First Light

Wildfires had been burning for several weeks, filling the sky with a dusty texture during the day and amping up every sunset and sunrise. I had flown into Bozeman, Montana and then rented a car and driven south, following the winding road through the Absaroka Mountains into Yellowstone National Park. A day later, having had my fill of bison and geysers, I had left through the park’s southern gate, continuing onward towards Jackson and the shadows of the Tetons.

I was there to renew my Wilderness First Responder Certificate (years earlier when taking my initial certification course, I was asked why I was getting it; "I hike with people that sometimes make poor choices," I said). The course was being taught at a small outpost north of town where the rolling hills turned to the undulating flatland of a high prairie valley.

Each morning, before breakfast and class, I'd take a walk west towards the Tetons, down the long, straight driveway to the even longer straight side road that led back to town, where I'd marvel at the pale light of dawn streaming over the horizon behind me, reflecting off the millions and millions of smoke particles in the air hanging in front of the jagged mountain peaks in the distance.

Kelly, Wyoming 2018

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