Hidden Falls, page 2
To me, however, they were “those people,” not “our people.” Our people didn’t go to college—we found jobs and got by. We tracked the seasons by the type of ball that was in play: baseball, basketball, football, and hockey. The idea that I could go to Harvard felt as possible as riding my bike to the moon. I would just smile, nod my head, and sit quietly for a few minutes until we reached the Citgo sign, which to a Red Sox fan was like seeing the Star of Bethlehem. It marked the entrance to the Holy Land, Fenway Park, where every spring the region threw its faith into a band of saviors who always found a way to break our hearts in the fall.
“But this is the year!” my dad exclaimed as we drove past in July of 1978. “Freddie Lynn, Yaz, Remy, Burleson, Rice, Fisk, Dwight Evans, the Boomer, Bill Lee, Dennis Eckersley, Bill Campbell, this is the best team since ’75 or ’67!” Those were years when World Series losses made for longer, colder winters.
Even though the Sox held a 14-game lead in the American League East as we drove past Kenmore Square, they ended the season tied with the dreaded New York Yankees and lost the pennant in a one-game playoff. It was such an epic failure that the local press dubbed it the “Boston Massacre.”
We camped like British explorers (which is to say, not lightly) in the National Forest off the Kancamagus Highway. The campground was beyond a covered bridge with a red tin roof that was supported by giant crisscrossed timbers. The water beneath it carried the tannins of decomposed foliage, which gave it the color of weak tea. The air felt clean like after a heavy rain, and smelled like my grandmother’s embroidered pine-needle pillow.
It took our combined strength to remove the canvas tent from the back of the Country Squire station wagon. The tent stood eight feet tall and was supported by wooden poles. It had three compartments: a bedroom for each of us and a living room between them. It took the better part of an hour to set the thing up. We had a six-burner Coleman stove, and a metal ice chest that was so heavy when loaded it could only be moved in a succession of short bursts. Our army surplus cots probably weighed 25 pounds each, but they needed to be sturdy to hold our musty wool insulated sleeping bags.
But the important moment came the morning after we arrived: the long-awaited trip to Hidden Falls. As we got in the car, my father placed three things on the seat between us: a canteen, a basketball ref’s whistle, and a small box wrapped in butcher-block paper. The wrapping was held to the box with twine—pretty anachronistic. My father didn’t have the type of personality that invited questions. “If I wanted you to know what was in the box,” I knew he’d say, “I’d have told you.” So, I waited and wondered.
My imagination ran wild trying to concoct a situation in which a canteen, a whistle, and something the size of two stacked decks of playing cards would become necessities. A gin rummy marathon was as close as I got.
After about 30 minutes of winding through narrow backroads, we turned onto an even narrower dirt road. The Country Squire wasn’t really made for country driving, and we bounced so vigorously over swells and potholes that we joked about putting on our seat belts. We came to a stop where the road widened enough for my father to make a three-point turn. He shifted the car into park. His face became so serious that it frightened me, it was tight with an urgency reserved for illness, divorce, and death. My heart skipped as he reached across me and opened my door.
“Straight out the’ah, Michael, is ya future.” He handed me the canteen and I almost shat myself.
Is he sending me off into the woods to survive on my own?
“Dad—” I started.
“Listen,” he interrupted, his eyes softening a bit. He placed the box and the canteen on my lap. “The wat’ah you need to survive, but in this box is the most important thing I’ll ev’ah give you. It’s the most important thing any fath’ah can give a son, mo’ah than money or the keys to a family business—it’s direction. The swimming hole is about a mile due north. In that box is a compass. The needle always points north. Follow the needle, and I’ll be waiting f’ah you.” And with that he pushed me out of the car and drove only a few yards before slamming on the brakes. The car slid to a halt on the rocky dirt road. I thought, this is where he’d say “Just kidding!” out his window, but instead he tossed me the whistle and shouted, “And if you get lost, blow this every few minutes until someone finds you!” before he drove off again.
The whistle was attached to a hockey lace that my father had balled in his hand. He had a good throwing arm, but it didn’t reach me. The lace uncoiled and fluttered behind the hard-plastic casing like the vapor trail of a sputtering plane. I didn’t move to catch it. I just watched it hit the ground as the car bounced and bobbed away from me.
I was dumbfounded.
I stood by the side of the road like an expectant dog tied to a pole waiting for its owner to return. Anger slowly burned away my initial fog of disbelief. I wanted to get to the swimming hole so I could yell at my father—maybe even punch him. My palms sweated through the wrapping of the package before I got around to opening it. It took me a few minutes to untie the string and clear away the damp paper. The compass looked like a pocket watch. On the front of it was engraved: “Always move toward your goals.”
“Okay, I get it!” I said aloud. “It’s good to have a goal. You can come back and get me now.”
After a few minutes, I decided there was no sense in standing around. It’s only a mile, I thought. I can beat him there. I can run a mile in under 10 minutes. That’ll show him. When he gets there, my hair will be wet and I’ll be relaxing on the rocks, spinning the compass on its chain, and the whistle will be at the bottom of the lake.
I popped open the compass’s lid and used the red needle to get my bearings. The forest was second growth, so there were lots of shrubs and ground cover to get around. There was an outcropping of rocks due north about 400 yards away, at the top of a bluff. I’d work my way there as quickly as possible, find my bearings again, and then set the next mark.
The first stretch was pretty easy—deer trails crisscrossed the hillside and I was able to scamper to the outcropping in a matter of minutes. The rocks were surrounded by enough unripe blueberries to make my stomach hurt for days.
Down the other side of the bluff was a ravine with a gently running stream. There was an eddy just a few degrees east of due north—it was the widest crossing point, but also the most obvious landmark. Thick brush made the trek slow. I was so determined to get there quickly that I didn’t even consider the possibility of poison sumac, oak, or ivy until I was a hundred yards down the slope. Imagining my father’s face when he saw me standing at the swimming hole waiting for him diminished my concern. His brow would furrow. His head would cock slightly to the side and the corner of his lips would bend upward until a dimple formed.
“How the hell did you get here so fast?” he’d ask.
I worked my way to the eddy, then followed a path that ran parallel to the water while I looked for a shallow or rocky crossing. The path brought me far off course, which made me nervous, but I also became curious about the increasing force of the water. The calm jabber of the gentle current was being overcome by the sound of powerful rapids downstream. Mist filled the air, and rays of sun shone through the evergreen canopy, illuminating patches of wildflowers along the ravine. Dots of purple, white, and yellow flashed brilliantly against an endless palette of greens and browns. The forest was a kaleidoscope of sensations: scents of lavender and pine, the chill of the mist mixed with the warmth of the sun, light sparkling and refracting in every drop of morning dew. The forest seemed to exhale and stretch itself awake.
I’ve gone too far east, I thought as I turned from the sun and headed back toward the eddy, running twice as fast to make up for lost time. I swam across the stream holding the compass above the water and floating the canteen between my chin and shoulder. The opposite shore was rocky and steep, but it was as easy to climb as a staircase. It was also a perfect hiding place for water snakes, my least favorite thing in the world. Swimming snakes are an evil evolutionary invention.
I scurried up the cliff. It seemed higher looking down from the top than it did while looking up at it from the below. Goosebumps covered my body as a breeze blew through my soaked cotton shirt and cutoff jeans. I moved out from the shadows of the birch trees that lined the cliff. To the north stretched an open field. Bugs and butterflies hovered just above the bending stalks of wheat grass, and the sunlight hit the field at such an extreme angle that all I could see to my east were silhouettes of grass and trees.
I looked for a landmark at the north end of the field, but nothing stood out against the wall of pines and maples. Before I could identify what was rustling by my foot, I was startled by a high-pitched screeching and a blur of feathers around my head. I had stepped on a pheasant hole, and said pheasant was letting me know visitors were not welcome. I was already five yards north before my brain could completely confirm it was a pheasant and not a phantom that had scared my nut-sack into my stomach. My pace had been fueled by adrenaline and it couldn’t be sustained for very long.
There was a giant oak tree 200 yards away, but it was too far east to be a landmark. I was determined to maintain my pace until I crossed its long shadow. The shadow, I thought, goes east and west. If I cross the shadow, perpendicular to it, I should be heading exactly north.
I concentrated on the area immediately before me, searching for anything like that pheasant that might trip me up. As I neared the oak, my approach was slightly caddywhompus, and I adjusted my course accordingly. I slowed as I crossed the shadow to check my logic against the compass. The needle pointed north, but it occurred to me for the first time on my journey that without a map (and unless my father had exactly calculated my departure point, which I was very certain he had not), I was more or less flying blind.
Suddenly, doubt and fear gripped me. What the hell?! I thought as I slowed to a walk. I stopped in the middle of the field, my vigor gone, and looked in every direction for something manmade, somewhere to walk to where another human might happen across me and help me find my way—a road, a building, something, anything—but I saw nothing.
I contemplated turning back. I knew I could find the Forest Service road again, and that would lead me back to the highway. It would take half a day, but I’d be safe and easy to find. I was probably closer to the swimming hole, but I had no real way of knowing if I was on track.
I decided to continue north.
What a jerk. Leaving me out here to die.
My concern was no longer getting there first—I was now concerned about getting there at all. As I walked, I scanned the horizon about 90 degrees in front of me, hoping to find some sign that I was heading toward Hidden Falls. With the compass open, I followed the needle diligently toward the wall of pines and maples. As I got maybe 175 yards from the end of the field, I noticed a road just inside the tree line.
I shut the compass and broke into a sprint. Within fifteen seconds, I’d covered half the ground to the road. The compass was clammy against my palm and the whistle, which I’d strung around my neck, was bouncing off my chest, then cheek, then chest, then chin, then chest, then eye, until I batted it like a tetherball around my neck. Through the trees I saw the outline of a trail sign. I focused on that sign like a hungry lion hunting its prey.
As I got close, I slowed and took several deep breaths. “Hidden Falls .3 miles,” read the bright yellow lettering carved into the brown sign—an arrow pointed toward a footpath. I sipped from the canteen and caught my breath as I walked in the direction of the arrow. My wet shirt clung to my skin. A drop of sweat fell into my eye. I ignored the stinging as I focused on covering the last three-tenths of a mile as quickly as possible.
Confident now, I began to run as fast as I could. My thoughts again drifted to my father’s face when he saw me climbing out of the majestic waters surrounded by all those glistening Kristy McNichol look-a-likes. The forest’s canopy opened before me. This must be it, I thought as I slowed to savor the moment. The path took a ninety-degree turn and followed along a rocky face that had been excavated to make room for a parking lot. I stood at the path’s elbow and looked across an expanse of asphalt to find the empty promise of a marketing brochure.
“What the hell?”
I desperately surveyed the area, looking for something redeeming, but there was nothing. The “falls” were a concrete ledge over which water dripped from a 12-inch corrugated-steel pipe. The catch basin was also constructed of poured concrete with a spill drain downriver to ensure the water level would always be sufficient for swimming, and probably most often stagnant. The wooden picnic tables were all missing slats, the swing set had no swings, and the bottom third of the lone fifty-five-gallon steel trashcan was completely obscured by overflowing refuse.
Tucked in the far end of the parking lot was a ’73 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme resting on cinderblocks with all its windows smashed out. The recession took its toll on many aspects of life in the United States, but this place seemed earmarked for aggressive neglect. Hidden Falls wasn’t hidden: it was abandoned. I walked to the end of the path, sat on the curb, sighed, and waited for my father to show up.
The sun rose above the trees and its warmth chased the goosebumps from my arms and legs. Heat bugs screeched as the humidity increased, but still there was no sign of the Country Squire. I looked at the engraving on the compass once more (always move toward your goals), and passed the time by thinking of more fitting alternatives (think things through, have a plan, bring a map).
I didn’t think of anything as motivational or affirming as the saying on the compass, but my phrases all certainly seemed more pragmatic. Having a goal is important, and moving toward it is important, but how you experience the journey is also important. Missing from the lesson on the compass was how to reach your goals without feeling lost, alone, and afraid for your life.
I sat and waited. I skipped stones. I sat and waited some more.
The sun was high above the trees by the time the station wagon jounced into the parking lot and screeched to a stop just a few feet from where I was sitting. My father sprung from his seat and ran to me before the car had rocked itself still. His expression was nothing like the one I had imagined. His eyes were wide and bloodshot. His chin trembled and his clinched lips had turned white around the edges. He was so unrecognizable that I felt a tinge of fear race along my spine as he rushed toward me—I relived that exact moment in anxiety dreams for the rest of my life. No words escaped as he opened his mouth to talk. Then he reached down and hugged me. His cotton and polyester shirt felt like burlap against my sun-reddened face.
I tried to say something, but I was distracted by the sound of his heart. It thumped so loudly that I could still hear it as I pulled back from his chest to see if his face had regained its stoic detachment. His expression had changed, but it was still unfamiliar.
He kissed me on the head and said, “I love you,” as he wiped a tear from his cheek.
It was twenty seconds, probably less, but that moment stayed with me for reasons I never completely understood—just like the compass that I still sometimes carried in my pocket. Maybe I kept it for the message inscribed on the lid (always move toward your goals) or maybe I kept it to feel closer to my dad.
Either way, it was in my pocket when I contemplated calling my dad after leaving my son in Eugene.
I was a cocktail of emotions: anxiety, fear, doubt, and deep awareness of my own mortality. During moments like this in my past, I’d often reached for a drink. Had there been a place to stop, I probably would have bellied up to a bar rather than picked up the phone.
I had no reasonable expectation that my father and I would talk about anything other than the Red Sox’s awful mid-relievers and the struggling bullpen, but I wanted him to tell me everything would be okay. I wanted him to assure me that Ben and I would grow closer. And if I was being totally honest, I wanted him to apologize for being a cold-hearted bastard and admit that he’d always favored Derrick. But I was ready to settle for a few reassuring words.
As I drove north on I-5, I couldn’t shake my chills. I’ve lost my son, I thought. I felt myself sinking into a familiar, concerning melancholy. A sad little gremlin, poking at me, telling me one drink would set everything straight. I always thought the first drink would fix my problems, and then the second, but that would typically lead to the eighth or tenth, and these tended to cause my problems.
I looked east past the lush emerald fields populated with flocks of domesticated sheep, to the rocky foothills just beyond. I wanted to feel solid and secure like the bases of those mountains, or even to feel the contentment of the sheep and what I imagined was their certainty that grazing and breeding were the complete fulfillment of their potential. Lucky bastards, I thought as I scanned my contacts for my parents’ phone number. I doubted my decision to call my father for at least a third time, then inexplicably determined it was my best course of action and dialed the number. I wished beyond reason that by some kind of magic, he was going to make me feel like less of a failure.
My mother answered the phone after having just watched a 60 Minutes segment about sexual assaults on college campuses. She gushed warnings for Ben about not getting in with the “wrong crowd,” subject to the whims of “women who lie about such things for attention.” I asked her if that was the focus of the segment. “No,” she said, “but you have to read between the lines with the mainstream media these days.”
Being a member of the “mainstream media” myself, I took a deep breath to maintain my composure. I paused to feel grateful that I did not live in the world that existed in my mother’s mind. Her world was filled with constant threats from forces she could not see or understand—all of them from non-Catholic foreigners and atheist liberals who hated “American values.”
“Is Dad around?” I asked.
She tried to drag me deeper into her delusion—I didn’t take the bait. It was easier to let her think I was offended by her jab at my profession than to try to convince her that Title IX enforcement was intended to gain equality for victims of sexual crimes and not to emasculate boys. I was going to tell her that Ben and I had had many conversations about drinking, consent, and sex, but instead I chose to stick with my family’s hereditary strength: avoiding directness and confrontation.
