A Dark Wood

It has just occurred to us that we have already been midway into the Northwest Woods without ever having actually entered it. So let's retrace our steps.

Now, the main entrance to the Northwest Woods begins with a fine and winding path surrounded on both sides by sunlight and trees. Even on cloudy days there is a luminous light emanating from a source that can only be the Northwest Woods’ own true nature. However, lest you think the Northwest Woods is just too sweet for its own good, dare we say cloying, we do want to mention that we don’t have to venture far into the bright and beaming forest before we come face-to-face with its inevitable… shadow.



Those more observant might notice that on the right of the path as they ascend the first steep-ish sort of hill is a small, tiny, desperate figure frozen in flight as she rushes downhill, her arms outstretched, her panic nearly palpable. Clearly she has been caught running at some speed downhill, which should be alarm sufficient for all but the most oblivious of passers-by.

It is, actually, our first clue that not all in the Northwest Woods is sweetness and light, and for that we must breathe a sigh of relief, lest we suffocate from sheer surfeit of sweetness.



Those who continue past the frightened little figure (and we imagine some do turn about in their tracks) are thus not entirely taken by surprise when, at the crest of the path, suddenly all golden vistas give way, and we are in a Dark Wood.

The Dark Wood is not terribly long a stretch of the path, but it is significantly darker, and more closed in on either side, and it does seem that the birds suddenly stop chattering, and everything else gets very, very quiet. In the silence, if one stands still (which one is not at all inclined to do), one hears vague rustlings and muffled snaps and other surreptitious scurrying about.

“Scurry” does indeed seem to be the order of the moment, and we won’t think the less of you were you to yield to that impulse.

Now sometimes it is fun to be scared, and sometimes it is scary to be scared, and it is useful to know just when one becomes the other. It is our conviction that the moment one no longer feels safe alone is the crucial divide, so we recommend that you are accompanied at this juncture of your explorations (Beloved Dogs are strongly advised).

If, however, you do screw your courage to the sticking point and manage not to turn yourself Right Back Around and go rushing down the path with your arms outstretched quite like a certain previously encountered figure, then right toward the middle end of the Dark Wood, off to the side, is a very nicely positioned log carefully propped up on two smaller pieces at either end, all but pleading Sit Here. However improbably, we absolutely recommend that you do so.



It may be while sitting there that you belatedly recognize the madly rushing figure you had previously encountered is not, in fact, fleeing in terror, but is a remnant of a moss-covered stump (though it does nonetheless leave one of us to wonder if, in an instant, we, too, can be transformed from our big, confident selves to a small scrap of ancient, immobile, mossy wood, and how, indeed, those circumstances would arise).

More about that later.

All the same, such a pleasant little respite seems utterly contrary to one’s previous biases about a Dark Wood, and we have found that when we sit in that quiet, shaded little spot we begin to feel remarkably brave and strong.

There’s nothing quite like sitting calmly with one’s fears, after all; we often note how when we do so, the fears seem to fade, and oddly enough the birds begin their sweet chatter once again.