The name of the town is not important. There are too many, too many small towns, too many names gone, too many memories lost in the cold waters of time. The fact that it was once my town is not important either, only that those cold, lost moments existed, once, long ago.
Rivers built America. The deep inland waterways we now take for granted? They were our first pioneer roads, roads linking ocean with prairie and mountain, then linking grain and wood and textile with the great markets of the 19th century world. Rivers, railroads, then roads, bridges into the future. Commerce brings life, hearth, family, and has done so since prehistory. Remnants exist of the tin and copper trade of the British Isles, remnants dating back to the neolithic, a reminder of humanity's ancient sophistication. Trade routes existed here too, beneath the watchful eyes of the rumored water panther and the Piasa Bird. Too many of those stories have been lost in winter and time and death.
The river ice has broken up, white knife edges crushing together against the silt, framing the dark river island trees, smooth maples and rough-barked cottonwoods, towering and umber-black in the twilight. This is a ghost island, always moving with the silt, a haunt of mergansers and harlequins. A doe moves in the fog, browsing for green winter shoots just before bedding down for the night.
Lost moments, lost memories, are like doors in time and space. We fear the paranormal, the ghost out of place, and are yet enticed by that same fear, like a weird and lighted carnival ride in the city park on a soaring spring night. Our young and plastic society cannot comprehend real passage of time, echoes of the ancient and that which has simply passed. Places like Stonehenge, like Cahokia, suggest our forebears did not struggle thus.
The lights are about to be turned off at the ceramic shop on Main Street, the building a 1930s' structure of simple gray brick, the front door uncharacteristically screened. Inside, the smell of cigarette smoke, bright florescent lights casting shadows against sharp, gray metal bookshelves laden with unpainted bunnies and holiday wreaths and vintage Christmas trees. A girl in a warm lavender sweater sits at the table, alongside retired old ladies and a lonely old man wearing a blue polyester polo shirt. He is bald and has a big belly. The girl is finishing a decorative piece, forest chipmunks on a bit of fallen log. The pastel burnishing a reminder of a summer day in the old, old forests of the river bluffs. A little black poodle moves from person to person, obeying commands like a person.
The riverboats are long gone though the landing remains down past the old cement grain elevators, past the city park with the tall silvery sliding board, an exhilarating and terrifying ride on a summer sunlit afternoon. From the old landing, from beneath the monument shadow of the grain elevators, you can look north to the railroad bridge. The Santa Fe and Burlington Northern are still crossing, crossing lights and lone whistle and red lights in the dark.
The freight will shake the old north side of town, rumbling through as twilight turns purple and Venus brightens the western sky. At the old railroad cafe, a few late diners remain, musing over lemon meringue pie and bread pudding. Ham-and-beans with dry but generous squares of homemade cornbread was the Saturday special and that too is almost gone.
So many moments, so many thoughts, ghosts of the past, all contributing to a culture, a culture that often passes and weaves unseen. I stand often at old windows, wondering of those who have also looked through the glass before me, looking through into another world and another time. Strange, empathic sensitives are not a commodity in a plastic, modern society. But in every small town, there are so many doors to places and times unseen and overlooked.
The cafe owner, a tall woman with long blonde hair piled high, wipes her forehead. She doesn't look her age, but she pauses for just a moment before walking to the front window. The sky has cleared. It will be a cold night despite the sudden and late winter afternoon sun. She turns off the Open sign. Another day gone.
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