A Place to Inherit
Kolbe Jr. (KJ) arrived on September 20th at 10:04 p.m., weighing seven pounds, fourteen ounces. My daughter Morgan shared the photo above shortly after he was born.
The next morning, Olympic Valley looked much as it had the day before. The mountains were lathered in alpenglow. The meadow was beginning its turn toward fall. Boo still wanted her walk.
But somewhere between our front door and the creek, I realized I was looking at everything differently.
What part of this place might my grandson come to love?
I hope KJ will feel the pleasure of a hike up to the family of trees I've come to know and respect.
I hope he takes long walks along the Lake and experiences breathtaking sunrises and sunsets.
And I hope KJ skips flat stones across the Lake's surface and discovers that the same hike and mountain and trees and Lake can surprise him with each and every visit.
And someday, I hope to be with him when it does.
Children have a way of asking us to look again. And I can't wait to see this place through his fresh, new eyes.
Isn't it true that by the time we're adults, we often know too much about a place to notice it properly? We know which road needs fixing, which street lights take too long to change, when the best time is to shop at our local grocery store.
But a child sees a creek and wants to know where the water came from, and where it's going.
A child sees a seed carried on the wind and follows it until it lands.
For a child, it's one exceptional moment after another.
I’ve spent years taking photographs here in Lake Tahoe, trying to hold on to the moments that make me stop. Moments, some exceptional, I know will never be exactly like this one.
But since KJ was born, I’ve found myself thinking beyond the frame.
What will be here for him to see?
Who will be here to welcome him?
How will Olympic Valley feel when he visits?
And a question that haunts me, personally, is what will I have done to care for this place before he's old enough to walk it with me?
There's no doubt that weather, people, development, and the simple passage of time will change the fabric of our Valley.
So, I can't promise KJ the Olympic Valley I know today, and I shouldn't expect him to love it the way I do. Instead, he will have his own discoveries, his own favorite trees, his own ski lines and reasons for coming back.
But what I can and should do - and what all residents of this Valley can and should do - is pay more attention to what needs care now, and be more a "Steward of the Valley."
KJ was just born and already I find myself thinking about hikes we might take together.
I’ll share with him the names of a few trees, each one a tribute to a writer, philosopher, poet, artist, or someone who made a splash in my life. And maybe KJ does a little bit of his own research into why I chose these luminaries.
Most likely, he’ll ask questions that send us both looking for answers. Or maybe he challenges me to climb a tree with him.
Like most children, I came to understand my grandfather's world in pieces: a story told at the right moment, something he had saved, a skill he passed along without making a speech about it. Now I'm a grandfather, and the distance between generations feels both enormous and wonderfully small.
My grandfather was a great storyteller and TV celebrity in Detroit, Michigan. He was the host of Bill Kennedy at the Movies for nearly three decades, until he retired in 1983. His voice remains iconic through technology. You may have heard it on the original Adventures of Superman TV series: "Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive..."
To this day, I still treasure any clip, soundbite, or scribbled note of my grandfather's. I loved his stories about movies and famous movie stars (especially Clint Eastwood, Robert Mitchum and Peter O'Toole), many of whom were his friends or people he interviewed on his show. I still Google Bill Kennedy and stumble on clips I never knew existed. Like these here, or here.
I hope I have stories that make KJ lean in as I did with my grandfather. The kind of stories that'll make him ask, "And then what happened?"
But if there are life lessons for him to learn while visiting us here in Olympic Valley, I hope these are among them:
Belonging to a place comes with responsibilities and some reciprocity with a vengeance. Think of ways of giving back. You can love the mountains for their beauty and still spend a morning hauling pine needles and branches for yourself or others. You can be grateful for the meadow and still kneel to pull noxious weeds. You can cherish a walk through your neighborhood, and still pick up debris you find along the way. And, when things don't sit right with you, you can be a voice of reason for your community... and make things right.
Zigong asked: "Is there any single word that could guide one's entire life?" The master said, "Should it not be reciprocity? What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others."
I didn't really understand all of this when I first came to Olympic Valley. I was drawn, as so many of us are, by the natural beauty of this place and the feeling of being somewhere extraordinary.
A place enters your life through its beauty. But it stays there through the relationships you develop and the care you give back.
Boo and I eventually turned toward home. The mountains had changed in the way they do while you're busy thinking: a different patch of light here, a shadow climbing there. Nothing was standing still long enough for me to preserve it, even in a photograph. And Boo wanted my attention.
KJ has been in the world less than a week. I have no idea what he will love, or whether Olympic Valley will mean to him what it means to me. For now, I see the path in front of me.
Boo is ready to keep going. And we have a place to care for until KJ comes and sees it for himself.
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All photographs by Michael Kennedy (unless otherwise noted) / BlueWolfGallery.com
I’m Michael Kennedy, a resident of Olympic Valley, CA (in photo above with Nicola and Boo). I’m a writer and photographer, and now Kolbe Jr's happy grandad - I love exploring nature and getting lost along the way. We live in a world that demands our attention and I just want to say thank you for your attention. If you enjoyed this post, please share this with a friend. For more photos and stories visit BlueWolfGallery.com.
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