The weather turned a bit chilly yesterday. I think in finally made it up to about 60 degrees, but that is quite a bit different from 94 degrees on Saturday. Yesterday was the day of the Volksmarch at Crazy Horse Memorial. I think that hikers can also make the trek today. Twice each year the memorial is opened up to hikers who can climb up to the level where the outstretched arm will be when the memorial is finished. That gives a pretty close look at the head of the sculpture, which is truly gigantic. I’ve never participated in the Volksmarch, but I did hike up the mountain once when there was an “Out of Darkness” walk for suicide prevention and awareness. It is a pleasant walk, taking a little over an hour from the sparking lot. the hike is on a gradual trail and while it is uphill most of the way, it never is very steep.

Mountain carving is a thing in the Black Hills. Of course the hills are famous for Gutzon Borglum’s carvings of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Roosevelt. The faces are very dramatic and one of the places we take visitors when the come to our area. Crazy Horse Memorial is even more ambitious. The finished memorial will be a complete three-dimensional carving of the mountain, leaving only the granite sculpture of Crazy Horse behind.

Some people believed that the energy for the mountain carving would wane when Korczak Ziolkowski, the man who envisioned the carving and got the project going, passed away. But Korczak passed away back in 1982 and the mountain carving went on. For decades the driving force behind the continuing mountain carving was his widow, Ruth. But Ruth herself passed away last May. There is now a foundation in place and a structure that will continue the work on the mountain for decades to come.

I don’t know how Crazy Horse would have felt about the project. He never allowed a photograph of himself to be made and I suspect that he would have desired a somewhat more natural memorial. But that is pure speculation. After his death in 1977 his parents saw to his burial and did not reval the place to outsiders. His story would live on regardless of the carving of the mountain. I have Lakota friends who are a bit skeptical about the process of carving the mountain, and i have other Lakota friends who feel that the attention brought to the injustices of broken treaties and the story of the Lakota people are worth the price of having the mountain carved. I guess it is a matter of perspective.

I can’t figure out how I feel about it. On the one hand, certainly Lakota people deserve a memorial on the scale of the one that remembers former presidents. And the project is privately funded - there’s no government money being spent on Crazy Horse. And you have to admire the pluck of Korczak, often working alone with inadequate equipment, believing that one day the mountain carving could be completed. That energy and vision and ability to start something so much bigger than on individual is truly impressive and inspiring.

On the other hand the Black Hills are pretty impressive all by themselves. It seems that they hardly need to be sculpted to be beautiful. I sometimes jokingly describe our hills this way: “South Dakota, where we believe that God made no mountain that couldn’t be improved by carving.”

OK, I’m making those comments tongue-in-cheek.

I like to live here. And I take guests to visit Mt. Rushmore and Crazy Horse when they come to the hills. I like to show off some of our attractions. After all, lots of people know that they can see giant faces of presidents in South Dakota, but fewer of them know you can pet an alligator at Reptile Gardens. There is plenty to see and do in the hills and that fact is one of the things that makes it fun to live here - people come to the hills and that means we get to see our friends a bit more often than we would if we lived in some place that wasn’t the destination for so many vacations - say some place that doesn’t host a million motorcycles at the annual Rally.

One of the beauties of this place is the changing weather. We’re supposed to get rain today and I’ll be glad to have the moisture. Things have been drying out quite a bit in the past few weeks with record high temperatures and lots of bright sunshine.

It is that season of the year when I don’t know for sure how many days of paddling I’ll get in. Certainly the lake can remain unfrozen for months. I’ve paddled in open water in November, but usually I don’t paddle in the coldest winter months. The amount of time that the lake is frozen over can vary widely. I’m comfortable taking a wait-and-see attitude. The kayak will stay on the roof of my car for a few more weeks.

The days are getting shorter and the pace of my life is picking up as well. It is time for fall stewardship drive at the church - we’ve got a newsletter to produce and stewardship materials to prepare and a lot of other work to accomplish. October is a busy time in the life of the church. I’ll have to see how much time I have for driving back and forth to the lake.

Today is “iffy” for paddling. The temperature isn’t too cool, but the chance of rain is above 50% for most of the day. As a wearer of glasses, I know that it can be a bit frustrating to see when the rain drops keep landing on my glasses. It can be fun to paddle in the rain some of the time, but the luxury of taking a day off from time to time feels good as well. I just haven’t made up my mind yet.

After all, I could hike up Crazy Horse for my exercise today if I wanted to.

The weather isn’t the only source of surprise in my life. For now, I’m willing to let the day unfold without too much plan or structure.

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