Over The Edge

One for the stars

The recognition that I was staying up too late nagged at me. The next day’s shooting would begin just after dawn. In northern Minnesota, summer days are long, with early starts and late nights for guys like me who insist on seeing the stars.

I fear that some of the guys on the crew get a little nervous about me sitting outside staring up at the sky. Perhaps their concern is that they may be awakened during the night by me howling as the moon is coming up. The night sky has been a fascination with me since I was a little kid. Nothing quite catches my imagination like the unimaginable vastness of it all. Staring into the sky is kind of hypnotic for me. But thus far, there hasn’t been any howling.

Tucked a way in the far northeast corner of Minnesota, the Lake Vermilion region is sparsely populated and very dark on a moonless night. I once had a job where it was my duty to shoot these large negatives on a huge camera. When overexposed, the dark film was dotted with pin holes. “There aren’t that many stars in the sky!” an old timer who was teaching me barked. After Minnesota, I beg to differ.

Pike Bay Lodge, as one might suspect, sits on a high spot above Pike Bay. It’s hard to imagine the enormity of the lake from the front yard of the Butler’s Bungalow (our headquarters and a much nicer house than the name might imply.) It was several hundred yards across to the far shore, with much of the calm surface carpeted with wild rice and other vegetation. It was incredibly fishing looking. Predictably, I couldn’t take this, and persuaded Aaron to join me that first afternoon on an hour-or-so pike expedition before the rest of the crew arrived. Neither of us really knew what we were doing, but we managed to catch a couple of pike a piece.

Waiting for it to get dark each evening was quite a pleasure. Sunsets were spectacular on the water. A few of the crew members came out to hang with me after it got dark, and I think they are coming around. Seeing a falling star seemed to be the best hook, and we were seeing a bunch. Late July is a good time for meteor showers.

On each of these shoots, and on any other trip I take, there is always something I see that will stay with me forever. Minnesota’s moment came at an unexpected time and place. I was driving behind Aaron, boats in tow, as we were entering the outskirts of Minneapolis just before midnight. What initially struck me as a missile was actually an incredibly bright, green meteor. Having gazed at the stars from the North Slope to the Kalahari Desert, I’ve seen some dark skies, never before seen a meteor near as bright or staying visible for that long – all in the bright skies above the Twin Cities.

I may have howled at that; I don’t quite remember.

“Did you see that!” were Aaron’s first words to me when we stopped at a hotel.

Along with the meteor, I know the images of that last night in front of the house will endure. The loon’s lonely cries were the only challenge to the silence of a dying day. A glorious burning sunset smoldered into a pitch black sky peppered with uncountable stars. An occasional streak of white or green darted across the sky. Beyond the far shore, a family of coyotes celebrated their wildness with a constant yapping and howling.

It was tempting, but I didn’t answer.