A trace simply defined is a line etched across a plane. Etched on the land, traces are old game trails that have evolved into human footpaths — ancient thoroughfares first cut by hooves and claws and followed by indigenous walkers. "Discovered" by white men, they become "traces."
Boone Trace was Daniel Boone's hunting path through the Cumberland Gap. The Natchez Trace, running from Natchez, Miss., to Nashville, Tenn., is prehistoric in origin — it was used as a walking route by Chickasaw and Choctaw Indians until explorers, traders, and boatmen made it the busiest highway in what was then called the "Old Southwest."
Such is the geographic and historically rich definition of a "trace" penned by Luis Alberto Urrea in "Home Ground: Language for an American Landscape," edited by Barry Lopez. Reading his definition, I see the banks of the Kentucky River in Frankfort, Ky., where an ancient buffalo crossing became a pathway for westward-moving explorers, pioneers and settlers.
I've long associated the American bison (commonly called buffalo) with the wide, open grasslands of North America where the Plains people hunted them for thousands of years — an activity fundamental for their food, clothing, shelter and sinew. Yet their historical range covered a triangle ranging between Canada's far northwest, south to Mexico, and east along the western boundary of the Appalachian Mountains.
Hunted to near extinction in the 19th century, herds of American bison now are largely restricted to a few national parks and reserves. Confined and protected, they graze peacefully, their hooves barely leaving a trace on the land. No longer free to thunder across open plains or carve traces through the woodlands with their hooves, we treasure them to this day for the spirit of freedom that they symbolize — something pure and good that we hold dear.
On the Aug. 27, 2012, cover of The New Yorker magazine, Manhattan's frenetic Times Square has been turned into a green space. New Yorkers sit here and there on portable lawn chairs amid a herd of grazing buffalo, silently capturing the idyllic scene with their iPhones.
On Aug. 28, 2012, Kit and I drove west in a small caravan with our friend, Shakir Hamoodi, members of his family and a few friends, arriving three hours later in Leavenworth, Kan. A band of innocents with heavy hearts, we knew only that our friend had to self-surrender by 2 p.m. that day at the Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary's minimum-security Satellite Camp.
Upon our arrival at the imposing 1902 stone façade of the main prison facility, we spread a picnic blanket under a tall stand of trees at a park-like green space adjacent to the prison's entrance. The sharing of food is ingrained in the Hamoodi family's very being. Our spirits were heavy, but we would use Shakir's final minutes before being incarcerated to break bread together and pray for his safety and prompt release.
Two minutes later, a van appeared, and we were encouraged to proceed on to the Satellite Camp, where Shakir was to begin a three-year sentence for sending money without a trace of malice to aid family members in Iraq to buy food and medicine at a time when sanctions against the government of Saddam Hussein had been imposed.
When friends and family visit Shakir, they see a small herd of bison grazing in a grassy field next to the satellite camp. The ironic juxtaposition of this majestic symbol of America's enduring strength and spirit and our friend, Shakir — the very best of America's hard-working, family-oriented, community-minded immigrant population — touches me to the core.
These days, my connection to the Buffalo Trace is personal. Undeterred by an unwarranted and unnecessary sentence, Kit and I have aligned ourselves with others in the community who support the Hamoodi family and the World Harvest Market. In Washington, D.C., a formal presidential pardon petition, half as thick as the historic Natchez Trace was deep, awaits review. Stay tuned. This noble journey is far from over.