Fresh Water

Coming downstairs with the children, they had found the mounted head of the deer on the rug in front of the fireplace. It was face down and the hook was protruding from the base of its neck. The head looked so big lying there, and Miles had instinctively lain his little hand on its neck, clouds of dust rising as he patted it. She had left them with the deer while she went to prepare breakfast. They had washed and eaten, and then gone to run with the other children. She had heard him call her name then and she stopped and listened, standing in one of the slivers of morning sunlight. She looked up to the raw wood of the open beams, the solid noise pressing thickly through the floor. His boots moved from one room to the next, but didn't come down the stairs, so her book in her hand, she stepped out of the sunlight and pushed open the brown screen door, catching it behind her so it didn’t slam and carefully descended the old, dried-out steps. 

She stood for a moment and looked out at the flat, limestone bedrock, strangely pockmarked by old fossils – the Alvar coast of the Great Lakes. She had only seen this bedrock in the summer months when the dense green of pine and spruce was occasionally lightened by the birch. When she first came, she had walked in the forest and looked up at the only trees that seemed to catch the sunlight, the only trees that shivered. She had suggested planting more of the birches, but they told her birches needed deeper soil to thrive, and here it was just a thin layer. She wondered at the winters with the lake a frozen mass and the sheets of ice covering the rocks, the mounds of snow that must pile up in front of the cabins. The purple flowers were out now and winter seemed impossible. Her gaze relaxed and a violet haze hovered above the clumps of grass and moss. The flowers small and scattered like their name, Blazing Stars.

The tablecloth from the night before flapped, cheap plastic that ripped as she watched. Stones were strewn about, dropped in their place and would leave an outline, a shadow on the ground, when she nudged one with her foot. She bent and picked one, some. They lay heavy in her hand and she placed a stone on either end of the tablecloth. The summer morning was mild and still, the shouts of the children distant, but as she rounded the swings, she could hear the waves. The wooden seats of the swings gently rocked, vacant after the noise and laughter. She reached the clump of cedars, the roar of the waves growing as her feet slipped in the incongruous sand. She had grown up with the sea, with the air thick with salt; the smell of rotting seaweed rising in tangible drifts as she walked amongst the mounds of pebbles; the luminous mother of pearl shells, tiny on their own, but left in great wave-like shapes upon the grey sand; the smooth, shiny, dark-orange kelp torn out from where the sandy bottom dropped into darkness, the sea grapes still growing and bursting on the sand as she had squeezed and squashed them. The sea, the sea. Salt on her skin, sun on the salt and now the lake. She had learnt that the lake was changeable also, the colours deepening and lightening like the sea, the whiteness of the curling waves lit up by the final bursts of sun, like the sea, but underneath the lakes’ waves lay a strange emptiness. The smooth limestone running endlessly out into the lake, turning to mud in places, the absence of creatures, the absence of shells. Cleaner, people told her. Refreshing. No uncomfortable sand. But she still knew the sea left an energy on your skin, and the lake's cleanliness left nothing.

She saw now there were two birches amongst the clump of cedars, surviving here in the deeper sand. The bench beneath the trees had been recently repainted, perhaps yesterday. The stain looked glossy, and had been spread over the wood with care. She read the plaque, ‘In Memory of David McPhail, 1975-1995’. She had read the plaque many times before, the children always with her, their voices taking them past the last clump of trees with the quiet bench to the point, where the waves would crash and scare them. The thin foam tracing fingers of fresh water waves across the shelf of limestone, reaching further and further with each shout of glee and pleasure. Today, her husband had made it easy for her to sit. The wind was cool on this side of the trees, so she sat and let the sun warm her legs. She crossed them in front of her, resting them on the bench just like they had been told at school and opened her book of Irish short stories. She liked to deliberately read them out of order. The soft paper cover was made fluid with the hands of others and the spine bent easily under her touch. The sun fell on her bent neck, her hair descended, cave-like, skimming the pages. The waves landed on the shore and the sound of people’s voices came within earshot, but she felt secure and hidden behind the trees, beneath her hair. Once she heard her husband’s voice calling her and she looked up, but the sun had grown hot, and she merely shifted to the shady part of the bench. Her foot came to rest on the grainy sand and she shook off the ants. With the quietness of the sun and the care of the boy’s bench beneath her, the world became still. There was lightness and peace. She read through the last story quickly, her eyes skimming the final paragraphs as her time on the bench ran out. As her children spent their hours separate from her own a mixture of anxiousness and warmth rose in her, quietly at first, but gaining momentum. So she read too fast for her own soul to feel the breakable sadness in the story she was holding. She read the last page again and she glanced up at the air around, the light earth, the wind swept trees, the wild daisies almost false in their bunches of cheer. Inside, her heart opened and she sat and looked at the lake on the dead boy’s bench, before standing and walking back to the house.

An Ocean Road

 The coast road was hacked out of the bush by returned soldiers. Using pickaxes and shovels they cut man’s clarity out of the dense fogs that sent ships to the sandy soil of the ocean. Lighthouses dotted the coast and eery rock formations rose out of the surf.  The road followed no track, just the circuitous route from the edge of one bay to the next. It was to be the epitome of the civilised scenic motor tour. Flies, flood and drought came and went, but the precipitous cliffs fell to the sea, again and again, blanketed by the dense rainforest with the mist over-hanging like a shroud. Those morning mists rendered the strong smell of the eucalyptus visible to the working men, and they knew they were home. Those men made small by war became once again great, as they stooped and stretched with the giants of the forest. The strong, round branches of the manna gum spread open confidently to their sky, like hands striving to contain the openness, their washed out greens pasted against the blue. The mountain ash stood like soldiers in silent file, still and giant in their vertiginous height, grey trunks wreathed in fog. And the myrtle beech were as gnarled and twisted as some deep, dark prehistoric secret that men see only to disturb their age old slumber. The loamy ground buoyed them up, and I imagined they rested on the ground littered with fern fronds, discarded leaves, and strips of bark, lying and listening to the call of the birds. The peeps of the honeyeaters, fantails in their looping flight, treecreepers, rosellas as streaks of colour, currawongs falling clumsily from branch to branch. The green, almost edible looking ground ferns sheltered tiger snakes and white-lipped snakes. It was a forest different from others, a forest of deep leaf litter, of fleshy-fruited plants and of very large trees. It was a great winding road that would send you on your way west if you wanted it. Where, now, once past the bustling summer villages bursting with swimmers, with their snorkels and thongs, with their buckets and boogie boards, most turned back to Melbourne where the lights always remained the same. For those who just came for the sun - the road could seem too long.For her, the road is neither long nor short - it just is. She is set up to face them, those so busy in their packed vehicles, the wind from their passing engines buffeting her soul about, blowing it wide open, until I can see her there and so small on that familiar road where we once were. The three of us in our Dad’s car. Our brother between us, his ringlets brushing our sun stained arms. Our singing, with our swinging brown summer legs making us giddy with ourselves and our eternal togetherness that cannot be recovered. 

Sequoia

Our brown car roared north up Highway 1, winding our way past gum trees and sheep until the 1 merged with the 101 and we were in redwood country. Straight into the midst of the California fog belt where during the summer the fog moved off the sea and on to the land. It hung above the black sand beaches like a white veil devouring the redwoods, as the trees in turn absorbed the fog and it dripped, dripped down from the foliage to the earth laden and made silent with the redwood needles. Sequoia sempervirens; the forever living, or the forever green. Unlike the Australian bush where noises sparkled, leaves shivered, birds swooped. In the redwood forest, the world was quiet, the branches reached up to the sunlight through the mist away from the unseeable, dark below. Up above at the sunlit crown, the needles were short and narrow and female, where the cone produced the flowers. While underneath, breathing the cool, dark air of the forest the needles were long and wide and male.  Reaching for the sunlight, turning the fog to water as they came into contact, majestic, immortal, physical manifestation of the vertical. We reach for the sun, turn our faces towards the sun, arms up in the silent forest, living above the ground.

We arrived in the late Sunday afternoon, in time for the volleyball match. We drove up to Cassidy’s yurt to see if the boys were still there. As we rounded the final bend in the old chevy nova, a jeep came bouncing round the corner, Raleigh’s grin out of a window -all smiles. Backs were slapped, cheeks grazed. Our wheels cracked the dirt, the gravel spat beneath the tyres as the car twisted and turned to follow them deeper into the forest. Our seats were low in our old car as the evening fell outside and the trunks turned to the opaque yellow of just before dusk. Our car parked in the mud. Out of the redwoods came people of all ages, from all countries. The noise of a generator grumbled and a volleyball court was lit up by great white lights, reflecting on the sand. I slung the bota bag around my neck, the goat skin heavy against my hip while Jacob grabbed his black guitar case and a bottle of whiskey hidden beneath  the seat. The game was on. Jacob could always hide behind his guitar, and immediately began tuning up with Raleigh. My old navy duffel coat was worn at the elbows and helped me contain myself as sofas lay strewn about and I stretched out, my legs long in front and rolled cigarettes.The game began, people rotated on either team, people changing on and off. I knew what I didn’t want. Jacob loved games of any sort, and he wanted me to play. He felt I would enjoy it if only I would let myself, but I did not want to feel loose, out there, on the open court, alone amidst the others, comfortable with others. So sat listening and smoking, stretching and unstretching on our first night. There. Those interactions, those expectations. I saw my face pull into a grimace as I lunged for a ball and stayed where I was.We had the music. And they came to us. People from all times. Any time. To keep to our time was irrelevant. To remember what time we were was to be too clear, to be conscious of where we were. Clothes traced decades, music traced centuries, minds were anywhere, everywhere. To own that moment to our time was selfish, it was all time and all music, and all gypsies and all transients, all travelers, those who don’t step into what is expected, those who do want they want, go where they feel. And play where the music is. Mandolins, guitars, mouth organs, harmonicas, and sweet georgia brown.The drive home was drunk, Jack Daniels drunk, with the red wine and beer and spliff, the car’s shocks cracked and bounced as the road was lit up, part of our world for a moment as we sped past and then left an inky peace as our lights already bright on the next bend. The road rose and fell the car bottoming out, the dirt scraping the side.The road, dirt dusty, curved, seemingly going nowhere, just endlessly following a trail through the dark trees to some light somewhere, deeper and deeper. Sometimes a gate lining the road, no cars at all for at least the whole half an hour.Car bouncing, airborne at moments, but we and the car were invincible, drunk and warm, cigarettes glowing, somehow holding the road, catapulting forward, I didn’t even know who was driving. Gravity pulled us on.

California

Raleigh and I decided to go on a fast. I think we were partly inspired by the Californian vibe and I also had a book that I had bought years ago filled with fasts for each season, and it seemed now was an opportunity to do one. Just water, mixed with lemon juice, cayenne pepper and maple syrup for the energy. You could drink as much as you wanted. A water fast, a spring fast, the master cleanse. I was trimming weed, so it was easy work, easy to work on nothing, so it seemed well timed.We started on a Thursday and the day before Raleigh cut out coffee, bread, most things other than fruit and vegetables. I didn’t, continuing to do things with a halfhearted measure, perhaps in order to protect myself from failure, as ‘I didn’t really try’. I ate all things I normally would. Brushing off Raleigh’s worry of preparing my body for what it was about to undergo. I was young, I was strong.We had met Anne and Francois at one of those outdoor events they have up there, some kind of fundraiser, but with great food and live music. I don’t know who had begun the conversation, in the whirl of beer and cigarettes, as the night had gone on into a swirl of people and dancing, she had approached us, I think, with her bright blue dress that matched her piercing eyes, and Francois, the Frenchman, had been there too, quietly he had asked to roll one or two of my cigarettes. And she was so warm, and knew Cassidy, and we were drunk, so we fell into each other, they were growers of course, and they would have work for us in a few weeks.  So we drove up to Anne and Francois’ for a session of trimming on the Friday. Their house was a mixture of additions and plans, wooden frame and with the ubiquitous Northern Californian shingles. They had built it room by room, and had lain in bed in the early days, with the wind whistling through the cracks in the walls, the bed piled high with quilts, drinking whiskey and reading books. It perched above their gardens, California valleys falling away to the horizon. They had a great long, hardwood table as they all did up there, and the vegetable garden was beautifully landscaped, the marijuana intermingling with the tomatoes. Anne offered the use of her washing machine and her shower. Before all the hot water was gone, I jumped in the shower to try to scrub off some of the lines of dirt, and then the laundry could go on. The work was set up outside. A long table piled high with stems. In the bright sunlight. I had taken to wearing gloves, to prevent any contact high, and just to save myself from the inevitable stickiness that came from handling marijuana buds for long periods of time.The laundry finished, I padded on bare feet through the airy house. I pulled the clothes out of the machine, and walked out the front door to where the line was strung between two trees overlooking the valley. I piled up the washing, the darker clothes on the dirt. The washing was bright and white, clean and wet, it flapped as I pegged it up, and the sun beat down on my head. The wind blew all the colours clear and cool. A simple job, such a pleasure it gave me. I felt the fast had heightened my senses. I couldn’t hear the others talking, just see the valley falling away, and hear the snapping of the clothes. I realised how good I felt. Such happiness I felt at such a simple job.Jacob came around the side of the house, still laughing, ‘Anne’s cooked some lunch, want any?...He swung his arms around my shoulders as I bent to pick up the last of the wet clothes, and his arms slid off. I said nothing, just pointed to my glass bottle half full with the maple syrup mixture.‘Oh, I forgot.’‘I’ll just finish hanging this out and then I’ll be there.’I had started to feel a certain lightness that morning, my stomach was flat, and I felt very in control of my body and myself. I felt focussed. Tighter. I felt released from the unnecessary. Emotionally and physically. This was only the second day but I remembered what it was like to be in control of one’s body. To hear one’s body. To listen. He was still loose out there. And I was not jealous. I did not want what he had. Unusual feeling for me. Focussed on what was important. Tight reins. But I was holding them. I enjoyed the feeling of control I had. Saying no was difficult to obtain, but once done, then all fell into place. They all drove back in the truck and I walked. I walked slowly the dusty road as it trailed through the dark redwoods, and then doubled back on itself along a ridge in the sun. My soul was light. As the road slipped down, back into the shade, a deer startled me. She was walking on the road towards me, a small one, I tried to stop breathing, and waited, my feet in the dirt in the sun, the deer in the quiet shade, she looked and looked, and I tried to hold her there with me on the dappled road. Her gentle eyes, and my human ones, and we wondered for, it seemed long, a long time, before finally I moved, and she bounded into the padded forest. I didn’t want to get back to the mess, the music, the noise. It was easy to walk what was left of the road, slowly, in my own life, to hold back the rest.

Drawbridges

Then he was outside with my friend Noel, with his bandana on now and they were smoking a joint, passing it back and forth and he was in the tree, the old gum, spot lights shining up the long trunk, turning it silver, while I sat inside with the others and didn’t care about trees and people who climbed them. He told me he had sailed here. And later he told me that he had been waiting tables where the curious customers had chatted and asked and asked, staring up at him, trapping him with empty glasses in his hands.

- And what now, Jacob, now that college is finished?

And he had thought of a place far from Vermont, a place where the seasons did not cut up the years, a place and a way of movement so unlikely they would be forced to look down to their full plates when he passed.

- I am going to Australia. I am going to hitchhike to Australia, hitchhike boats.

They snorted.

- Impossible. Can’t be done. 

They swallowed their rich food, swilling their wine around their mouths.

But he knew it could be done. He had done it.  As a younger man hanging from a bridge one night near Calais, late one night with his mate Jason-the-drummer, after playing three bars, and giving up on the dancing Virginias, they had decided to walk out of town and camp. The moon, of course, was full. They shared their last joint as they waited for the draw bridge. And Jacob impatient, could see nothing they were waiting for, no vessels, until he clambered over the barricade and saw a bobbing white yacht, small, about 28 feet long.

-Oy. And in jest had thrown his thumb up. The man in the dark let his engine idle and called up.

- Where you goin’ mate?

- England!

- Got any drugs on yer?

And truthfully, they had not, no longer.

- You’ll have to stay awake.

John Johnson steered the yacht over, pulled over to a place where the boys could drop onto the deck as light footed as any ship cats, while his family slept beneath. He had left them by England’s white cliffs in the new morning and the boy had understood that his road was not limited to land. The answer Jacob had given to those diners in New England had become his impetus. Once articulated, it was no longer far from real, as those things we say become true.