May 19
It is most difficult for me to express the joy, the complete relief, to at last return to the forest and find that I have the strength and resolve to walk up the hills and down through the trees, to breathe in fresh air and act upon my own will! After these months of opium tinctures and bed rest and worry and that terrible, ultimate grief, it is as if some precious element of my being has been restored.
I left alone just before noon, and for a time I followed the wagon road behind the officers’ homes, but when I heard the laughter and conversation of an approaching walking party, I ventured off the trail. Stepping into that shaded, somber hush is much like entering a cathedral, the fir trees serving as grand pillars, their green limbs arching overhead. Occasionally there came the songs of chickadees, the chattering of dark-eyed juncos, the sweet call of a song sparrow or, far off, the dull thud of a woodpecker. For one thrilling second I thought I would encounter some wilder beast?—?there was a ruckus through the dried grass and sticks, but it was only a little field mouse or mole, and that, too, made me joyful.
The forest has always had such an effect on my spirits, the moment slows until I can see the intricacies, bright and pure, like removing the back of a pocket watch to see the shining metal gears turning, turning.
I thought I spied a humming bird’s nest in a spindly dogwood, and oh that would have been a lovely discovery. Since that day with Allen, they have become all the more precious to me. Yet through my field glasses I recognized it as only a paper wasp nest, tattered from winter’s wear.
As I made my way back toward home, it was as if I had sprouted wings on my feet. It was a wondrous sensation, making my way down the hill, a breeze in my face, Mount Hood revealed in all its snowy glory, the Columbia River Valley spread before me in greens and blues, and I felt as if I could bound across the world in weightless leaps. For the first time since I lost our baby, I felt wholly alive.
May 20
Today Charlotte joined me on my excursion to look for nests, and though I did not expect to be so, I was glad for her company.
When we set out, we waved hello to Mr MacGillivray, who is planting a row of maple trees along the lane in front of the General’s house.
“See you’ve got your armed guard,” he said when he noticed the sling-shot at Charlotte’s side. “Always best to be prepared.”
Charlotte’s disposition is much changed now, and she chatters along merrily, with little time for a breath. I have learned much about her family?—?that she has all brothers, several older and several younger, that her family is Irish but her mother named her Charlotte because “it doesn’t do anybody any good to be Irish in this country.”
The girl is an observant scout and eager to learn. I have done my best to name those plant species I know, and have promised her that we will ask Mr MacGillivray to help us identify others. A few she knows by such muddled common names as bloody hearts, everlastin’ pearls, little baby twin lowers, and wolf’s mane, and each vivid name induces her to share an equally colorful story. A few short weeks ago I would not have imagined the need, but now and then I must gently ask Charlotte for quiet, so that I might hear the bird calls.
When she is not asking about a type of tree or flower, Charlotte inquires more times than I can count, “But ma’am, what are we looking for?”
A nesting bird to photograph, I say. Why a nest? It will provide a focus for the camera, a place that the bird is sure to return and, hopefully, sit still long enough to be photographed.
All that I tell the girl is true enough, yet there is more: I seek a certain arrangement of light and shadow, a folding of lines and balance of weight so fine as to let me catch sight of something beyond reason. I can only pray that I will recognize it when it is before me.
May 21
Surely a baby’s spirit is a slight thing, with little consciousness or will, yet I sometimes feel its presence. It is not so morbid as it sounds, nothing like a phantom or ghastly haunting, but rather like an unexpected dappling of light.
Perhaps I only conjure it out of lingering grief. Can an unborn child, which has never taken a breath or opened its eyes beyond the womb, be in possession of such a spirit?
And if it is true, what Mother and her Society of Friends believe, that we are each inhabited by some bit of divine light, then upon death, how long before those particles dissipate entirely, becoming unrecognizable except as a part of some greater whole?
I think my little one would like to perch, even for a moment, in that lovely space between light and wing, air and silence. If only I might create such a photograph.
Lieut. Col. Allen Forrester
May 22, 1885
Welcome news! They have found their way to the village.