Summer Love: Sculptured Rocks

So, my new hero is Melissa Lion because she’s funny, she’s a good writer and (to my knowledge), she’s never lost a jury trial. Oh, and she has good ideas, like Back Fence PDX, which is, in part, “an evening with six people telling their six-minute stories based on the month’s theme.” At present, the theme is “summer love” and, reading through the website, I’m amazed at the many different approaches that the writers have taken in tackling that topic. The stories are great (I especially like this one) and, I don’t know, something about it makes me want to give it a try. So, even though nobody asked, I’ve decided to give it a try. Here is the story about summer love that I think I’d share if we were to spend a little time together by the back fence. Or, you could simply read this poem by Dana Gioia instead. He says everything that I’m trying to say, but in fewer words and with greater eloquence.

Here goes.

Near the town of Hebron, New Hampshire, just Northwest of Newfound Lake, there exists a small geological curiosity known as “Sculptured Rocks.” I had, I think, a vague sense that I might end up there again when I pedaled away from the apartment that summer day, but it wasn’t anything planned, anything consciously chosen.

Instead, when I got on the bike, I let it follow the natural downward slope of Spring Street, which led me to the banks of the Pemi where I stopped and closed my eyes and let the roar of the river fill my ears and the cool mossy air fill my nose and where I breathed slow, deep breaths and wondered what the hell to do next. New Hampshire had been a mistake.

It had seemed to be a good idea at the time, but that was before I had dragged my city girl to the country and watched her wither, like Ceres pining for Proserpina, under the cold, damp shroud of depression. That was before I had failed the bar exam and learned that the penalty was revocation of my job offer, and it was before we helplessly watched our savings diminish to 29 cents one month before the wedding. That was also before I knew that the old doubts about the girl from another lifetime would resurface and haunt me every night as my betrothed lay next to me, awake in the dark, unspeaking.

Behind me now, too near, sat the mouse-infested house with the sloped floors and the splotched windows and up top, under covers, she huddled in the bedroom with the shades perpetually drawn like some premature Miss Havisham. Was I really considering this? My thoughts revolted me. I spun away.

The wind clutched at me, but my knees powered up and down again and again like angry beating pistons and all the while I raged. I sped through town, turned left at the church and headed up the western shore of the lake and it was then that I knew that I was headed for Sculptured Rocks because it was far and it would be a hard ride and I needed to wear myself down.

The lake slid by my right while the rock walls and cottages blurred by my left and in my head it was neither the money nor the failure that surfaced. Instead, it was the girl from another lifetime.

What did I really know about her? What I remembered the most were her calves. She had the most amazing calves. Yes, I remembered that. She had been a dancer and there was that time when I saw the ripple as she propelled her compact, well-muscled body across the stage. But there was more than that. There had been the feeling of her. Not the physical feeling, because of that I never got to learn, but just the feeling of her, the way the air used to hum when I saw her. The way my head throbbed like a bass drum and my chest spun and chimed like a carousel when she said my name.

Finally, I was there, the tiny canyon where the (and yes, this really is its name) Cockermouth River pours through, carving the stone on its way to the lake. Over time, the relentless water had formed the granite into fantastic, twisted shapes.

I sat down, marveling that I had the place to myself and thinking that that was yet another thing that I would miss about New Hampshire – how it always seemed to be able to provide you with a quiet place for yourself when you needed one.

What was I doing? Honestly. What did the one girl have that the other one didn’t, besides mystery?

The shamefulness of it. The late night, clandestine visits to the icy glow of the Google homepage, guiltily typing in the name, thinking that maybe, this time, I’d find her. Shameful. Shame on you, I could hear emerging from the river. Shame on you, you fool, said the Cockermouth. It wasn’t meant to be. If it had been meant to be, then it would have been.

After a long while, I got up and walked to the edge of the cliff. The water rushed by. The wet granite shined in the summer sun. A perfect leaf fell into the stream and picked up speed as it bobbed into the canyon. It slid into a side pool and twirled there for a moment before reconnecting with the main current and being spirited away. The canyon stones remained behind, immersed in a force beyond their control.

I got back on the bike and headed toward home. Sculptured Rocks, I thought. Aren’t we all.

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