The next day, I was so close to finally finishing my hide that mine and Michael’s blossoming romance was forced into the back seat. Instead of cuddling up next to him, I spent three hours sitting next to a metal bucket filled with rotted wood that was lit on fire — this created a small, intentionally damp fire that smoked profusely as my hide hung above it from a tree branch. I couldn’t leave it unattended, because if the coals burst into flame I needed to be there to rip the hide from the smoker, otherwise the whole thing would literally go up in flames and be ruined. I meticulously watched the thick smoke billow up and penetrate the hide, one hand on a second bucket of water next to me just in case something went wrong, the white material slowly transforming into a deep golden yellow from the smoke.
When my faithful teacher returned my eyes were burning from the focus and the smoke exposure, but he gave it a peek and announced that it was finished. I carefully pulled it off the smoker and held in my hands a buttery soft, golden piece of finished buckskin that was pliable, bouncy, and in my eyes, perfect. It was hard to believe that just a week ago it was a sopping wet pile of fur and skin, and before that, a living, breathing creature. I thought of the deer I witnessed getting hit by that truck on my drive to Montana, which now felt like a moment from another lifetime. I took a deep breath and touched my finished hide again in reverence.
Even more impressive than my hide however was how undeniably disgusting I had become. I was covered in deer hair, mysterious hide juices, grease, sweat, and smelled like a combination of wood smoke and very ripe body odor. I was used to getting dirty on the farm, but I always ended the long days with a nice hot shower. Rivercamp was different. While everyone else was satisfied with jumping into the freezing cold pond on the property, I declined that offer and instead had mastered the art of the sponge bath. This was still a rare treat however, as it consisted of many steps: warming the water on the wood stove in The Shed, carrying it back to my tipi, working up the nerve to peel off my many layers in the still crisp air (would it ever warm up in this Arctic tundra?!), and then usually shivering there naked as I waited for the boiling water to cool down enough to use (the flip side of which was finding the water was barely warm by the time I got it back, which was the worst). I would then awkwardly wash my hair hunched over like Gollum while trying to dump it on my head (sometimes missing) and then used whatever water was leftover to wipe the stinkiest parts of me with an already dirty washcloth. It was debatable if it was more of a smearing of the filth around than actual washing but when finished it at least felt like I’d removed a layer of grime.
When I emerged from the tipi shivering with dripping wet hair that might not have actually been any cleaner despite my best efforts, I saw Michael coming across the field towards me.
“Do you want to go to the hot spring?” he asked casually.
“Wait.. what? You mean to tell me there’s a hot spring close to here?” I could not believe that this news was just now reaching me.
“Well yeah,” he said, “But it’s kind of a long drive down a dirt road, and I don’t know, I was thinking if you were okay with it maybe we could all pile into your pickup and go together,” he rattled on tentatively, as if asking me to drive would have been a deal breaker.
“Are you joking? Yes! Let’s go! Now! Let me get my keys!” I ducked and scrambled back into my tipi, all plans for the day now mute, with the glorious thought of immersing myself into hot water now the only plan worth pursuing.
We gathered around my truck and Jack and Kevin crawled into the bed, ducking beneath the old truck camper and getting situated while Michael coaxed Ranger to hop in and join them. I swear that Ranger visibly glared as he realized that Michael was sitting in the front with me and as I closed the camper shell I heard Jack say, “Okay Ranger, stay over there and don’t bite us now.”
We bumped and rattled along for forty five minutes down a very precarious dirt road, passing several hundred-acre ranches with domestic bison running alongside the truck, a thin electric fence the only barrier between us and the giant hooved-beasts that were literally the same size as my pickup. The snow-peaked Tobacco Root mountains loomed overhead, and as we rounded another bend I could see the steam rising from a collection of pools nestled into the side of the Jefferson river. I parked the truck on the side of the dirt road, released the passengers locked in the back, and followed suit as we scrambled down a steep hill to get to the water. There sat three steaming shallow pools of varying degrees of temperature and cleanliness, two of them clear but the last one a slimy puddle of mud and algae. At this point I didn’t care what the pool looked like as long as it was warm. I had already changed into my bathing suit at camp but was curious what the boys had planned — Michael and Jack donned their boxers and to no one’s surprise Kevin opted to go naked so I averted my eyes as the nude and partially clothed boys dropped into the pools ahead of me. We all chose the deepest and cleanest pool, the water piping and shockingly hot, and while it took me several minutes to ease my way into it the others adjusted the temperature by using a resident bucket to scoop cold water from the neighboring river into the hot pool. And then there we were, steam rising all around us, sitting in a gloriously hot bath as the snowmelt-fed river rushed past us on the side. Ranger roamed around the bank, visibly contemplating if he’d like to put his muddy feet in the hot pool or take a dip in the frigid river first, coming to visit Michael on occasion to give his cold ears a friendly lick. I felt my muscles fully relax in the warmth and took in the beauty of it all — Red-winged blackbirds twittering in the pasture on the other side of the river, the breeze moving through the newly leafed-out Cottonwood trees, the steam from the pool filling my lungs. I glanced at Michael through the steam across the pool, caught him looking at me and smiled, and a familiar sense of being home came over me. This was exactly where I was supposed to be. Ranger snuck up next to me and gave my head a gentle sniff, surely a sign of endearment, and then I sunk down and finally immersed my hair in the gloriously hot water.