A Boy's Will

This wasn't inspired by the poem "My Lost Youth" by Longfellow, but about halfway through writing this, i realized how well it fit. Read that too, and all of his other poems while you're at it.

The manor itself had been built in 1839, by some early patriarch of the family, and seen many owners through it's years, all with the same name. The house wasn't important to the boy. To him, the house was simply where his father worked, and where his family ate and slept. Nothing more. The house was like the disappointing hotel within walking distance of the museum that was the forest. Year after year of camping expeditions and countless days spent exploring it's vast mysteries had made the woods more of a home to the boy than any manor could have been. The woods contained: a small creek for washing off one's feet, and hunting after craw-fish, a large creek for swimming, fishing, and ice-skating in the deep winter months. There was a tree fort, constructed one summer, and expanded on every year since. There was a spot where the fossils of little shells could be found with some regularity, a little cave where one could take shelter during impromptu rain-showers, and there was a clearing, on the far side of the woods near the big road, where the sun could be seen setting over the growing town. The forest had not changed, grown or shrunk, since the beginning of time. To the boy, the trees were the pillars holding up the sky, the rocks were holding all the earth in place, and the forest was the world and the world was the forest. It was as simple as that.

As the world changed, the boy changed with it. The grinding gears of time were pushed forward by the cycle of the seasons, as freeze and thaw advanced the landscape of the earth ever closer to the modern day. Calenders were bought and disposed of, the boy blew out candles and opened gifts. Soon the boy was using the forest for other things, and the small clearing became a place to bring a date, and carve initials. Someday he must have realized that he would inherit the house and the woods, eventually, even though owning the land wouldn't change his will to simply walk around in it. That day was a long time ago, but it was important. It was a turning point. It was the matchbox that would reshape the lives and legacies of the boy's family.

It was a day like that when he thought to himself how much could be done with the forest, in the hands of a man.

The college age inevitably arrived, and the boy left the world he knew for a different one. He returned in the summer, but somewhere along the way, the forest changed. Like an old house nobody owns, it was slowly repossessed after two or three years in college. It was as though his senses had dulled, and nothing in the world of his childhood felt real any longer. The creek's water was less reflective, the colors less bright, the sunset less romantic. The tree fort had fallen into disrepair, and the little beach for skipping stones had eroded away. The entire forest was smaller, as if through the years nature had no choice but to recede into itself, due to neglect. The college boy stood for a long, long time in the forest. Looking about at all the things that had so captivated him as a younger boy. After a half hour or so, he walked home with his head down. That night he lay in bed for several hours, weighing past against future. It was times like these when he would wonder if his choices were truly his own, or if he had lost something greater than what he could have gained.

It would be thirty years until the deed would leave the hands of it's previous owner. In this time, the boy and his first home had been growing distant and unfamiliar with each other. There was no emotion left, he had given that up long ago, exchanged it for the will to shake hands, and lie to strangers. The Boy traded in strange-looking rocks and the occasional fox or badger for an almost-corner office. The Man received a phone call on a day like any other. He would jokingly say to those who asked that he was in “the business of being busy”. His decision about the land was made before he even revisited it. He went back to the house, a month or so later, expecting waves of nostalgia to be ready and waiting. When he arrived, however, his childhood seemed to have deserted him. He had waited long enough for most of the work he had ordered to be finished. From the patio, he found he could see all the way to the big road, a strange and unsettling discovery. It was a chilly evening, a death throe of August at the end of the summer. He refrained from putting his hands in his pockets, afraid that he wouldn't like the feel of his wallet. The lights of the highway looked encroaching to him, as though they were growing closer. The businessman thought about how huge the forest had seemed all those years ago. He walked with some difficulty down to one of the streams, which had nearly run dry. Looking around, he recognized a stump, and remembered finding an arrowhead nearby. It was probably in some drawer in his room at the house. Planks of wood from the tree fort were scattered, he only glimpsed a few of them. He could hardly find his poorly carved heart when he visited the clearing, and the letters had weathered off the tree. He looked up at the sound of far-off thunder, then back down at his meaningless handiwork. He went home, and had dinner in the house with his back to the west. Afterward, he walked down a familiar hallway to his childhood bedroom. Fossils, a poorly made flag, presumably from the fort, a walking stick, the arrowhead.

The man lay in his bed that night and remembered everything that had happened. With great effort, he could summon up some emotion for the years he had spent in the woods behind the family home. The businessman didn't sleep well that night.

He still hadn't cashed the check. Land in a suburb is valuable, as is lumber. The Boy stood every day for a week looking out his window as log after log was hauled away.

8/16/11

8/16/11

Author's Note

Full opinion please, thanks so much
Fourth Edit

Reviews

[Larry Dyson]

feel as if you almost made your point almost told your story...feelings are there..emotions need to be explored more...why does he really need to sell it.. or why not try to recapture the place of his youth..or at least the feeling..kinda like wandering thru a story in a daze ...stifled emotions..other than depressed state of mind? Is this what you meant to portray?