side. I soon find myself standing at a cliff over a large creek bed I call “Turtle Island.” This hidden place in the jungle is my own artifact. The creek shimmers like gold where it’s moving slowly and plays a beautiful melody where it runs along faster, narrower bends of its own path. Everything in my woods has its place, and every place has a name. Everything except that damned buzzard. “Hey!” I scream at the black streak atop one of the rotting trees by the creek. “Get out of here, bird. Nobody’s dyin’ today. Isn’t Dad enough for you?” I hear something from the woods behind me and remember James. “Man, he must think I’m crazy, talking to a buzzard,” I say aloud as I dive back into the brush to make my promised return. No storm today.
I
feel like a kid again. “Am I allowed to say that, now that I am eighteen?” I ask the moss below me. “Are you allowed to be sitting up in a beech tree in the middle of the woods, now that you are eighteen?” retorts the motionless lump of green. I shrug my shoulders, sobered. I can’t tell if I even have a place in these woods anymore. The trees shed their leaves around me, letting me know this visit is long overdue. The familiar woods that once formed my comfort place have changed with the years. It’s grown difficult to remember the way through them. Soon, I’ll be living in
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JOHN DEERE | Linda Hogan | digital photgraphy
California anyway; there’s no telling when I’ll be here in Virginia again. “Only two more sets and I’ll get out of here,” I tell the tree, swinging down to hang off of a branch and start my pull-ups once again. I can still feel that cold tree branch in the fading red marks on my hands after I drop through the December air. Finally, I’m filling out into a man’s body, but not without work. My mind is outside of the woods, toiling away at my desk somewhere; my body is only here for exercise. All I notice are the black wings of a buzzard circling in through the treetops, looking for a place to land. He comes to me like a messenger from a world much bigger than my stand of trees, a world all the more interesting for a mind still craving adventure. His wings seem to span the years of stress that cast their distracting shadow over me. I think of grades, schedules, money, and all the “graces” of the civilized world. But suddenly a strong gust rattles my big trees, sends the buzzard scattering off with all of my worries, and calls me back. I can feel the cool earth embracing me once again with the memory of my father, and I look down to thank the motionless lump of green below me. Somehow I know that he welcomes me now and promises to welcome me back no matter where I go. A hawk cries somewhere far off in the clear, blue sky, and I imagine he’s saying something like, “No cuts yet.”
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