A Reverie on Failure Part 12: The Stupid that Dwells Within

Commentary

Inculcated within the heart of every woodsman is the axiomatic reflex to look up. In the woods, stop every once in a while and look up. Before entering a grove of trees, look up. But within this woodsman’s heart, a greater stupid dwells. Indeed, as you will read in the actual journal entry, I obeyed this instinct to look up, but experience and hubris clouded my judgment, and I entered the woods anyway, as the stupid that dwells within dictated. I have the desire to do what is smart, but not the ability to carry it out.

There were no “widow makers,” you see, those fallen trees which span over a path, beguiling you by their mass that they are stable, safe to transgress, leaning comfortably against another large tree, creating (they whisper) a lovely gate of leaves and bark to lead you into the next section of woods. Thus they entice you, and then they summon a gust of wind, innocent enough, but in unwitting service to the fallen tree, and the live tree shudders, throwing off the dead tree, which smites you as you attempt to pass under, and you, instead, pass over, suffocating to death while bleeding internally. Large, dead limbs still attached to live trees are of similar evil. I cannot remember ever not knowing that.

70mph gusts and outside in a tree stand? No problem.

I was madly in love with a delightful young lady whom I met at one of these summer camps of yore, a fair maiden, fifteen or sixteen years old, with very dark curly hair, those exotic tightly wound curls that hung around her ears and down her shoulders frontways to guide a young man’s eyes to where they are taught not to go. Oh, and if your hand should gently follow their path… Well, we struck up a long-distance romance by mail. We wrote letters to each other, in an era still anticipating the advent of e-mail. Back and forth we wrote to each other, weekly, strengthening our love for each other, looking forward to the days of drivers’ licenses and gas money, when we could meet each other and…date properly, as young people did back in the late 1980s, that innocent age of purity and mutual respect.

One day a letter came with the terrible news that her father, an experienced woodsman, had been killed in the woods by a falling limb. I wrote her condolences, shocked. I did not hear from her again for a few years, I think. I vaguely recall sending her a few follow-up letters, inquiring, but she did not respond. A letter did finally arrive, written in her handwriting, describing her life since her father died, and the only thing I can remember about it is the unfortunate phrase, “a different guy every night.” I wrote her back and have never heard from her again. Her name was Veronica, just like in the song.

What evil lies in a tree limb to entice from the wise the stupid that dwells within! The woods surely knew that I knew their evil intent. Yet, they would pervert the lesson I had learned from that tragedy into a comedy of misjudgment, a mockery of everything in life about wisdom and security. It was as if this little patch of trees was a high school jock bullying a little lame girl, me, my seared woodsman’s reflexes. And so I entered the woods, looking up and seeing that it was safe.

I was in there on the last weekend of archery season, not to hunt (it was far too windy), but to scout in behalf of my friend, the very same one who bestowed on me the gift of this leather-bound notebook, which, as you recall from Part 1, I would use to record all my wisdom, counsel, and exultation as I took down game animal after game animal in a cornucopia of mastery and lordship over the woods. I did not know at the time that it was an accursed thing, like Raito Yagami’s notebook, except with my name written in it.

I left this out of the journal entry: the wind knocked the journal out of my hands while I was getting it out to record my thoughts about November 13 (which is now forgotten to all posterity) and blew it into a briar patch, so while I was making my escape, I had to take extra time to rescue the thing and tear my clothing and skin. Yes, as a matter of fact, I did see a deer while I was up there, at a fair distance; it was utterly frightened and looking for safe shelter, while I clung to a tree, stupid incarnate, literally on display for the entire woods. If it hadn’t been so frightened, I’m sure that little deer would have died laughing at me.

That tree stand John affectionately called “The Stand Where that Tree Almost Killed You” until December of 2022, when the entire section of the woods was obliterated by a windstorm. The woods had given their all, rallying the wind against me, until, like all alliances among the evil, treachery overcame and the wind turned against the woods. Evil in a woods: it really was just a random natural process, wasn’t it?

Journal Entry

November 17, 2020

When I go into the woods on windy days, I make a special effort to look up, to see if there are any suspiciously weak-looking branches, especially if I’m staying in one spot for a while. I did so on Sunday, and I felt pretty secure. A squall line appeared on the weather map, which created a low-level trepidation within me, so I stood up in the tree stand (about ten feet above the ground) and hugged the tree. It was a straightforward affair, and the squall passed, causing only one branch in the woods to fall, some fifty yards from me.

A relative calm ensued, so my focus was on spotting wildlife and signs of deer movement. After about twenty minutes of that, a roar came from the woods across the field. I looked up into the sky to see if it was the echo of a low-flying military transport plane. Seconds later I realized it was a massive wind gust, and I looked at the little stand of trees next to me. All four trees, none with leaves or substantial branches, swayed violently, pitching randomly in every direction.

One of them suddenly twisted and snapped with a loud explosion, about six feet from the ground. It began to fall in my general direction, so I quickly tried to put the tree in which I was harnessed between me and the falling tree. Fortunately it fell five yards from me.

I was chastened, however, and made as much haste, as safety will allow, to exit the tree stand. When my feet hit the ground, I was running until I was in a field. I could not have been more stupid than to climb into a stand that afternoon. I am glad I got to learn the easy way.