Authors' Row

Those who know me well, know that I can be a bit directionally challenged. It's not my fault, really. It's the roads. They never go in the direction one would think they'd go. They veer east to go south and north to go west. If you could raze all building and tell me my destination was two miles west, I'd have no problem.

Amend that.

Raze all trees too.

And set up landmarks.

Big ones.

With arrows.

After our second musket firing demonstration, the kids and I loaded up into Cam's mini van and I began the disorienting task of trying to find my way using a map, my phone's GPS, and road signs.

We got lost, of course.

Still, every time I thought the situation was hopeless, I'd wander past a landmark on our list. And twice past Walden Pond looking like a haven for mosquitoes in the wet summer air.

First up was Orchard House which I wrote about in great detail over at Write on Edge.

The brightly colored lilies flowed around the frame between the door. Brilliant gold contrasted with snow white on a dark background of deep purples and greens. Between the window was a small desk, a space no bigger than a night stand. White wood. No shelves. Low to the floor. It looked out through windows wavy with age. A small front yard filled with flowers and small trees gave way to a street and then more buildings. 

But it wasn’t always like that. 

At one time, the windows looked out over treeless meadows. At one time, sitting at that desk, fingers stained in ink and pages filled with flowing script, a woman looked out the window and paused in thought, perhaps seeing her friend Henry strolling past. Noise from dinner being cooked competed with the sound of feet tapping up and down the stairs. The smell of paint and the scratch of charcoal from the next room combined with the murmur of deep voices.
I ran my fingers over the smooth white wood and felt the vibrations of imagination, talent, and work. It was where Louisa May Alcott wrote, this small room on the second story of a home restored by her father. It was here her muse danced between rooms to her actress sister and her painter sister. It was here where the ghost of her beloved baby sister whispered in her ear. 

To be able to feel the magic of a home filled with love and talent was an amazing experience. The kids were game for anything, happily jumping out of the van and sitting through videos detailing Louisa May Alcott's life.

Afterwards, we drove into Concord, where I again got lost, but found an ice cream shop which means I was probably never lost to begin with.

After ice cream, I decided being on foot was a safer proposition and off we went to find Authors' Row in the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery.

We walked under dripping pine trees and across soft grass. We peered at the tombstones dating to the 18th century. We backed away from statues sure to be Weeping Angels and climbed the stone steps of war memorials. The cemetery echoed with the laughter of children leading me to wonder about the ghosts in the vapor of the heavy mist. Did they smile?

I want to think they did.

We paid our respects to Thoreau, to Alcott, to Emerson. We left pine cones and twigs on humble stones and walked quickly back to where I'd left the minivan, parked in front of a stone building with no name.

Back in the car, we drove and came upon the North Bridge the way we'd come upon the cemetery and Orchard House: by complete accident and only after we'd passed the entrance.

We turned around in the parking lot of a private school and found our way back. Disembarking, we crossed the street and walked the final steps of Battle Road to the arched North Bridge. We stood at the top as a group of nuns walked past in their wimples and habits. I imagined a time when every breath was held, a time when sweat beaded on the brows of men who knew, somehow, that this was the moment to turn the path of history. We crossed the bridge and looked back the way we'd come, the top windows and dock of the Manse in full view.

What must it have been like for Reverend Emerson to see the British soldiers in formation on one side of the bridge while the Colonial militia stood on the other?

We crossed back over where the nuns were still talking to the ranger and took the river path to the Manse.

We didn't go in. The kids, by this point, were beyond exhausted. They rolled in the grass and chased each other around trees. I had a feeling Emerson and Hawthorne would look upon them in amusement. I hope they would chuckle as Joseph darted behind a large tree to use the "facilities". These were, after all, men with children and, I'd like to think, a sense of humor.

I wandered the garden at the Manse - a massive vegetable garden filled with towering corn, twining beans, and plump squash. I spoke to the woman tending it who told me it had been a wedding gift to Hawthorne and his wife when they lived at the Manse for three years.

I wonder...what must if have been like at Authors' Row?

Not the cemetery plot, but the town of Concord during that time period.

The Alcotts - Louisa, a former Civil War nurse who penned books based on her family's life, May a gifted painter, and Anna who formed a play company; Nathaniel and his wife welcoming their children living in the Alcott's former home while he wrote The Life of Franklin Pierce; Ralph Waldo Emerson in the midst of the Transcendental movement, his poetry already well-known receiving letters from Walt Whitman; Henry Thoreau swimming in Walden Pond and walking from his cabin in the woods to the Alcott's house where he described cobwebs as "lost fairy handkerchiefs" to Louisa.

The very thought of it sends chills down my back. Did they know, those men and women, that they were shaping American literature? Were they aware of how amazing it is that they four lived in the same small New England town?

I drove away from the Manse with a sense of wonder.

And three very, very tired children.