Darkness

     The forests of the Smoky Mountains are often dark, wet places. Deep coves, numerous streams and a dense canopy of leaves creates an environment that can seem almost prehistoric. Some of the deepest valleys may only see the sun for an hour each day. If you hike here, you become accustomed to moving through a world that seems stuck in twilight at times, and it becomes comforting. The cool mountain air, the mosses and ferns that muffle every step, all of it seems designed to protect you from the larger world. But sometimes, there is a darkness that is unnatural and threatening.

     In the summer of 2002, I drove from my home in Asheville to visit friends in Balsam for a day of paintball. There's no playing field there, just a large expanse of uninhabited forest. We walked to the end of the road and then followed a barely visible path that took us past a vacant vacation home and into the woods. The only real sign of human activity was a crumbling foundation wall for a home long since gone. We played in this area for a while, testing our paintball markers and generally enjoying a beautiful summer day. There were only three of us, so we felt free to do as we pleased. We began to walk up the hillside, angling back towards the vacation home and the trail, but moving higher in elevation.

     A few minutes later, we crossed the ridge line and were staring into a typical mountain cove. Rhododendron and laurels crowded the sides of the draw where a hidden creek surely ran. Tall oak and maple trees crowned the ridge, with blue sky visible through the canopy. But we, this group of young men enjoying a warm afternoon, were frozen. The darkness in this little cove was threatening. It had a solidity, and it seemed to pulse as we stared into it. It was big, seeming to swallow up the ridge behind it. 

     I've seen darkness like this twice before on hikes in this area. It's a darkness that seems to hide palpable terror. All three times, I have fled in fear from it. If I ever see it again, I will flee yet again. There's a natural human fear of these wet, dark places I suppose, and that fear is probably well founded. Snakes, spiders, these are the things that have reinforced this fear. But this darkness, this particular darkness, is not of that kind, it is something else. Something more ancient, maybe.

     I can't really explain any of this rationally. It's hard to sit here and write, "Three grown men were afraid of a dark spot on a mountain in the middle of the day." But that's what it is. Spend enough time outside and you might see it too. I won't even begin to try to rationalize what we saw or why it affected us so powerfully. I'll just say that we left, quickly and without speaking, and we all seemed to realize that to stay meant to give up, give in to it and maybe not come back. The Cherokee that lived here long before us spoke of places of power, both light and dark. That darkness still seems to haunt the mountains here.