a place to keep it. (I always loved my own handwriting and still do—even though it’s less elegant and practiced than it used to be.) The trouble was, I really only knew my lineage as far back as my grandparents. Do most people know the names of all 8 of their great-grandparents? I do now! But I didn’t until I decided to write it all in this family Bible. What do we really know about the very people who made us who we are, whose DNA we share, whose life-quests, and preoccupations, and personal choices undoubtedly still shape us, even though we’ve never met them? Get past grandma and grandpa, and most of us know very little about where we come from. This was certainly the case with me. So, I had to do some digging, for which the Internet was far more helpful than my parents, who are in their early 80s.

My father’s maternal grandmother died on Christmas morning when I was 8, and she's the only great-grandparent I remember. (This isn't her; this is my father's paternal grandmother, whom he barely knew, but whose grave I found very close to my place up north--like 3 miles away.) She loomed large in family legend. My father and his sister absolutely worshiped her. She would come to stay with them for a few weeks at a time when they were children. I remember her as a frail, withered old lady with a single long silver braid wrapped like a crown around he top of her head. She looked ancient, older than water. Turns out, she was only 75 when she died. A 75-year old in the 21st century Pittsburgh suburbs probably has a TikTok account and kick-boxes for exercise. Why did people look so much older back then than they do today? The actors who played Archie and Edith on “All in the Family” were only in their 40s! By modern standards, they looked to be in their 60s.  

Oh, they were scoundrels, my ancestors. Scoundrels, and scallywags, and rascals—if you’ll pardon the strong language. Both of my parents failed to recall the names of their own grandparents, aside from their maternal grandmothers (which is an interesting commentary on the American family). My mother and father both grew up in homes without cars, so it’s not like they drove to grandma’s house each year for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I was only able to find them by looking up my own grandparents, whom I knew well, then finding the names of their parents in their old online obituaries. It was fun connecting the dots, filling in the old, half-remembered stories, as best I could, and writing it all in the family Bible. Oddly, 2 of my 8 great-grandparents are buried very close to my place up north. That’s a quarter of them! I knew they were from that area originally, but I enjoyed whizzing about the January countryside in search of old cemeteries and graves. It was especially fun to make the grave-searching excursions in our oldest car, which I sometimes call “the wheelbarrow,” pictured above. It’ll be an antique next year.

Actually, I call it a wheelbarrow, but our 2002 Honda Accord might be the best car I’ve ever owned, even still at 270,000 miles. It often sits unused for weeks at a time, but it always fires right up. And it’s got that great old car smell inside. Down in Pittsburgh, people look at you judgmentally for driving such an old and unsightly car. Up north, these old Hondas are in demand because they run forever. When our mechanic offered to buy it off us, two weeks ago, I decided it’s time to start taking better care of the thing, maybe even get it repainted. 

The Appellation Mountains or the Apple-atchan Mountains? Discuss. (Plus Link to an Insane Winter Camping Trip in the Seneca Creek Backcountry)

Are these the “Appellation” Mountains or the “Apple-atchan” Mountains?  Traditionally, here in the northern reaches of the geographic region, it’s the former.  But call it whatever you want.  These are just the foothills anyway.  Each year, when I go to my father-in-law's house for Christmas, I take a photo or two of his property.  I’ve been doing this since my now-adult daughters were toddlers, and I took them outside at grandpa’s house on Christmas Day to play in the snow—only to find two eviscerated deer dangling from the swing set by their hind hooves, with a puddle of blood and vital organs on the cold ground beneath them.  Grandpa’s backyard is an ever-changing display of old appliances, rusted out vehicles, and discarded belongings.  One purpose of the annual photos is to show them to my wife (his daughter) as a cautionary tale against hoarding tendencies.

I also like to have a record of how much things have changed here down through the years. My purpose is not to make fun of anyone.  The rural poor are still considered fair game for mockers, but I do not mock them.  I hail from their ranks, and I’m sensitive to their plight.  (You don’t dare throw anything away because it might come in handy someday.)  But also, as I’ve done some very limited genealogical work on my side of the family, I’ve found myself wondering, “Hmm, where did these people live?  What was their place like?  Was it that farm that I vaguely recall from when I was about 6–where I lost one of my church shoes in the crook of an apple tree while climbing it?”  And so, if the world of blogger stands into future years, here are some photos of a certain place in Northern Appalachia that’s significant in my children’s lives…and my own.

By the way, I pronounce this region and its hills in the less fashionable northern way, exactly like the word “appellations.”  The “Appellation” Mountains, and “Appellatia.”  The more fashionable southern pronunciation is “Apple-atchan” Mountains and “Apple-atcha,” which I have to admit, has a better ring to it.  The southern pronunciation is more popular because they’re more likely to embrace the word and use it.  There’s no correct way of saying it; all pronunciations are just part of the vast cultural richness of the American empire—as multilingualism itself ought to be.  I've heard a few other pronunciations as well, including an AI voice that called them the "Apple-latch-EE-ans."  So…these photos are more for my own records than anything else.  In fact, this whole blog is a selfish endeavor, just a photo-journal of my life and travels, where everyone is welcome, but no one is really expected.  I just like to have it all documented and available for future reference.  

For photos of a completely insane winter backpacking trip into the Seneca Creek Backcountry of West Virginia, click HERE. 

Have Yourself a Stoic Little Christmas

Because Christmas lasts till January 6, you know...  But it's never too late to become a Stoic.

I'm feeling philosophical.  A good guiding philosophy can carry you through life with a sense of purpose and meaning.  It will help you to calmly face joys and calamities alike, and it will prepare you for the ultimate question: Death.  Surely, the hopelessness and anomy that we see in the world today--along with all the toxic worldviews, like racism, nationalism, and white supremacy--are due to the fact that people are living without an overarching vision of what life is, and how to live it.  When people live rudderless lives, they drift into erratic and desperate ways of thinking and acting.  And yet, there are lots of good life-philosophies to choose from.  The trick is to pick one that makes sense to you, and stick to it.  I'm most profoundly influenced by the Stoic philosophers of ancient times: Epictetus, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius.  Even before I knew about their existence, I was living out a rudimentary form of juvenile Stoicism.  Now, as an adult, when I act in ways that are not in keeping with my Stoic philosophy, I run aground and end up wasting time and energy on fixing things, or covering up my messes.  But when I behave in keeping with the values and the vision that make sense to me, I'm consistently healthier in body and mind.

The word "stoic" is misused, and for that reason, it's become almost meaningless.  (I hate it when good and meaningful words fall into misuse...because a misused word is a lost word.  Take for example the verb "to connive," which is almost never used correctly.  Conniving means to allow something bad to occur, even though you have a moral duty to try to prevent it.  It means "to turn a blind eye."  And in this 21st century America, I think we need the verb "connive" because there's so much of it going on, with Congress and the Supreme Court conniving endlessly at the President's attempts to set himself up as dictator-for-life, modeled after North Korea or Russia or Congo.)  Words that describe complex or nuanced ideas are often lost--which means that "connive" and "literally" and "stoic" all face the same sad fate.  People use the word "stoic" as if it simply meant unemotional.  But being guided by something greater than our emotions is only part of being a Stoic.

A real Stoic is a person who tries to live their life in accordance with the ways of Nature while attending to four key principles: Prudence, Fortitude, Temperance and Justice.  What does this mean?  Well, let's say for example that the doctor has given me 6 months to live.  My first reaction is to consider Nature: death is natural; all things die, and so dying isn't a terrible fate for me or anyone else.  It might be sad, but it's not wrong.  Next, I'll face my mortality with Prudence, which means that I'll think logically and carefully about it--I'll consider the ways that it will affect the people I care about; I'll write my will and plan my funeral.  I'll face it with Fortitude, which means that, to the best of my ability, I'll try to remain strong, and focused, and unafraid.  I'll prepare for death with Temperance, which is to say that I won't be excessive in any way--no maudlin displays, no giving-in to self-pity, no raging against the dying of the light, for the light will always wax and wane, and there's no sense in raging against it.  Finally, I'll confront my death with Justice, which is to say that I'll embrace the rightness of Nature's rule that all things must die in order to make room for other things.  Justice reminds me that I am only a small part of a very big Whole, and that I've had my day, and it was mostly good.  A Stoic focuses their energies on how they respond to the vagaries of life, while also accepting their lot with gratitude and trust.  You can't change realities, but you can decide how to respond to them.  

Okay, so there is maybe just a small element of fatalism to it.  Marcus Aurelius frequently speaks about resigning oneself to Κλωϑώ, the Sister of Fate who spins the destinies of all people and things.  In ancient Greek religion, even the gods were subject to the will of Κλωϑώ.  She spins the threads of one's life: its quality, its textures, its various entanglements and best uses.  She determines whether the thread of your life is coarse or fine, thick or thin, strong or soft.  Her sister, Lachesis, measures the length of the thread--determining your longevity.  The third sister, Atropos, cuts the thread--determining the moment and the means of your death.  While I don't believe in the existence of three literal Spinning Sisters who determine all of life, I do actually kind of believe that most things are pretty much predetermined, and the only thing we get to control is our reaction to them.  (And so, Stoicism makes me a good Presbyterian...as it was surely the ideological forerunner to Calvinism.)

For a Stoic, there is a form of life after death--or more accurately, life-outside-death--in that all things--including one's personal identity--return to their source, which is the universal consciousness at the heart of all existence, and which governs all things.  At death, a soul is broken down, simplified, and subsumed back into the Whole of which it was always a part.  And so, we continue to exist after death, but all the things that mattered to us before--like accomplishments, and relationships, and possessions--become moot.  If you invested your life into the ways of Prudence, Fortitude, Temperance, and Justice, then your eternal lot is peaceful.  But if you led a turbulent, egotistical, self-centered life, then these anxieties remain with you in death.  In other words, we are in eternity what we were in time.

I was a Stoic long before I knew what the word actually meant.  But there are other guiding philosophies that might work better for other kinds of people.  (Alfred North Whitehead appeals to me, and his tenets would be a good guide for a person's life, but I'm just too fatalistic.)  The best way to weigh your life's guiding philosophies is to take them to the bike trail at Oil Creek State Park in the dead of winter.  You won't get far without a sturdy pair of ice cleats, so be sure to get some Yak Trax.  Go walk on the ice.  You'll have the whole park to yourself.  Let the dormant trees and the chilly creek tell you what most surely matters, then go home and write it all down.  If you had to reduce your guiding principles to just a few words--maybe even three or four watchwords to live by--what would they be?

Oil Creek State Park under Snow

I slipped away on a Sunday night, just after the concert described in the post below, to go up to the North Country to write a Christmas Eve homily.  The sermon on Christmas Eve needs to be short, poignant, and pleasing to the ear.  It's more a poem than a speech, so I needed the inspiration of snow and silence and trees.... Also, my birds were getting hungry. 

While there, I went to an area of Oil Creek State Park that I'd never hiked before.

I didn't realize that Oil Creek State Park was originally created by the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, which owns and operates the Frank Lloyd Wright house, Fallingwater.  That knowledge inspired me to become a supporting member of the Conservancy...which I've considered doing for years.

Oil Creek really is a beautiful place.  It's not jaw-dropping beauty, but it's consistently scenic.  And there are great birds.  In fact, this park put on a brief course in birding, and that's how I got initiated into my newest hobby.  On this short jaunt, I saw nuthatches, a downy woodpecker, and the ubiquitous chickadees.

The snow seems to last all winter up there...

Old Petroleum Center Road was a sheet of ice.

The park is mostly just the steep-walled valley of Oil Creek, which I seemed to have entirely to myself on a Monday afternoon, a few days before Christmas.  

My goal was to follow the Gerard Trail from Old Petroleum Center Road up to the overlook, or "vista," that's shown on the park maps.

The ghost town of Petroleum Center was located where the park office currently stands.  It was as wild a place as any other oil boomtown in these parts: saloons, brothels, overnight millionaires, whiskey, opium, intrigue, abductions, de facto slavery...  Girls were lured to these boomtowns with the promise of respectable work as nannies for wealthy families.  But once they got here, they were imprisoned in the bedrooms of the bordellos and made to commit sex acts against their will.  All that remains of the notorious Petroleum Center is a train station and a single historic house that appears to be maintained but disused.

Interesting how the towns that existed prior to the oil boom are still in existence: Pleasantville and Plumer go back to the 1820s.  But Pithole and Petroleum Center disappeared when the oil began to trickle out.  So many ghosts of the oil days are hidden in these hills.  Old wooden barrels, grassy old roads returning to forest, rusted pipelines, and even the occasional shed or other building.

The birds were great, but I also met a porcupine!  Porcupines are pretty consistently less excited to meet me than I am to meet them.  This guy refused to pose for the camera.  In fact, he wouldn't even let me look him in the face; he kept turning his back and fanning his quills at me.  

Here he is again.  I remember being told, many years ago, that porcupines can shoot their quills at you.  I'm not sure I believe it, but I didn't want to take any chances, so after a brief conversation, I allowed him to carry on along his slow and tottering way.  Our conversation was largely one-sided anyway, more a monologue than a dialogue.

This portion of the Gerard Hiking Trail was picturesque.  

And here's the humble vista out over Wildcat Hollow, with a bench to sit and watch the raptors soaring over the treetops below.

The Gerard Trail circles the entire park.  I really, really want to complete this whole 30-some mile loop someday.  It'll take me three days to do it, due to the fact that it's very strenuous in places.  In winter, you really need a pair of cleats on these steep and slippery trails. 

A beautiful winter day to be out in the world.