mccarthyism

The last day of autumn.

The path broke into a clearing, and I stood still for a moment. There were a lot of fallen trees in the center, and on the far side I could see the footpath leading away to the left, away from campus and everything that was familiar to me. For here on it was all new; I didn't know where the path led.

There was a tent pitched to my left on the far side of the clearing, on the other side of the fallen logs. It was camoflage and I hadn't seen it at first. I called out but no one answered; someone must have left it there. I was suddenly disappointed to find that I wasn't really alone. Someone had come here ahead of me, and would return sometime after I had gone. It didn't make any sense, but I realized that part of my joy at finding this trail was that I had been alone, and that the trail was in some sense mine. Now I saw that I had been wrong.

I turned and went on. The path began to climb, gently at first and then more steeply, leading always to the left. The late afternoon sun was in my eyes as I climbed, blinding me one moment and then disappearing behind the horizon the next. Every so often it would light up the woods with a blaze of golden light. Once I could even see the rays, split apart by the trees above, shooting down through the clear cold air to land on the fallen leaves below. I passed a deer stand to my right, a light iron ladder and a platform high up in a tree, so quiet and unobstructive I could easily have walked past without noticing.

Here in the woods the wind was still and the only sound was my feet on the leaves. The sky was clear and bright blue above. It kept surprising me, walking below. I would be walking along and suddenly through a space in the trees above the sky would dazzle me with its blueness. I thought it contrasted well with the drab autumn brown of the woods.

Up and up the path led. It was very steep now, and I kept slipping on the leaves as I climbed. For perhaps fifteen minutes it went up, and I struggled along, slipping and clutching at small trees to keep myself from falling. Sometimes I would run for short bursts, and then tire and stop for a moment to catch my breath.

Finally I reached the top, and the path dead ended into another, perpendicular one. I had a little time before dark, but not too much, so I chose the righthand side which led back in the direction of the school. I wondered how far it would be, or if the path would even lead me back to school. I set out again, walking briskly now that the ground was level and relatively even. The hill fell away steeply to my right, back the way I had come.

Suddenly, and completely unexpectedly, I rounded a curve and found the entire school laid out like a toy village beneath me through the winter trees. It seemed very small and a long ways off. The hills wrapped all the way around it, and I stood, opposites the school's entrance, high on a ridge looking down. I could see the buildings where I had my classes, where I and my friends studied and ate and played. I could see the dining hall, and a few tiny people like insects going in and out. I went further down the path and up a small rise to try and see better, but the trees got in the way and I came back. I began to put together my perspective, trying to place each familiar building and field. I could see the sidewalks I walked along every day, and I could make out odd objects, like the awning of a particular dormitory or the steps out in front of the library. The buildings were all the same drab red brick color, blending nicely with the brown hills. It seemed as though they were meant to be there, as though the college had come about quite naturally, without disturbing the serene woods.

I had grown tired of the school. It was small and Christian and far away from any city. I often felt trapped, as though I were missing out on something greater, a fullness of experience somewhere else. Every day I saw the same things: the same buildings, the same people, the same trees and cars. Nothing was new. The feeling had gotten worse as the last semester had worn on, so that by the end I could hardly stand the boredom and sameness that my life had taken on. Now it was break, and all my friends had gone home for Christmas. My family lived in town, only a few minutes away. I had come to walk in the woods, to be alone and think. It was the last day of autumn.

It all seemed so small. I could cover the entire school with my two hands stretched out at arm's length from my body. It was something of a shock, to see my entire life shrunken down to a view from the surrounding hills. But it was a welcome change. It was so easy to get caught up in the moment, in the details of one project or another. From here, all those details disappeared. What you had was buildings, neatly arranged in a valley, a color contrast, an aesthetic, and that was all.

Something about seeing the entire school so small and comprehensive below me made me think about the history of the school. It had begun a hundred years ago, with a couple of buildings, and slowly added on as the school picked up steam. It was still very quiet, unassuming bible college in the hills of northeast Georgia. There had come several adversities of which our professors often reminded us, a couple of fires, and a dam break and flood which had killed about fifty people. There was a small book, a history of the school written by a white-haired gentlemanly man who had been with the school in the beginning. It was called "A Tree God Planted." I thought about this now, looking down at the little school in the hills, with its houses and buildings I knew; all right there in front of me. A tree God planted.

I realized abruptly that it was going to be dark soon. There wasn't enough time to go back the way I had come. The sun had slipped over the hills behind me, and it was already getting colder. I looked at the tiny campus a moment longer. Then I set out down the ridge toward the school.