The Mill and The River Vol. 2 #2

1) I was allowed to be heard by the river while I was seeking for an answer to a question of life I was milling through. In a complete daze that was only a bout of lost looks seen in my eyes, looking at the trees long enough for them to see me—nature talking, nature brooding, and sweet summer skies cheering and soaking in the warmth of the easy sun—but I had enough senile talk of troubles from back home, and it's always sad, or at least only my last two returns home, and I told them that I wouldn't come back for some time and that I meant it this time... The loud bang was a disruption in my dream, as I was having a very sad dream and was glad to be woken up in a time that was only getting sadder. Gareth, who would come pretty late from work after a long shift down at the hotel, down in Rutland, not far from the mill. Though he stayed late, I thought it could be him because he had come in late—very late some nights—into the very early morning, on a grand mission he'd call it, and I went back to sleep thinking nothing of it. An early phone call—it was 1:30 AM—could it be? Before she says anything, it was Tilly on the phone, and the scruffle and scramble to hear her through my window and in my telephone, she said a tree fell down in front of the yard. Had all of us off our beds and in our shoes and running out the door and into the road. I put on all my clothes, my jacket, my raincoat, and everything, and I walked down to the bottom of the barn. Open to clear, I could see a little lifeline from the downside of the parking lot where all the cars had been moved, except for the one big van that had left for everyone else. Out there on a branch of the big tree—the tree I’d written about earlier yesterday—the maple tree, growing and glowing with lush and brush, and all the trees extended down to the farm. The bugs were wild. The lightning bugs were everywhere—lightning bugs, bugs, bugs, bugs everywhere—more bugs than I’ve seen in years—and then Tilly, who looks into the dark, her eyes glowing behind moon-glazed spectacles, her eyes wide not just at the fallen tree but at me and Gareth and the bugs, and the trinkle in her eyes as in mine. The bugs are back. And the lightning bugs made me think of Kansas, made me think of all the morningtide signs and all those long summer days, and it felt like summer again. This time the storm had passed over. The tree itself had fallen, and Gareth walked around the van and moved his car and his van, and he tried to upright the tree—hollow and rotten to its core, deep underneath the brush, deep beneath the underlying growth of what could be hidden beneath something so beautiful, so green, so vibrant, so majestic. Deep inside, it had been rotting—until today, when it finally fell into the ground and lay there until morning.

2) The tree had fallen, and a day away I’d come back to see it still on the dirt, laying still, though it had been taken to by a chainsaw in different parts—the efforts to get rid of the tree had begun. And sometimes the tree should stay there, stay there a while, and let it be, just be. Trees fall down, and trees will grow again. It’s the first notion that the stories of the mill have passed, and new stories have begun, and at the same time, the morning comes with its orange sun and the birds humming and chirping and zipping along down the river, by the wooden door, and the one nest where I see the same bird every day. And all the while, the peace and tranquility of this place remain, in the ever-so-gentle coming-of-age into the next phases of one’s life—like fallen bark dug into the dirt, with the seeds of its roots being watered down by the past storm that took it down. And while the world is in chaos, the man remains unseen and unheard, trying to keep it simple. The wars—the wars he dreams—are just dreams and not mistaken for real-life tragedies, though they are, and yet he feels compelled to reject them, and thinks let it be known to my own faults that the rejection of reality is the rejection of truth, and this life could be nothing short of a lie—if allowed.

3) I guess you could say it’s death to the traveler, or death to my old self, and the new self is born again, and the travels will stay at home—and the home is Vermont, though the home is always Kansas—and at the mill with the running waters in the morning and the tweedy bird blazing song in the tree above the balcony, whistling and singing and tuning its feathers on a rainy day such as this, and just like the train not far down the road, the tracks that dig through the trees and aren’t far from the Clarendon bridge—some might call it a gorge—but the Appalachian Trail cuts right through the place as well, and I’ve seen the trail many times and seen the hikers sit on the stump by the trail to talk and eat and wait, and I hear the train thundering by and I see and hear everything from the top of the mill, and the rain today has cooled off the heat from me dripping in sweat in the summertime sun, my clothes ragged and dirty, my socks torn in places, yet I keep them—for what? only to wash them again—and it’s always socks I leave to be torn and worn and used until they can’t be worn no more, and I lay flat across the floor, wooden and cold and warm too, because the warmth of the air has sneakily crawled into the cracks of the floor, and I can only have both and not one or the other, and I am dismal of it, and so I lay there and fall asleep and let the summer day and summer heat and summer rain end a perfect evening, and there is Tilly talking on the phone, and I give a nice, subtle wave and then put my head down and carry my books and food and hike up the steps to the mill where all this was happening.

4) A waged war—a war is brewing, a war unlike the ones I’ve grown up with, but how can I attest to a war that is met when I have only seen one, and many have seen many? Once a war, always a war. The war in Israel, the war in Iran, the war in the United States—whether it’s with weapons or big bombs falling or big people in armor pushing around the faces of the people, with mad looks on their faces, and they spit and curse and wave their hands in wild motions—at them, at each other—and they scream and holler and run down the streets because they’re all mad. And the war is with me, and it’s a war as internal as it is external, and two things can be true. So, who is right in the matter? Who is the peacemaker? Who is the arbiter? And so I sit quietly and pray, cross my hands and clench them tight, and begin to kneel down and deeply beg that the world will sit quietly with me... for now.

5) A heat unlike any other—a heat not seen since each summer day passed nearly four years ago, long before I had entered the mill space to write and to learn about the river and its teachings, like the way water moves through life, interrupted and uninterrupted, like the rush of water from the great flood, and like the tree that stayed after it became crushed and motionless in rock and boulder—and it’s still there today. But no other day has been hotter than today, when the air is dry now, though earlier it was buggy and muggy and humid, and the water flowed down your back like a shower of warm running water would. The day has come when it should be recognized that the days are only getting hotter, and the once cool and warm Vermont summer is now a hot and putrid summer—but it is still the Vermont I know, and all the while as morning day is breaking through the stained window that could be wiped with a towel and then I could see the river more clearly and understand it more so that Cal is by the oak tree that had fallen and is sawing off the limbs and its trunk and filling in the holes and dirt that had been displaced and made the yard look like junk and that is what damage does, it does what it should do and that is when a damage had happened, the repair into something better is on him, and he took a break and headed down the path where I could see him wipe his neck with a cloth and look back up the road at something then turn and head back into the mill before the scorching morning heat could touch him no more.