An Epic Poem Calms a Fearful Night
Recent storms remind me of a night long ago when an ancient rhyme told a story of heroes deeds and monsters vanquished.
While it rarely snows in the Santa Cruz mountains, winter can be a harrowing time. Floods wash over the saturated earth. Giant waves batter the coastline. Avalanches bury roads and houses, sending them into rivers and the sea. Sometimes the events make national news, but such fame doesn't mend the terrified hearts of those who lost property or loved ones. The 1982 storm ripped Santa Cruz County to shreds. A Love Creek hillside slid down the mountain, burying several people in tons of mud.
In the following week, as friends gathered to watch Apocalypse Now on TV, real helicopters flew over the house carrying bodies from Love Creek, drowning out the Hollywood version. This surreal experience cemented the horror of what we were feeling. And watching a Vietnam war film provided an ironic diversion from this actual disaster.
The PTSD acquired that year seeped into my fears during a similar winter when we lived in Boulder Creek. It was the site of much of the damage from the 1982 storm as well as the 1989 earthquakes and other mayhem happening around that time. Anyone alive and cogent then will remember how the whole world spun into a new political reality. Those events and Nature's upheavals severely whittled away my usual ignorance-is-bliss approach to life. I was becoming a wimp.
One night, I baled from performing in a storytelling concert because a redwood tree had fallen on a power line next to my cabin. While the dispatcher at the power company assured me the cable would hold the tree, I just didn't have the courage to drive down a winding, landslide-prone highway, only to face a bunch of dead-eyed people in the audience. My emotional resources were spent.
Jeff soon arrived home from work after driving from San Jose. Just as he stepped in the door, the lights went out. The electric stove wouldn't work, so dinner stalled. I carried a pan of stew to the woodstove in our bedroom where a cheery fire crackled.
With all electronic entertainment cancelled, our evening activities were cut short. Scared to sleep alone in her room, Val burrowed under the blankets with me while Jeff searched for a book to read by the light of the fire. There was a specific story he wanted to read aloud to us.
The rain drummed on the roof, sending shivers whenever I thought of the soggy earth releasing shallow roots of the redwoods surrounding our house. It was so charming to sit on the patio in summer, watching the squirrels jump from limb to limb. That night, however, all I could think about was how a redwood sliced through a cabin just as the woman and her children moved from the couch to the bedroom just in time. Would that redwood hanging on the power line suddenly drop on our house? I could no longer see the treetops swirling over the skylight. Darkness deepened around the house and in our hearts.
Jeff found the book he wanted and sat on the floor in front of the wood stove. With just enough light to illumine the pages, his baritone voice soon uttered the poetry of Beowulf. https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/beowulf/summary/ Val and I cuddled under the quilt, listening to the epic tale of Beowulf killing Grendel, a member of a neighboring tribe angered by the noisy revels of the Danes.
There is always a threat to survival, be it natural forces or the clash between other beings living on our planet. No matter how technology distracts our attention from physical harm, when it fails, we seek other diversions from our fears. My fear that night was the forest and a storm that threatened to crush us under its weight. There was nothing I could do to control the situation.
As Jeff droned on, firelight flickered on the rustic beams of the ceiling, enhancing the ancient tale. I could visualize a Danish clan huddled inside the great hall, listening to a storyteller as the central fire cast dramatic shadows around them. Jeff's voice and the poetry calmed my nerves, inducing sleep. Val curled up against my hip. In time, Jeff tired of reading. We were all worn as the rain increased its tempest upon our roof. Jeff slipped under the quilts with Val between us. With the embers in the stove banked and an oak log placed to burn all night, we finally fell into a deep slumber.
If you enjoyed this post, feel free to explore other writings in the Ring Around the Basin Archive. I also love to read your comments, so please share your thoughts. Let’s start a conversation. And if you wish to support my writings, please consider subscribing or upgrading to a paid subscription. It’s now only $50/year. Even better, I would appreciate it if you could share Ring Around the Basin with your friends. Thank you!
All my books, Paradise Ridge, When the Horses Come and Go, and Ghost in the Forest are currently available on Kindle. Ghost in the Forest, is also available in paperback. Paradise Ridge is out-of-print, but the Kindle version is re-edited and better quality.
Book Review of Ghost in the Forest:
"Ghost in The Forest' is a great read! Take note People. If you love stories about environmentalism and nature, its clash with urban mindsets, as well as personal transformation, this is the book for you!
"Ghost in The Forest" is a quick 126-page read. It's the story of Dori, a woman trapped in a mix of grief over parental loss and refusing to accept how her hometown and her friends have changed over the years. Because of this, Dori has become a recluse and a self-imposed misanthrope who finds more comfort amongst the hiking trails around her hometown of Morristown than in her dealings with the raw reality of other humans.
The book, in some ways, resembled Edward Abbey’s “Desert Solitaire” in that the story follows a protagonist's love of nature and angst about humans encroaching on it. In this case, it’s how Morristown is transforming into a mountain biking destination where cyclists run rampant on trails and nature.
However, a tragedy involving said mountain biking becomes a major pivot point for Dori, leading to a series of events that eventually bring about personal evolution and discovery.
If you're a nature lover, this book is a must-read. It beautifully portrays the clash between environmentalism and urban mindsets and the journey of personal transformation. The book's vivid descriptions of nature and the protagonist's love for it will surely intrigue you.
Paradise Ridge Review by western author D. B. Jackson:
If you draw circle roughly around an area that includes northern Nevada, southern Oregon, and southern Idaho, within that circle exists a culture and people who live a lifestyle largely untouched by modern values. These are the "buckaroos" and Basque characters author Sue Cauhape brings to life in her literary novel, "Paradise Ridge".
Leandro, the illegitimate seventh son of patriarch Xavier Arriaga and his mistress, Gisela, is at the center of this intriguing story that travels exceedingly successfully at both the personal level of the characters, as well as the compelling level where the story is told.
Cauhape writes in a literary style that reminds me of Annie Poulx. Paradise Ridge, on the surface, appears to be an upscale Western novel...once inside the pages, you will soon discover a potential classic waiting to be discovered.
I rated this book a 5...because that's all the stars there were.
Sweet remembrance. Wasn't Grendel some kind of monster?
Beautifully recounted, Sue. This hit close to home for me ... My family lived / lives in Porter Gulch just east of Santa Cruz, surrounded by redwoods... They have seen more than one fall, and miss the cabin.