Touching Cottonwood

by Randall Simpson

  “They moved cautiously up the side of the mountain toward the spot of their last sighting. The biggest and strongest of the braves, who was furthest up the hill, saw it first. He instantly fell to his knees. The others caught up and then did the same. There on the hillside, perched upon a rocky outcropping, was the star-tail—but not just a single star-tail. They could, in fact, no longer identify the star-tail which had been their guide along their vision quest, as there were now hundreds of star-tails perched before them on the rocks.

  “The four braves stared in disbelief, as none of them had ever witnessed such an odd and amazing sight. Most amazing was that all the star-tails remained completely silent. There was not a song or sound from any of them.

  “A short while later as the braves continued to stare in disbelief, there came the sound of footsteps behind them. ‘You have stopped!’ exclaimed Hanasawi. ‘Then this is the end of your—’ but before Hanasawi could get the rest of his words out, he noticed what the four braves were staring at, and he too fell to his knees in amazement.

  “‘This,’ Hanasawi said weakly and straining through a trembling voice to find the words, ‘is the greatest of vision quests I have seen! Nothing like this has happened to our tribe before. You have honored our tribe by completing your quest, and to have this many star-tails sitting before you—it is a most auspicious sign…an honor…’ Hanasawi’s words trailed off, and he was lost in the vision.

  “For some time, the five humans knelt in silence, and then, without warning, the large flock of star-tails lifted off the rocks and flew together in a cloud of flapping gray and brown. The braves and Hanasawi continued to watch with astonishment as the flock circled and finally disappeared over a ridge.

  “Once the flock was gone, Hanasawi said to the braves, ‘You have done well to find this place. You have been honored and also bring honor to our tribe by receiving such a vision. Your quest is now complete. You have become warriors. Remember this place always. It is a place of great power—a place where the heavens touch the earth.’

  “And tonight,” continued Ranger Duncan, “I’ll tell you all a little secret. The Native American who told me this story assured me that the very spot where those four braves became warriors by completing their vision quest is located somewhere in this park, perhaps even near this area. Some of you may have climbed across that exact spot during your visit this week.”

  As the ranger concluded his story, eyes began to open or look back from the fire toward him. Another rumble of thunder, this time much closer, echoed down the dark valley from the west.

  The Scoutmaster stood up slowly from his seat on the log and stepped over to Ranger Duncan. “Well, I think the rain is going to be right on schedule. Thank you so much for coming to speak to us tonight. I’m sure the boys learned a lot, and that was a wonderful ending story.” He then turned to all the boys. “What do you all say to Ranger Duncan for spending his evening with us?”

  In unison they replied, “Thank you, Ranger Duncan!”

  The group scattered and headed for their tents, with a few of the boys stopping momentarily to talk to Ranger Duncan—tapping on the small drum he held, and a few even trying on his broad-rimmed felt hat.

  A closer flash of lightning down the valley, followed soon by thunder, sent the last of the straggling boys to their tents, and Ranger Duncan gave a quick good-bye to the Scoutmaster before hurrying down the trail, flashlight in hand, toward his vehicle. He made it to the parking lot just as a few large raindrops began splattering on the wide brim of his hat…ta-tap tap tap tap…

  By the time the ranger pulled out of the dirt parking lot and headed down the dark and wet road toward his forest service cabin, the rain began falling harder. All of the young Scouts he’d spoken to were long since nestled in their tents. Some were still talking with their tent-mates about vision quests and star-tails, while others were fast asleep, not hearing the rain now dancing in a chorus of drops on the canvas roofs above their heads. In their dreams, it was not rain they heard, but something quite different. They heard a drumbeat and the tweeta…tweet…tweet…tweetatweet of a star-tail as it flew among the high branches of the forest. They ran along behind, rapt feverishly in wispy, dreamy pursuit of their own vision quest—running back to a time when the night covered the world in black silence like a pure blanket of ancient darkness.

  The rain fell hard throughout much of the night. There was frequent lightning followed by rolling, booming thunder that rattled Ranger Duncan’s cabin window with a distinct and oddly rhythmic ta-tum tum tum tum. He heard the rattling only the first few times, as sleep found him before his mind could dwell on the oddly familiar and consistent rhythm.

  After a night of continual rain, Matthew Duncan woke the next morning feeling refreshed and not remembering any dreams. He remembered only the campfire talk with the boys and the rainy drive back to his cabin. He peered from the cabin window to see that the weather had cleared to reveal a clear, orange sky over the mountains in the east. The sun was not quite over the mountain yet, and as was his usual routine, he warmed his small cabin by starting a fire in the wood stove and then sat next to it covered in a blanket from his bed, waiting for some warmth to spread into his body. When the stove’s fire was large enough, he heated a kettle of water for some tea and a bowl of hot cereal.

  It was later, when the cabin had warmed and he was eating and looking at nothing in particular, that he first got the feeling that something about the cabin had changed. Something seemed different, but in looking about, he couldn’t spot anything that was obviously out of place. The feeling was like one might have upon returning home and noticing things were in disarray and then discovering a robbery had occurred. It was like that feeling for Matthew; however, the cabin was simply and sparsely decorated, and any small change should have been easy to spot. His ranger uniform was draped over a chair by the bed; his broad-rimmed hat was hung on a hook by the door; his boots were set against the wall near the cot; the drum he’d used the night before was on a small table a few feet from the stove. Across the room on a small shelf above the cot was a picture of a young woman with auburn hair and a bright smile. Next to that picture was another photograph. It was of three people—his parents and himself at the age of nine, standing in front of their old house, back in the small town of Cottonwood, Colorado.

  He got up from his chair, dropping the blanket to the ground, and moved over to a nightstand next to the cot. Sliding open its drawer, he moved some books aside and reached to the very back. His hand felt what it was looking for, and he pulled out a small jewelry box. He opened the box and inside was a diamond ring, exquisitely cut and sparkling, almost glowing, even in the dim light of the room. He looked up at the picture of the young woman and then closed the box and returned it to the drawer.

  Ranger Duncan removed the picture of the young woman from the shelf and carried it back to his chair by the stove. He continued to eat the rest of his cereal and drink his hot tea while looking at the picture. He thought about the last time he’d seen the young woman. Her name was Rebecca, and she was far away from Mount Rainier, back in Colorado. He’d written her letters and recently talked to her on the phone, but at that moment, the desire to see her suddenly grew inside him with some new and unexpected urgency. He puzzled at that feeling, as it brought back thoughts of the last time he’d seen her. She was returning to Colorado after visiting him in Washington State, and he was seeing her off at the airport. As she was getting ready to go through the security gate, she turned to look at him one last time. In that moment, she smiled her sweet and innocently sexy smile and then turned around and went through the gate. During his long drive back to the park and his cabin, he tried to hold on to the memory of Rebecca’s good-bye look and smile, knowing it would be a long while until he’d see her again. Now as he studied her photograph, this new urgency to see her forced itself upon him. He decided he would call her later in the day, after his daily shift had ended and he’d have time for a longer conversation.
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  He finished his cereal and tea and worked through his feelings of the unsettling yet unrecognizable change to the cabin—and also of missing the love of his life. Ranger Duncan got dressed, dampened the fire in the stove, grabbed his hat, and went outside into the cool, brilliant light of the morning. The sun was now just peaking over the ridge to the east. His cabin was in a grouping of several others, with all of them housing the full staff of rangers in the park. The camp was quiet, and no one else seemed to be up and about just yet. He followed a short path down a small hill to the main ranger station. It was still too early for the station to be officially opened for the day, so he used his key to unlock the front door and went inside. He crossed over to the main counter and went around behind it to a clipboard hanging on the wall. He lifted it off, scribbled down a few quick words, and hung it back up. He then went to the opposite end of the counter to a table holding several portable radios plugged into chargers. He unplugged one of the radios, put it into a carrying holster, which hung on the wall with several others, and attached the holster to his belt. Ranger Duncan then left the main station, locking the door behind him.

  Taking a purposeful and deep breath of the sweet morning air, he walked back up the hill toward his truck that was parked in front of his cabin. As he approached the vehicle, he noticed a bird perched on its roof. It was a Western Meadowlark—a star-tail. He stopped for just a moment and watched the bird, having the distinctly odd impression that the bird was also watching him, as it cocked its head slightly up and to the side at his approach. The species was common in the park, and seeing this one was not at all unusual. What was unusual, and a curiosity to Matthew, was the fact that this bird was perched on the roof of his truck. He knew meadowlarks usually preferred tree branches or, even more so, fence posts. Also odd was that the bird hadn’t been startled enough by his approach to fly away. He began to think that it might be sick or wounded, but at that moment, the bird lifted from the truck and flew off toward the north, over the trees and out of sight.

  Without giving the bird much more thought, he got into his vehicle and drove several miles toward the north, down a winding and muddy dirt road toward the site where he planned to work for the day. The recent rains had done a good deal of damage to the trails in the area, and there were plenty of repairs to make.

  After twenty minutes or so, he drove into a muddy parking lot and pulled up in front of a sign that read Kernishaw Valley Trailhead. He turned off the truck, grabbed a small sledgehammer, a shovel, and some posts from the back of his truck, and headed up the trail.

  Ranger Duncan worked hard for several hours without a break— digging, moving rocks and timber, and replacing washed-out trail posts. He was pounding one of the few remaining posts into position when something crossed his field of vision from right to left. It was a bird, and instinctively he followed it with his eyes as it traveled higher up the hillside and then disappeared into a cluster of trees and rocks. As he started to look back down to continue pounding the post into the ground, something else caught his attention in the same area where the bird had disappeared. He saw a flash or a flicker of light. Something bright now flickered like a star might through a turbulent nighttime atmosphere, but this light was far brighter and larger than any single star he’d ever seen—bright enough to be seen in the brightness of the day.

  He continued to watch the unusual, shimmering light for a few moments, thinking at first it might be a small fire, but its unusual flickering and color were not typical of a forest fire. He then thought that someone with a signaling mirror, perhaps in distress, might be standing up on the hillside reflecting the late-morning sun in his direction. He then realized the angle was completely wrong for it to be a mirror, as the sun was directly ahead of him, above and behind the light.

  Matthew dropped the hammer to the ground and began moving up the hillside toward the light. As he climbed, he found it uncomfortable to look directly at its brightness for any length of time, even through his sunglasses. All he could do was take quick glances so as to keep moving in the right direction toward it. As he moved further up the hillside and closer to the light, though still not able to peer at it directly, he became convinced that it was neither fire nor a mirror. He began to distinguish pulsations or motions within the light that seemed to be the source of the flickering effect.

  He had climbed to the base of a large rock formation, perhaps twenty feet in height, with the flickering light resting above him on top of the formation, when he noticed something else as well—the rock was covered with meadowlarks. They sat silently on the ledges and points of the rock, not disturbed by his arrival or bothered by the intense light close by. Though the large gathering of meadowlarks was startling, the brilliance of the light still called him on. He unbuckled his holster with the radio in it and set them carefully on the ground next to the base of the rock. For a brief moment, he considered using the radio to call his fellow rangers to inform them about both of the unusual phenomena, but that thought was erased as the flock of meadowlarks immediately ascended from the rock. He watched the flock circle above him and then out over the valley. Before the flock was completely out of sight, his attention was drawn back to the mysterious light above him at the top of the rock, now only twenty feet away.

  Slowly, making sure each hand and foot was placed firmly and securely in the rock crevasses, he climbed the formation. He was still not able to look for any long period directly at the light, though he continued to keep sight of it out of the corner of his eye. The rock formation was not high, and the climb was not difficult, but Matthew could feel his heart beating strong and rhythmically inside his chest:

  Da-dum dum dum dum…da-dum dum dum dum…

  Some brilliant and mesmerizing mystery was just ahead of him, unlike anything he’d seen and now less than a dozen feet away. The steep curvature at the top of the rock forced him to arrive on his hands and knees, crawling much like a baby. Finally he stood, putting his outstretched hand in front of him to partially shield his eyes from the most intense center of the light. He moved cautiously forward, his short steps scuffling along the rock.

  When the ranger was only a few feet away from the light, he began to notice more fine details of the phenomenon. The light was oval-shaped, taller than it was wide, but only roughly maintaining this shape as it was constantly changing. It was also translucent, and through parts of it, especially at the edges, he could vaguely see the mountains and trees from the other side of the valley. He also noticed motion and colors across the whole oval shape, as the light was not one color, but many. Thousands or millions of different colors swirled and moved in streams and eddies inside the light, reminding him of the motion of a river. He realized it was the motion of those colors that caused the flickering of the light. It was almost like a large cloud of fireflies swarming in front of him, bright enough to be seen in the day, only these were all different colors of light, and rather than mere firefly points moving rapidly about, they were long ribbon-like streaks moving in and around each other. His eyes seemed to be getting used to the brightness, and cautiously he lowered his hand. The light was still intense, but now no longer unbearable to his eyes.

  As he lowered his sunglasses and watched the spirals of brilliant colors dancing before him, an odd notion came to him. Though the colors were moving and spiraling in seemingly chaotic swirls, it appeared they were moving in more than just random patterns; there appeared to be a purpose and intelligence behind them. The moving ribbon-lights seemed alive and, taken as a whole, seemed almost more of a liquid than a light. The feeling grew in him that he was standing before some sort of living and intelligent presence. The swirling patterns of colored light, though foreign to his experience, were oddly familiar at the same time. The pulsating and flowing light was like something he could not quite recall from a long time before…something from childhood…something like the face of a stranger one can’t remember having met before, yet whose face seems more familiar than even the closest of friends.
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  Matthew couldn’t tell if he had moved closer to the light or if it had moved toward him. It no longer mattered, as he now found himself in the midst of it. He dropped both arms to his sides and felt his sunglasses fall from his hand and bounce off his boot to the rocky ground. He was mesmerized by the intense purity of the colors as the purples, reds, blues, greens, yellows, and millions of others arced, streaked, spiraled, and circled around him. As each streaking ribbon of color passed, it seemed to have a unique, pure, living presence and identity of its own. Was this light now one or many? It was hard for him to distinguish as he felt a single, strong, living presence, but somehow each of the millions of flowing ribbon colors had its own identity as they all formed to make up the whole. There was the one presence, but it radiated and flowed out through the expression of the many colors.

  While lost in the colors, suddenly and without warning, one strand of pure violet wrapped around him like a bright flowing liquid ribbon, holding him and completely immersing him in some sweet and intense pureness he’d never known before. It swallowed him and carried him away. He dissolved into its violet pureness like a grain of salt into an infinite ocean—he became that color; he was that ribbon of liquid violet, dancing and circling with the other colors. Then something else pierced his consciousness like a blazing arrow piercing the night sky—each color was not just a pure, living presence, but also a pure meaning. The colors were pure meanings! Each of them meant something. Each of them individually was a pure meaning—whole and pure like the pure colors themselves. The ordinary hollow meanings found in words were impossibly weak, dim, and insufficient shadows of these pure meanings. These colors, these meanings were what words pointed back to—they existed before words, eternally before. These meanings, the colors—were what words were born from.