The Book of Yaak by Rick Bass

cedars arid follow those woods up the mountain just a little farther before turning back and heading home. It was the time of day, late in the afternoon, when you are most likely to see all sorts of animals, though because of the strong wind, I did not think I would see any. Sometimes the wind was in my face, but other times it quartered from upslope, from the north. The aspen leaves were beautiful, shading to bright yellow, and they rattled in that strong wind.
    I came around a bend in the trail—the whole valley below me—and saw a golden bear walking slowly toward me, not forty yards away. Too close; too damn close. She was smallish—about twice my size—and her thick forelegs were chocolate brown, while all the rest of her fur was sun-struck blonde.
    The wide face, the round ears, the hump over her shoulder—another grizzly, but coming
toward
me, unlike yesterday's, and averting her gaze—- not making eye contact. Swinging her head and shoulders left and right of me, looking everywhere but
at
me. I was stupid enough to believe for a second that she did not know I was there. The wind ruffled her fur, blowing from behind me now, like a traitor, and in that cold instant I knew she knew.
    One yearling cub appeared behind her, ten or fifteen yards back, looking exceedingly nervous, and then directly behind that one its twin, also looking troubled: not playing, as cubs do, but looking hesitant, looking uncertain.
    We were all too damn close. The mother stopped about thirty yards away, the villainous wind gusting at my back—and she circled a quarter-turn and pretended to gaze out at the valley below.
    She was so beautiful in the disappearing sunlight that seemed to paint her that gold color.
    Her cubs came anxiously up the trail behind her—almost dancing in their nervousness, seeming to want to rise to their hind feet and turn away, and go back in the other direction, but obliged to follow—and I understood now that she too was nervous—that she was trying to move me out of her territory.
    Instinctively, I circled a quarter-turn to the south and looked out at the valley, too. I dropped my head to show her I was not a threat. I felt fear, but even stronger, apology, even dismay. I felt incredible respect for her, too, and a surge of gratitude. We both studied the valley for a moment. 1 was waiting to see if she would charge—a thing passed between us, as if we were wired directly together, for a moment—the knowledge and understanding by both of us that she had every right, more than every right, to charge me (and whether in bluff or attack, no matter; she was almost
mandated
to charge)—and yet she chose not to.

    I am convinced it was a conscious decision not to—that it was a thought, a rational decision—the mind overriding the body. It was merciful and generous.
    There may be only a couple hundred grizzlies in the Lower Forty-eight outside of national parks (Glacier and Yellowstone)—and here were three of them, waiting for me to move aside, so they could continue down the trail, into history—into whatever fate awaited them.
    I turned and walked weak-legged down the mountain in blue dusk, the sun now sending up orange sundial rays from its nest for the night, behind the far mountain. I reached the truck in dimness, half an hour later, and drove home to my wife and daughter. I held on to that new fresh feeling of still being alive for as long as I could; and even today, I can still feel, can still remember, the gratitude.
    I am not going to speak against science. Science has its own wildness. But the science we have been taught pauses at the edge of borders, does not usually spill over, unless either by elaborate design, or by accident. We are taught not to leap.
    In art, as in the wilderness, you can stumble into grace and luck, into magic, not just on the rare occasion, but every day; every single day.
    I am too hungry, too gluttonous, to remain a