David's Inferno (30 page)

So, what did I do all day? Looking back, I wonder the same thing. Even on the days when you feel almost human, you can't walk away from agitated depression. Wherever you go, there it is.

Even though I eventually lost 25 pounds, I did eat. Even though I feared waking up in the morning, I did sleep. Even though I lost most of my interest in TV, I did watch some. Even though I wasn't all that functional, I did manage to work a few days a week. Even though my words were primarily monosyllabic, they did come out of my mouth. And even though I wasn't much fun to be with, I did have some fun with people, and I like to think vice versa.

Figuring a few small victories at home might prove that there was a bright side to having a fairly dysfunctional husband, I started a variety of long-delayed projects: Washing every window in sight. Cleaning up the basement. Sorting through boxes of memorabilia. Matching all the socks and throwing away the orphans. Most of these projects never got done. Although I did make some progress on the socks.

There were, however, a few projects I did finish—with a feeling of accomplishment way out of proportion to the physical labor involved. Projects that felt as symbolic as they were practical. Projects that still remind me in an oddly fond and visceral way, what it felt like to do them. And, how, in the midst of it all, I could almost always find glimmers of hope.

Project #1: Stepping Stones. April, 2006
. The stepping stones to my cabin don't lead straight to the cabin. And they're more than a step across—unless you take giant steps.

For many years, I didn't understand why Wendy asked me to put them like that. Particularly in the spring when I often have to hop-step to avoid the saturated ground after rainstorms. Many muddy shoes and vaguely annoyed thoughts later, I've finally seen what she saw back then: that while nature doesn't really abhor a vacuum, it is slightly baffled by straight lines. And, although it's bemused by human dreams of creating order out of chaos (Dewey's decimals be damned), it can't help but follow its own mysterious, decidedly non linear logic.

Back in 2006, I didn't care
where
she told me to put them. I just wanted to be overwhelmed by weights heavier than my heart. As soon as the ground dried out, I began going around the property with my lawn tractor and cart to gather rocks from 6 inches to 9 inches thick, with one flat side at least 18 inches wide. Rocks that had been cast aside by glaciers or farmers sometime in the last ten thousand years. I even copped a few from a tumbled-down stonewall out back. But only ones that had tumbled down on our side. Stealing rocks from stonewalls around here is akin to rustling cattle out west. But I figured a few from our own land would be forgiven by the Gods, and hopefully, the neighbor whose border we share. I bring it up only because it's an example of the kind of thing I'd worry about with Talmudic obsession.

Unlike the borderline boulder I'd wrestled with after my road
trip (and which, in better times, eventually became the front step of my cabin) these stones were all in my weight class. As long as I kept my knees bent and back straight, I could lift them high enough to rest on my thighs and then leverage-pivot them onto a cart and bring them over.

Setting stones may be physically exerting but isn't very mentally taxing:

Position rock on ground. Outline ground with spade, staying a few inches back from the rock so you'll have wiggle room. Set aside rock. Remove sod. Dig/scrape soil until hole vaguely mirrors contour of the rock. Place rock in hole. Rotate back and forth a little. Try to convince yourself it's perfect. Realize it's a little high or low, here or there. Remove rock. Repeat. Repeat. After 15 to 30 minutes, tell yourself it's good enough and move on.

It sounds simple. But to my mind it was high drama, requiring several more essential steps:

Decide exactly where to put the stone. Eyeball the depth exactly on the first try. Debate with self whether it looks exactly right—that is, like it had risen gently out of the ground after that last glacier and was getting ready to settle comfortably back in place until the next one. And, most importantly, worry about what Wendy, friends, neighbors, and casual walkers-by would think. Would I be exposed for the incompetent hole-digger and stone-paver that, clearly, I was?

Most of the time however, I didn't care what anyone thought. All I cared about was digging deeper into the ground, moving rocks I could barely move, and the feeling that I could purge my psychosis with sweat.

Project #2: The Footbridge. June, 2006
. We also have a seasonal stream—about 8 feet across, that runs between our house and the cabin. Shortly after we moved in, I built a platform bridge to cross it—just 2 × 4's nailed onto 6 × 6's. Occasionally, during the spring
runoff, it had rained so hard I had to clear the leaves and gravel that were damming the upstream side. The rest of the time, it did just fine on its own.

One day in late spring 2006, the rains were so strong, the waters actually lifted up the bridge and deposited it 10 feet away on the lawn. Instead of just putting it back, I realized I should build a small arched bridge so the spring runoff could run underneath.

I thought about this bridge a lot. I mean, a lot. I mean, a
real
lot. As I drove and biked around, I looked carefully at other small arched footbridges. I studied pictures in books. I measured the span several times a week because I kept forgetting the numbers or where I'd written them down. I settled on a width and then realized it wouldn't be wide enough for my lawn tractor. I decided to put in railings and then realized that the lawn tractor cart might occasionally be loaded with sprawling saplings and brush and the railing would get in the way.

Occasionally, I'd try to reason with myself: “Dave, calm down, it's just a little footbridge.” But the other voices in my head refused to listen. Eventually, through extraordinary engineering insight (which is to say I found some graph paper), I realized that if I bought three rough-cut 2 × 12's that were eight feet long—no, better make it ten feet; no eight feet will be fine; no ten feet, just to be safe—I could cut arcs in the tops and bottoms, nail down some planking, and be done with it.

But where could I get rough 2 × 12's? And, if I went up to ten feet how would I transport them? Did I need to dunk them in a high-powered preservative? Was there something less toxic to use? What about the arc? It looked good on graph paper, but what would it be like to walk across? Most, importantly, how the hell was I going to layout and then cut eight-foot arcs in a 2x12? Okay. I think I got it! But wait … I'm going to have to dig up a couple of those stepping stones I just put in! I could go on and on. And did.

Eventually:

I walk across that bridge almost every day. From where I live to where I write. And back. Over the last few years, the water, as is its nature, has started eroding the banks below the ends of the bridge. So, a few weeks ago, I reinforced that area with heavy rocks. I still need to put some flat rocks under the ends of the bridge. It'll never be
completely
stable. But what is?

Project #3: The Invasive. July, 2006
. From my perspective, humans are the only truly invasive species. After all, an “invasive” is described as a “non-native species whose introduction causes or is likely to cause economic harm, environmental harm, or harm to
human health. These species grow and reproduce rapidly, causing major disturbance to the areas in which they are present.” Need I say more?

One of the more common invasives around here is the multiflora rose (
Rosa multiflora
)—a beautiful, crawling vine, full of tiny fragrant rose flowers. Crawling is a polite word for it. This vine can overwhelm just about any tree or bush it gets its prickly tendrils around. I didn't really get what the big deal was until one day I biked past a neglected field that had mutiflora growing in one solid mass all the way up its hillside. Still, it's not quarantined in Vermont. Just on the watch list. Dwight Miller, the aforementioned late great patriarch of the orchards that surround us, used to watch it all the time. And, in his inimitable ADHD way, tried to control it using a combination of his beloved “Brush Hog,” Yankee wit, and, if all else failed, benign neglect.

We had one major multiflora rose on our property which had begun to envelope a tree that, at the time, I thought was a young multi-trunked black birch. Over the previous few years, I'd grown kinda guilty about letting the vine keep growing. Not just because it looked like it was subjecting the tree to a long, slow strangulation, but because I knew that birds were happily eating the berries and depositing the seeds in Dwight's orchards.

In 2006, “feeling kinda guilty” meant “thinking obsessively and feeling overwhelmed with guilt.”

After consulting with Dwight, I learned that the vine propagated through its roots as well as its seeds. So I couldn't just cut the thing down, I had to dig up the roots—which were busy underground doing the same thing as the vines were doing up above.

I started by pulling away all the vines I could without ripping my arms to shreds. Then I went at the thing with a shovel and pick axe, following the distinctive roots—inside they're a bright mustardy color—until I was confident I had removed every single trace of this “unwanted” plant that had invaded our personal piece of paradise. I don't remember how long it took. In my memory, it was days, weeks, months. So it must have at least been a few hours.

Eventually, I was done. Having spent an extraordinary amount
of time sweating mentally and figuratively over a project that really could have been ignored—or taken care of with a chain saw (and a brief yearly follow-up) in less than a minute.