Then there’s the crew I work with: Phil, the producer; Steve, the videographer; more recently, Adam, the drone operator, and Joe, the still photographer. I’ve always enjoyed working with a gang of men more than anything else, so this is my element. Over the course of at least a decade we’ve pretty much learned each other’s moves (I can’t help but noticing, for example, that the last two hotel rooms Phil has reserved for me have been designed for the handicapped). They’re all really good at what they do, which makes life on the job much easier.

Those two factors have been important parts of loving the job. But more central to it have been the people we’ve met. From Appalachian Trail thru-hikers to military veterans “walking off the war”: from a still-mobile and cheerful survivor of the Battle of the Bulge to a family with a little daughter fascinated by everything new around her –watching distant lightning at dusk –and trusting her parents utterly.

The crew and I have done two “shoots” this month. The location of the first was a few miles south of Crawford Notch. On my way, I appreciated for the first time how easily accessible the White Mountains are from my part of Vermont. The routes to the three major notches – Pinkham, Crawford, and Franconia – all radiate from a twitch of the steering wheel at St. Johnsbury. In decent weather I can be at any of them in about two hours.

So it was easy on a Tuesday morning before the leaf-peepers were up and around to be at the end of the Sawyer River Road by 7:45. I could tell, as I drove the road, that it had a history. Once the route of a logging railroad, it even sported a hamlet where loggers’ and railroaders’ families lived. I’ll be back to take a look at that another day. This time it was to meet Tom Ryan, a good friend and the author of the best-selling Following Atticus, with his two newer dogs, Samwise and Emily. Kiki and I had hiked with them before. Tom had picked out a lovely hike – what I call fogey-friendly – to Sawyer Pond, a remote trout pond cradled between high ledges and now slowly reverting to wilderness. We and our dogs enjoyed our usual comradely hike. Tom has lost about a hundred pounds, changed his diet, and recovered from a very scary death spiral; I’m still living with the loss of my wife. By the end of the hike and conversation the friendship felt even closer than it had before.

Last Friday evening I drove to Durham (pep rally night before a home game!) and Saturday morning unloaded my guide boat at a kayak rental dock in a cove off Portsmouth Harbor. This time I’d be spending the day with a group of young ladies from Outdoor Afro. This is a national organization dedicated to getting people of color into the outdoors, which for various reasons has long been the province of white folks. There were six of ladies, besides the leader, Chaya Harris, whom I’d met a couple of years ago on a climb of Mount Washington in really poor weather. This time the weather gods smiled – sunshine, a light wind, and fairly easy tidal currents. We paddled (I rowed) out of the cove and across the harbor to Strawberry Banke, the restored colonial village at the mouth of the Piscataqua River. Tasha (Kindergarten teacher; I wish she’d been around when I was in Kindergarten!) concentrated on creating a muscle memory of paddling, and was brilliant; Lina, an immigration lawyer, struggled less successfully with the same problem, while other paddlers surrounded her sympathetically – like flock members around a wounded individual– till finally she got it. She ended the day with a wet bottom from the water running down her upraised paddle handle, but with a quietly triumphant smile.

Chaya, the leader discussed a book she’d brought – Black Jacks, a history of African-American seamen in the age of sail, written by a UNH professor – but again, the important part of the day was the fellowship and support inherent in the group. We broke up at last, and I turned to face three hours’ driving into the setting sun with a windshield I’d forgotten to clean. But the warmth of the group’s inclusion of an ancient white mariner (plus a cup of black coffee) carried me all the way. This is a really nice job I’ve got.