Blake Wasson
Not about a bird. Homage to a friend, a rock thrower--his erstwhile island home and his New Hampshire hometown that reminds me of a coastal duck.
Blake Wasson is one of the most interesting people I know. An evidence-based opinion I’ve held for years. He works in the woods, learning the forested landscape.
Cut a trail with Blake. He’ll make it clear what he likes or doesn’t.
Do not cut the ferns. Wouldn’t you rather walk a fern-lined trail than one devoid of fronds and pinnae?
Stop and admire sassafras. Blake had to remove a handful of sassafras trees, against his desire, outside his employee housing. He still talks about those trees.
Furrowed bark. Root beer scent. The unlobed leaves, purely oval; the twice-lobed mitten-shaped leaves; the thrice-lobed trident-esque leaves—all smooth at the edges. Like snowflakes, no two are the same. A tree worth pausing for.Do not rush. Move at the pace of the woods. How does one adequately revere sassafras when moving too quickly?
If the land wants to reclaim something, let it.
Blake is constantly engaged with the land. Collecting seeds of little bluestem grass, growing pumpkins, looking for antler sheds, catching albies off a crowded jetty—passing on a broadside shot at a buck because it’s better for the herd if he takes doe. Blake is not separate; his engagement with the wild is symbiotic.
Over 100 miles of trails on Martha’s Vineyard are under his purview. His most prized is the sui generis Waskosim’s Rock Reservation. Nearly 200 acres of woodland and fields. Mill Brook meanders through—native brook trout a bow-and-arrow cast away.
The namesake Waskosim’s rock, the island’s best-known glacial erratic, has adorned a ridge for a score of millenia. The rock was almost overtaken by vacation homes—par for the Martha’s Vineyard course. Luckily, the sanctity of the land won the day.
Blake drops pitch pine (Pinus rigida) ravaged by the Southern Pine Beetle (Dendroctonus frontalis), builds woodland bridges and boardwalks and is comfortable at the helm of a Bobcat or a tractor.
If you see a handrail of locust, there’s a nonzero chance Blake cut, debarked, and sanded each length before fastening them together, hauling them into the woods, and setting them in the ground. If you’re driving to the boat launch at Pecoy Point, vegetation along the shoulder sculpted into walls of green, thank Blake.
Not just a woodsman for pay, he’s an all-around outdoorsman, a craftsman, photographer, and writer—with bylines in New Hampshire Magazine.
A laptop’s demise robbed him of his magnum opus, a screenplay he put years into, as well as drive to write. He’s getting it back and turning to Substack. I’ve shown him Jesse C. McEntee and Lou Tamposi for inspiration, but Blake has enough interests to stay busy away from the keyboard.
More than anything, Blake is a hunter.
A freezer in Blake’s basement often contains north of a thousand pounds of venison. To the left, another freezer he found abandoned outside a restaurant and now uses to hang meat.
To the right, a pool table where he’s handed my ass to me more than once.
Blake is from Seabrook, New Hampshire, a place as original as he is. Seabrook residents speak a strain of Shakespearean English you won’t hear anywhere else. One Seabrook father reportedly exclaimed “hark!” to get his kids’ attention.
New Hampshire has the shortest coastline in America. A chunk of that is Seabrook Beach. “We are very proud of our beach,” the town manager told local press. Sounds about right. If you’re from Seabrook, you’re a “Brookah” and proud—very. Brookahs are sometimes disparaged as “rock throwers.” The uppity might snigger: a Brookah doesn’t have money to spare, so he throws rocks for fun.
Spend enough time with a Brookah and you’ll think of “rock thrower” as high praise.
Oh. You need a TV and a fancy car to be happy?
Adorable. Pitiful. Shallow.
A Brookah throws a rock. Hips rotate, shoulder drives, arm uncoils. A rock thrower will be happier hurling a stone than you’d be at the wheel of an M3 or an A6, driving home to your 4K HD TV to plop your out-of-touch ass on a $6,000 sectional.
A rock-thrower gets to watch a stone arc through the sky or skim across the water.
I used to pride myself on being able to skip a rock. Then I skipped rocks with Blake—and he can skip a rock.
Seabrook is the Common Eider of New Hampshire townships. Most write both off, eider and Seabrook. Take a closer look.
Blake disparages me as an “email guy.” He is the antithesis of an email guy. One thing we have in common is alpha gal syndrome.1 A Lone Star tick bit him. Blake’s reactions are worse than mine—he went to the hospital and lost fifty pounds.
The thousand pounds of venison in his freezer is no longer for him.
Most bowhunters, faced with that, might just call it a day. Blake will never hang up his Hoyt. He found a new end for his means. He hunts for others, teaches woodland stewardship, and turns deer into art. His nickname—along with “breaker of hammers” because he’s broken many sledges—is “tax man,” for taxidermy.
If Blake gets a deer, he makes a Euro mount. If you get a deer and want a Euro mount, call Blake. Aside from skull and antlers, deer have hides. Blake puts them to use. He stretches the hide over a large wooden frame, cord looped through, pulled tight. The flesh dries; he removes the fur. He works the hide until it’s suede-like. He boils bark high in tannins to make liquor—not the kind he and I used to drink as we watched gulls drop shellfish at Lake Tashmoo. It’s more like tea. He soaks the hide. It grows darker, the liquor gets lighter. Repeat.
Blake’s great uncle carved duck decoys. The tax man is picking up the torch. For my 30th birthday, he gave me a Bufflehead he carved. I told him I’d pay for his early flubs. They’ll be worth something someday: an early Wasson. He replied that I will always get free pieces. If I put up a fight he’ll mail them without return addresses.
Blake was the first friend I introduced Larissa to. She’s also from New Hampshire. When he said he was from Seabrook, she asked, “is it still…” He said it was—unspoken understanding between Granite Staters.
I’d told Blake about Larissa long before she and I started dating. “I have a crush on my speech therapist.” I’d been dating someone else; Blake presented a hypothetical:
They both text you to get dinner. Who do you pick?
Larissa, I told him. He knew how we’d met, but wasn’t sure if it was beyond the pale to bring it up. Feigning unawareness, he asked what she did for work and acted surprised at “I’m a speech therapist.” Larissa knew he knew. She sees how I smile when Blake comes up and jokes that she wishes I smiled that way about her. She knows Blake is important to me and has made him almond torte.
Years ago, Blake and I spent a day making the hedgerow along the Pecoy Point road to Sengekontacket straight and clean. It took the whole day. Walls were the goal, perpendicular to the ground.
I doubt Blake remembers that day.2 He’s had more days like that than I have, but I think about it if I drive to Pecoy to row to Sarson Island for cormorants and plovers—Black Skimmers if I’m lucky.
That and an affinity for trucks. Blake drives a beautiful Nissan Frontier PRO-4X. The color is very him. He has a softtopper that matches.
When I got a Ford Ranger, I sent pictures to Blake from the lot. I replaced the repugnant stock tires with B.F. Goodrich KO2s, of which I’ve now bought four consecutive pairs—always mounted with the white lettering face out—and drove to his place to show him, like a proud dad.
Before his Nissan, Blake was a Jeep guy. He had a Wrangler and sold it, which he regrets to this day. The tires were never rotated so they were cupped—you could hear that Jeep from a mile away, with its Pittsburgh Penguins bumper sticker.
When we lived together in employee housing, it was nice to look out at the driveway and see two capable vehicles. We drive new vehicles now, but that Jeep was synonymous with him. That Tacoma was synonymous with me. In a way, they always will be.
Those were special days, living there, but Blake will tell you I was never there. I was there less than I should have been. Now that I don’t get to see Blake, I wish I’d been there constantly, exchanging quips, talking shit, and watching gulls.
This essay being about him, I sent it to Blake before I published. He read it and texted me that he spent half laughing, half on the verge of tears.
“When you wrote about the Pecoy walls being done by me, I said out loud screw that, he did those walls.”
No, Blake. We did.
Heck of a tribute to who seems like an awesome person. Appreciate you even mentioning me!
We should do a New England meetup. Jesse and I have been talking about a hike for two summers now….
This is beautiful, bother. Well done. What a centered, grounded human.