Hemlock Hall- October, 1974
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 29. [Based on notes written in Hemlock Hall.] Wake at 7 and put the rest of the things together, gobbling some toast for breakfast, shaving and brushing teeth, and John goes down to the car at 7:50, so I can only shove the sheet of instructions under the door for Bill, hoping he'll act on them well. I leave at 8, taking down my fairly light suitcase and John's gallon of sherry, and drive through the hazy day until we stop for lunch and gas at 11:45 off the Northway, John getting a map that tells us how to get to Blue Mountain about 2:30. I'm down to Balsam while he parks, and then I'm up to the phone on the porch, having gotten change from the stamp drawer, to call Rob Butts, who answers, and then the operator says "$1.05" and I don't have enough, so get some change from the standard guy inside, and call back, but there's no answer. Try a few more times, then write a letter to say that I'd like to see them sometime, see the Griswolds and the Hoyts coming down the trail, and John goes out on the porch to sip sherry and nibble on the cheese and crackers that we bought for dinner this evening, and gets so entranced by the wind blowing through the trees and the balmy weather that he sends me up to the trailer to invite the Griswolds down for sherry on the porch. They're comfortable there, having just been tired from a hike, so they take a rain check, and we talk about various things; they recommend going up to the meadow to see the brilliant trees up there. Back down about 5, and it stops raining and the sun comes out in patches, so we're up to the meadow, violet colors very intense, great parti-colored leaves on many trees, and John's down when it clouds up again, and I walk up road and see the gleam of oyster mushrooms through the trees, and pick a pocketful of them and John's delighted when I also get better from Mrs. Colden (or whoever) and he cooks them up to eat with the sherry and cheese and crackers. I build a fire, smoke at 7, get feelings of fear about the possible flight to Greece, and though the andirons are broken, making it hard to make a good fire, the flames soar up and about, John's to bed at 8, and I laze, eat, and watch the first until I crawl into the tremendously cold bed (after baking by the fire) at 9, and sleep quickly.
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 30. John's up before I am and out of the cabin at 8, so I get up at 8 to shower in the cold, not quite hot water, using no cold water at all in the mix, and have breakfast with the Hoyts and the Griswolds under John's request. Out at 9:30, up to the parking lot at 10, and drive to the Indian Lake Post Office and up the road to the CBS (?) Christian Brothers Society (?) camp and they talk to Peter to get us permission to walk through the Boy Scout camp and we walk past the wrong washrooms to use a lower trail through the woods, many times bushwhacking to try to find the right trail, and then find the top of the falls, to look out over the deep narrow valley filled with colored trees, and then up the opposite slope to sit in the sun while they have lunch. I look over the valley, marveling at the showers of upflung yellow leaves cascading and tumbling in the air before the falls, and talking with the Whites and the other two couples. They're telling me names of plants: bunchberries red; clintonia, or blue beads, blue; tasting the white tuberous root of the Indian cucumber, and Curly and Mack and I head up the hill, finding the Pepto-Bismol fungus that exudes the characteristically pink fluid of that medicine, and finding the hillsides strewn with mushrooms of all kinds. Get to a high vantage point and see all the rest grouped around the top of the falls, and we take many pictures of them, then bushwhack again, sometimes going three separate ways, and finally getting together at the top of the falls, where Curly slips down a steep slope and makes himself older and frailer in my estimation in that one accident. Rejoin the others at the top of the hill and follow the "real" trail back, laughing at the 22, 18, 21, 20, 14, 19 misorder of the signs along the guided-tour trail, and get back along a high trail, showing bright red trees against bright blue sky, and see our second snake. Sphagnum mosses and descriptions of dolls' eyes. Out at 4 to Freddie sitting in the car, talk to blond caretaker, look at lakes, drive to see Indian to OK walk to Black Mountain Pond on Wednesday. To cabin to have sherry, orange, cheese, and dinner of lamb with awful Mr. Lawrence and other talky couple who have 25 years from near Rochester. Shower. Smoke, watch long fire, John to bed after porch at 10, me bed at 11, dizzy-stoned; GREAT fear of flight, shits, knotted stomach, and say I just WON'T smoke again, since the fire is so depressing.
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 1. Again John's out, watching geese flocks flying over with the "noise of barking dogs," and I out of bed at 8, put on double socks, sit apart at tables with Harriett and Harriett. John loses phone number that came last evening from Bill Kirkpatrick from Boukichoff, and he frets and fusses, shouts that he doesn't have enough money to make long distance phone calls, and wants to go to Indian Falls. I get directions from Curly: three hours in from the ADK Loj. John hunts for number from 9:30 to 10, and we drive to 11:35, John saying we won't have time to finish the trail, and the trail is blasted and muddy, gloomy under pines, and we pass lots of people, and John says that he hasn't been sleeping well, and is tired and depressed, so we turn at the .85 mile trail to McIntyre, which he says I can climb alone if I want, but he's going back to the car. I'm disgusted with him, but we turn back at 12:15, to the car at 1, back to the cabin at 2:30, having essentially used up the day without doing anything. He goes to bed for a nap at 3 and I'm down to the beach to lie on a chaise in the sun until 3:45, when the sun starts going behind thick clouds and it gets chillier. Up to make a fire and he wakes and fixes more mushrooms at 4:15, which we eat, and I read "Gulliver" till 6, tending a long-lasting fire, and back from dinner to find it blazing PERFECTLY. Dinner of GOOD pork (lamb last night) at table with movie-going woman and "my son" and his wife and the quiet couple that I'd gotten change from. The conversation is slow until we get to India, and I'm conscious of how awful he sounds trying to tell everyone that they should ignore the poverty of the country, which is not as bad, in its way, as the poverty right here in the states. John stays up and talks to the Hungarian Lawrences about Bartok. I go down to row out to see moon CLEAR the clouds, then loads of stars and follow a BRIGHT one that I fantasy a spaceship to which I send out as strong a "Hello, hello" as I can manage from the center of a CALM lake. There's a great full moon, a LONG SLOW shooting star, clouds creep over Blue Mountain, and I'm back at 9:30, read to 10:45, forgo smoking, wait till the fire's almost out, and I go to bed, then John follows at 11:15 to sleep.
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 2. John out again at 8, I shower, up to breakfast with the Griswolds and the Hoyts again, still talking about John's book and its composition and music. Call Jane Roberts at 9:15, class on Tuesday 7-11, busy weekend for them, I don't ask about Monday. Write all THIS stuff from 9:30 to 9:45, then up to trailer for day's outing. Ride out in two crowded cars to Tony Piette's (or something) and meet Eleanor and Monty Webb for a walk through birches to Black Mountain Pond, stopping for lunch at 12:30 near a cache of cans that Betsy tried to hide under pine boughs from Eleanor, who packed many of them out anyway. Then it started raining (also, the custom of having people who hadn't been there retrieve the cans from the water), making a noise like fizzing pop on the flat water surface, or as John suggested, "thousands of fish." then it changed to a fine light clear rock-salt hail as we watched and walked around the lake, and then it grew opaque and larger as it fell, puffing out into what they called popcorn or corn snow, though still tiny. But it fell so FAST that the ground was soon covered, Mack was shooting pictures and complaining about his cold in his bikini shorts, and I thought the red, purple, and yellow leaves and green grasses against the white background make the forest look like the pattern for a dazzling summer floral tablecloth of starched white. THEN it changed to SNOW, and the flakes got bigger and bigger until they LITERALLY looked an inch wide, floating gracefully down to the pond, where the still-reflecting surface made it appear that they were then bouncing UP in an arresting illusion. Colder and wetter, and we slogged down and down, quite quickly, Monty talking about their trip to Nome in -70F weather in a plane which had to have its batteries brought indoors so they wouldn't freeze, and they had to heat the fuel oil on burners so that it would be warm enough to take contact from the coldness. Eleanor rattled on and on (for nature notes see page 8983), and we got back about 4 to the cabins to get a fire going and a shower done to warm up. Chicken and dumplings for dinner VERY good, with the "two dykes" and one's mother, and the gingerbread is brought over by the Griswolds so I can have two. Continue reading into the evening, John suggests I smoke HIS grass with my pipe, since he'd dumped his pipe's screen into the fire last night, for the slides tonight, and the same fellow who showed the two hours of "gas stations and bus sides" that John so often complained about before shows slides of Alaska at 8, still pretty boring, which John describes as being rickety houses with tiny edges of spectacular fjords peeking around the side. Get to bed at 9:30. It feel truly a pity to be in such a romantic spot with someone who used to be a lover, and now there's nothing in the line of even the barest touch between us. That probably explains as much as anything my depression with the fire, and add to that the fact that he, probably also conscious of our togetherness-with-apartness before the fire, keeps insisting that he likes the porch so much that he's outside constantly while I'm watching the fire. And then we never get to bed at the same time, so that later, in the motel, I make sure that the beds, formerly connected, are now NOT connected so that they can be moved apart, so that we won't even have to be aware of the other person's moving about in bed. Later he says that he doesn't sleep well when he's sleeping with me, and that might even explain his lack of sleep that made him turn back from Indian Falls. But there are so many encounters with the Hoyts and the Griswolds and the Webbs that there's enough to take our minds off our relational problem, and since we steer clear of each other, that's the end of that. On the way down to Ithaca I ask him, after about an hour's silence: "What do you, um, think of the break in the relationship?" he responds, almost automatically it's so fast, precisely merely "I feel fine," and I tell myself that there's absolutely no use to ask him any more questions about it: either he IS fine, or he's demanding of himself that he tell me he feels fine, so there's no use my pressing it, and no use fantasizing that he's dreadfully and silently unhappy, desperate to get back together, and I can thoroughly turn from him as a lover and try to cultivate him as a friend. Actually the NEXT Hemlock Hall will be better, I suspect, and he reserves the place above the boathouse again (whoops, DOUBLE bed!)
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 3. John's determined to practice his speech, so I ask around to those who went up Sawyer yesterday to find it's well marked, and take the car out at 10 and drive up to Sawyer Mountain, half way down the road to Indian Lake, on the right. 1.1 mile trail. Arrive at 9:55, to the top at 10:40, start down at 11, out at 11:35. "You're here" is a false statement on rockface about 75 yards from top on an overlook over 5-6 ranges of small hills, patches of sun, some gray dead trees, early color, large lake and farm and road, distant edge of lake, and maybe a BIT of a lake at high far right, which they say might be part of Blue Mountain Lake. Highest peak appeared to be to the left under a cloud bank. Easy walk, but for one or two rock-climbs, treetrunk scrambles, and wet slippery mud sections. Not much UPhill. Snow-circles of graceful beauty in center stems of evergreen woodferns. Red lead surprises by falling on sheer white background. Wet collecting inside rainjacket made me feel like a perambulatory terrarium. Nice of me to get the Griswold's "papoose showers" to go with the "Squaw Snow" of yesterday that comes before the "Indian Summer" warmth predicted for the weekend. I'd gotten down to the "chipmunk chitter" area where whole stems of green leaves littered the ground. Started no snow, up to where only the path was wet, up to total snow at the beautiful top. Snow fell then rain fell for a bit, and I get very warm from walking back, passing up "Rock River 3 miles" as too far, "Rock Lake .5 miles" as too close, and stop at "Rock Lake, Unknown Pond, and Indian Lake" with no distance marked, though Rock Lake should be about a mile---and I start off on that at noon. Write notes, and in to find it very wet and sad going, and then hit honey-mushroom tree and decide it's time to beat back to the road, where I constantly hear cars throbbing past. Mark telephone pole numbers down and back at John's at 1:30, but he's not finished yet, so we look up mushroom, I talk to Nan White, and go up to read more of Gulliver till he's done, and we're out to find tree easily and THEN find more logs of oysters. Back at 4, John starts cooking and I shower, and we're over to Whites in their slanting boathouse at 4:50, and Griswolds and Hoyts arrive at 5:15, laughing about slides last night and talking about THEIR trip to Alaska, and the Griswold's to New Zealand in January for two months, and drink lots and up to VERY good corned beef at the center table with the Collins's and the other couple in the big cottage, back to finish Gulliver as John talks to Hungarians, and I get to bed early, leaving light on for him, and he gets in later. This MIGHT be another eve. The older Webbs gave me lots of notes Tuesday: here they are:
Smaller, whiter bark: silver birch )These also called ASPEN
Larger, darker bark: white or canoe birch )
Poplar: ridged below and matte smooth above, rather like birch.
Christmas fern: broad leaves, rather coarse pattern.
Evergreen woodfern, typical fern-shape, fine leaves.
Clintonia, also blue bead: blue-black large berries.
Northern Ladyfern: or New York Fern, is different from the other: tapers different
Witchopple (from Witch Hobble, as it trips people) gets those purple HUGE leaves.
Striped maple (buds known as Moosewood) is the ENORMOUS maple leaves-bushes.
Little branches off spruce and hemlock trees---hemlock has the fern-shaped needles
Bunchberries are Canadian Dogwood: four-leaf plants are drones; six-leaf w/berries
Oval, bright-green leaf, somewhat rare: trailing arbutus.
Mushroom trees located BEFORE (second) 45 map sign, left poles E6 and 275/235(?)
Cedar: fan-shaped, breakable processes, not really needles.
White pine: LONG five-needled clusters.
Balsam is the Christmas tree, as is blue spruce.
To Indian Falls: to Tupper Lake, take Route 3 to right, through Saranac, and between Saranac and Placid, road to right, almost to Placid "Old Military Road" and "To Keene." This goes around Lake Placid. Past sign to John Brown's farm, then one mile, to right, marked "ADK Loj." Park outside Loj, along road. Takeoff to Marcy Dam; Indian Falls three hours in from ADK Loj. According to Curly: NOT the Vanhovenberg Trail (steep, goes right), but take the SKI trail that goes straight ahead, since it's more gradually uphill.
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 4. John wants to climb today, so he suggests Black Bear Mountain, and we all gather in the parking lot near four cars, and Dave whoever comes with us. Drive to 8th Lake, park 2 cars, and take two cars around In let and almost to Eagle Bay, then down Uncas Road to parking spot, Freddie forges ahead, and we're up path teaching Eleanor about mushrooms and oysters until we reach our trail for the mountain. Up the 1.1 miles in about 45 minutes, and John and Dave rest on the side while I say "Ten minutes" and leave at 12:30 to get to GREAT top and GOOD view over Blue Mountain and its lake over there, the 7th and 8th lakes out there, and the rest of the Fulton Chain of Lakes in the opposite direction. Down at 1 to find they've gone ahead, but catch up fast and down to trail to meet Brandy and his cute father, lots more oysters, and lots of Indian cucumbers. They stop at cairn that used to have the Uncas Road sign, then stop at arrow and down to Bug Pond (thanks to Curly's shout) and then get tree-oriented by the Webbs, down the trail and back to two cars, all into the Griswolds for the ride around to the other cars, and John has no gas, so the Griswolds proceed and the Whites follow until we hit a station that's open that only puts in 8.6 gallons, plenty left. To motel at 4:30, and John goes directly to trailer to cook, and I strip and get into tub and smoke and jerk off VERY satisfyingly and redly, and eat crackers I'd brought over and get to trailer at 5:15 to finish off all the snacks and sit down to laugh at the "Urinarian Choir" behind the sheet and the "sexytant" out and the "I'm not going to cross the equator staring down some DRAIN!" Everybody is in a hilarious mood and we get to table with the young ones: Charles and Judy we'd met two years ago, Paul and Sari with the marvelous eyes and meatless stomach. Laugh and giggle and talk about magic mushrooms and infecting the table and Sari says "I should get the recipe" and we laugh at the TV ad, and John adds "with cornflakes dripping from its mouth" to the vampire I have leaving Mrs. Post's castle on the bluff above the town. Back to start "Limbo" but I can't really get into it, and John gets in at 10 so we're both to sleep, me cursing the porch light that I could just as easily have turned off.