Restless Sanctuary

When you’re lost in the middle of the forest the last thing you feel like doing is admitting it. “I can figure this out” I told myself. All around me the edges of the landscape were blurring together in a sea of green leaves, tall trees, and giant rocks. D can tell I’m confused, but I’m trying to look sure of myself. The map in my hands is wet from the rain and mosquitos are everywhere. Its becoming more clear that we need to get out of here, but the GPS on my phone isn’t helping any and I can’t find our location on the map. The light gets slightly more dim with each passing minute and a nagging thought occurs to me. We’re running out of time.

The adventure started like so many do for me, with a half-remembered idea read in a book. D and I were in Rockport, Massachusetts, near the fisherman’s haven of Gloucester, coming out of a candy store. We had plans to meet a family member later on for dinner, but there was extra time to kill. Naturally, I had a suggestion. In Gloucester, near Cape Ann, lies a forest containing the remnants of an abandoned settlement known as Dogtown. It was in the search for fun and interesting times that I came across it in a book about such places, and in my head resolved to visit someday. Although I like adventuring, I’m really more of an explorer. When there are stories about something that isn’t commonplace, I find myself drawn to it. The sense of discovery can be exciting, but also dangerous. It’s enticing, but you have to be wary of what you might be getting yourself into. The key to that is research, but I hadn’t done much of it, I just wanted something fun to do to pass the time. I sensed in D a willingness to do the same. We were more alike than I could have hoped for.

It seemed that, despite the gathering clouds, it was the best day for it. We were in the right frame of mind and, more importantly, we were close by. We parked at some business, closed for the day, near a communications tower. The rain was light but it didn’t bother us too much. Near the communications tower is a trail marked with a rock that reads “Olde Rockport Road.” I smiled because I knew we were in the right place.

On the trail you come across large rocks with interesting phrases carved into them. The first one we came to said “Get a Job” and then there was “Help Mother” and “Save.” Someone had crudely written “yourself” underneath it, which made it just a bit creeper than I had been expecting. The basic story that I had learned was that a billionaire named Roger Babson had paid for these messages to be carved into the rocks during the Great Depression. I imagined the messages were meant to be more inspiring than silly, but it amused me to see them. After the third message, we started to have some trouble finding the fourth and I knew we would eventually need to leave to be on time for dinner. It was time to head back.

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Our dinner plans soon changed when we realized we were a decent distance away from where we needed to be and that my family was all for us spending more time getting to know each other. We had waited so many years for this, and now it was happening. These were bonding experiences to look back on fondly in the far, far, future when we’re old and decrepit. Now we had time to return to Dogtown and find the other Babson Boulders, as they’ve become known. Based on what I had learned, there were at least 15 of them and we had only found 3. As we had trouble finding the others, I suggested we try going to a different entrance and picking up the trail from another angle.

The official entrance to Dogtown has its own signpost and a small metal box attached containing copies of maps for walking. It was 5:30 p.m. in late June. It wouldn’t be dark for another two and a half hours. We grabbed a map and a rain jacket and umbrella from my car. Although it was raining, neither one of us was going to let it stop us from having an adventure. The excitement I felt was hard to describe, here I was with my biological brother and we were having not just a good time, but an interesting one. We walked the trail into the woods, making note of the large rocks everywhere. As a teenager, I loved exploring the woods behind my house and although they seemed large to me back then, they weren’t even close to the size of the place I now found myself in.

The mosquitos started to eat D alive. They seemed to enjoy the sweet, salty taste of his blood and I made a mental note to bring bug spray the next time we were going to be in a forest. The map seemed straightforward at first but over time it seemed to be more inconsistent. The minutes passed slowly, but we weren’t finding the Babson Boulders. Upon turning a corner we were greeted by a rock with the number 15 carved into it. The map referred to it as a cellar hole, and implied that this marker was left to note where someone had once lived long ago. The history of Dogtown is a sad one, that D and I have since read about, but at the time we didn’t know that it was a failed settlement, abandoned long ago, with rumors of witchcraft and strange occurrences. As a rule, nobody in Gloucester really talks about it. I always wondered what a place could do to the public conciousness to have that kind of effect. But when I saw the rock I knew we were in trouble. Because we had seen it before and had just gone in a circle.

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So I looked at the map and told myself I could figure it out. The ever dimming light filled me with a sense of urgency. If there’s one thing I was certain of, it was that we shouldn’t be there after dark. I felt guilty because this had been my idea and my stubbornness had prevented me from recognizing that things weren’t going according to plan. In these moments, you tell yourself that it’s not over, that you can still find what you’re looking for if you look hard enough. There’s something you’re missing but you’ll find it. Was I going crazy now? Did I look crazy? I really wondered if D thought so. It’s no good for him to think his brother is an obsessive lunatic. I hadn’t wanted to give up, to quit. But it was just an adventure, and we were lost. Of course, it wasn’t long after locating the rock on the map that we figured on using it to try to get us back. We had been trying to use these landmarks to find the other Babson Boulders, but to no avail. Now, we needed them to get us home. Of course, it was then, when we started to make progress, that we heard the scream.

The bloodcurdling sound pierced the air, and I shivered a little bit. It sounded very close and yet far away. The wind can easily pick up sound and carry it great distances, but when you’re in the woods this is the last thing on your mind. I’m not a huge believer in signs but if we needed a cue that it was time to go, we could certainly have done worse. D had heard it too, I could tell, because he stared straight ahead, avoiding my gaze ever so slightly. When I asked him about it, he said “I was hoping you hadn’t heard that.” It’s important to note that we don’t know what it was, and never did find out, but it made our adventure more memorable than a tale of people lost in the woods likely has any right to be.

D doesn’t think I’m crazy, but he knows I’m stubborn. I know that he has his own stubborn streak as well. Both of us like exploring and finding things and we seem to know how to have a good time, even when it rains. It wasn’t the first time we were caught in a storm, and it wouldn’t be the last. But at least now, as the narrow spaces widened into the greater world beyond the forests edge, we knew we would be by each others side when it counted. It feels good. — J

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