Down Rabbit Holes

In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in the world she was to get out again.~Lewis Carroll, The Adventures of Alice in Wonderland


It sometimes takes a bit of poking around to find visual inspiration in this part of the state. Aside from the heavily forested areas, patches of so-called wilderness do occur quite dramatically between developed areas or in other spots where one wouldn't think to find such beauty and serenity. I found another such place the other day during my ramblings and stopped to do some exploring on foot, as driving by in a vehicle usually doesn't do justice to such tucked-away spots.

This place sits nestled in a low gully at the eastern end of the Deering Ridge Road where it connects to Route 109 in Shapleigh, just past the Springvale town line. The road dips dramatically from the sharp left turn off 109, and water appears in the form of a fast-moving stream on one side of a small bridge overpass and courses toward a more open expanse of calmer water on the other. Driving by there of an evening, when temperatures up in that neck of the woods are decidedly cooler, I've often seen fly fishermen standing thigh-deep in the water on the calmer side, while other fishermen try their luck on the upper end where the water flows swiftly from an outlet in a granite wall farther up.

The western section of the sluice, which I gauged to measure roughly 25 feet wide, is channelled in on both sides by solid low walls of granite blocks, and the tree canopy is virtually closed over it, making for a very shaded area. A narrow rocky path leads down from the road's shoulder to the water's edge, and from there, one can stand and observe the river travel away into the distance beneath the small bridge. Vegetation grows thickly on either side and along another longer path that winds its way along the upper side of the stream. It was in that direction that a young couple and their baby headed that sunny day, he loaded down with fishing gear and she carrying the child and what appeared to be a picnic cooler.

Across the road on the calmer side of the stream, the river opens into a more pastoral idyllic landscape, surrounded on all sides by thick stands of trees and lower growth whose reflections lend a distinct note of lushness to the scene. The sun was high and cast short shadows, and the water's surface broke into a million gems at its touch. Birds sang from high up in the trees, but aside from the traffic on the main road, it was a quiet and peaceful experience.

A friend asked me recently how I find such places at these, and I told her that those few I've caught out of the corner of my eye as I drive past have caused me to rethink my driving habits. Now, unless I'm bound for a particular destination and pressed for time, I make myself slow down now so as not to miss these treasures. I take the occasional "road not taken" to see where it will lead, and if I don't have a sense of where I'll end up, I simply turn around and go back with the intention of researching the area more thoroughly before paying it another visit. Or, if it's a particularly nice day, I simply decide on a particular route and negotiate it slowly so as not to miss something striking or deserving of more attention.

There is so much to see out there in the most unexpected places, and there is so much happening in the tiny spaces, in the worlds within worlds, that we miss in our eagerness to get to wherever it is we are going. Nature's processes are so intricate and fascinating, and only those who make a study of them realize just how specialized and complex they all are.

Just the other day, I happened to glance out through one of my living room windows that overlooks the long side porch that I share with my neighbor and that is just mere feet away from the busy street. There sat a chipmunk, leaning back on its hind legs, taking in its surrounding. Within a few seconds it was gone, startled most likely by some sound or activity close by. I was surprised to see it in this environment, and when I went outside later, I noticed the characteristic hole in the dirt under the back porch steps. I realized immediately that I'd found the chipmunk's home or at least the doorway to it.

Nature's greatest gifts to us are the doorways, or the rabbit holes, if you will, through which she shows us wondrous things and that simply await our curiosity. And all it takes to discover them is losing ourselves in the moment and not giving a single thought to how we will ever get back...


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Incongruity

Sometimes, when I take a look around me, I try to imagine what this place looked like before the advent of modern technology, before culvert pipes redirected water through the soil and telephone wires crisscrossed the blue sky and leafy backdrop like enormous spider webs to convey messages quickly from one point to the next. Objects like the transformer on top of the electrical pole or a blue reflector marker poking out of the earth seem incongruous, unwelcome and superfluous additions to the landscape and that, at times, just don't seem to belong here in this place where just about everything else simply evolved from where it stands. Even my truck, sitting in the middle of the yard, offends me some days, and I wish I could just erase it so that it wouldn't spoil the view.

The rock walls, however, are a different thing entirely. Yes, they were placed there in their particular configurations by human hands. But being of and from the earth, they fit, plainly and simply, into their biers of leaves leftover from years long before I arrived, nestled into the soil as though they've been there forever, a living chain trailing through the woods. I never cease to be amazed at the industriousness it took to construct them, and to how well they have stood the test of time, delineating boundaries between farms and pastures, many of which the woods have since reclaimed.

Having taken many walks deep into these woods, I'm aware that it wasn't always so easy to navigate them before someone decided to blaze paths and wear wheel ruts through the undergrowth. In some places, I can see how it could have taken days to cover just a few miles, tangled as they are with low growth and branches, the ground littered with dead trees in some places or too mucky and bug-infested to traverse in others. It doesn't take long for nature to reclaim what is hers, as I discovered having blazed my own path through the woods behind the shed a few years ago and that is now only visible from the marks I left on the trees there. A mere year's worth of fallen leaves is enough to obliterate a trail and to render it once again invisible to anyone who didn't know it was there.

I am most saddened, however, by the debris I find whenever I walk down the dirt road, which is a legal right of way to the properties closer to the pond. Empty styrofoam coffee cups, beer cans, and other trash litter both sides, and at the foot of my driveway across the road, there is what appears to be the remains of an old dump where I've found rusted pails, jars, bottles, and other crockery, intact or in pieces, that clearly date back to an earlier time. Many autumns have come and gone since then, effectively burying the cache, but a few items still poke up through the soil once the snow melts away each spring. Judging by the types of things I've found there, my guess is that the spot once served as a dumping ground for whatever the locals no longer wanted, and nature did them a favor by camouflaging their detritus.

At least it's not all that visible unless I'm actually looking for it, which I do at times just to see what new treasures the earth's heavings may have uninterred. Unlike the other unsightly obvious things that are not of these woods, I can conveniently forget that it's there, shifting my gaze rather to the hazy panorama that is this place at the height of summer.


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