When: June 2013
Where: the Middle Fork of the Snoqualmie River
With: my partner, my friend Nina, and her friend Kyle
What: camping
Accompaniment: Shining by Islands
I was in desperate need of some outdoors time: we’d bought our house a couple months earlier, and were planning our wedding celebration for the end of the summer. The Middle Fork Snoqualmie River Valley isn’t far from Seattle, but the dirt road to reach it was more pothole than road and took an hour to drive the 17 miles to the campsite (it’s since been paved). One of the two sites was already taken when we arrived, a large creepy mask hanging from a tree as camp decor.
I poured myself out of the car and sucked in a breath of fresh mountain air. I could feel myself exhale stress with each breath. Camera in hand, I beelined into the forest to shoot photos. After an hour of soaking in the forest, I’d finally relaxed enough to come back and set up camp.
When our tents were up, the guy from the neighboring campsite wandered over to chat. In his fifties, with a face that wore all his years, he looked a little rough but was friendly if aloof. “They call me Strings,” he introduced himself, because he played guitar. He was there with his new girlfriend after what read between the lines like a bad divorce. We shared a cheers with our Longboards and he wandered off.
We relaxed with our beers, rousing ourselves enough to mosey down to a sitting spot along the river where someone had built a ring of large stone chairs. A swallowtail butterfly lit from columbine to columbine as we picked ripe salmonberries. The long warm day slowly faded to dusk. A large family with five or six cars pulled up into the bare space beyond Strings’ campsite, dumped wood on the ground, and lit a bonfire. They cranked up the tunes and had a party going in minutes.
Our campfire summoned Strings. He seemed determined to talk even though none of us were in the mood. My stomach was upset and I didn’t feel like entertaining a stranger. My partner filled in enough conversation to not be totally rude. Suddenly, a girl’s voice joined us from the darkness outside the fire. Strings must have brought his daughter, I thought, or his girlfriend was very young. A petite woman stepped into the light. Dark wavy hair down to her waist obscured her face. Giggling terrifyingly, she hung off of Strings. She tossed back her hair and revealed a face just as weathered as Strings’, shocking us in the contrast with her young voice.
Finally, they took the hint and excused themselves. Nearing midnight, still feeling bad, I asked my partner about heading home. We broke down the tent and tossed our gear in the car in record speed. My partner stopped by the bonfire to say farewell to Strings, who’d crashed the family party after ours. He couldn’t find Strings, but one of the guys, pissed, grabbed my partner and pointed. “Who the hell is that? She with you?” Strings’s girlfriend was wearing the mask we’d seen earlier, laughing shrilly as she cavorted around their fire like a demon in Fantasia’s Night on Bald Mountain. My partner threw up his hands — not with me! — and skedaddled. He hopped in the waiting car and we hightailed it out, my favorite CD playing for the long drive back to the highway.
