A Walk in the Woods

snow. The talk was all of the weather. There was no telling when we would get out of
here. It was impossible not to feel trapped.
We spent a wretched night in our bunks, faintly lit by the dancing glow of the stove--
which the timid man (unable or reluctant to sleep with the restless mass of Katz bowing
the slats just above his head) diligently kept stoked--and wrapped in a breathy, communal
symphony of nighttime noises--sighs, weary exhalations, dredging snores, a steady dying
moan from the man who had eaten the Philly cheese steak sandwich, the monotone hiss
of the stove, like the soundtrack of an old movie. We woke, stiff and unrested, to a
gloomy dawn of falling snow and the dispiriting prospect of a long, long day with nothing
to do but hang out at the camp store or lie on a bunkbed reading old Reader's Digests,
which filled a small shelf by the door. Then word came that an industrious youth named
Zack from one of the cabins had somehow gotten to Franklin and rented a minivan and
was offering to take anyone to town for $5. There was a virtual stampede. To the dismay
and disgust of Buddy and Jensine, practically everyone paid up and left. Fourteen of us
packed into the minivan and started on the long descent to Franklin, in a snowless valley
far below.
And so we had a little holiday in Franklin, which was small, dull, and cautiously
unattractive, but mostly dull--the sort of place where you find yourself, for want of
anything better to do, strolling out to the lumberyard to watch guys on forklifts shunting
wood about. There wasn't a thing in the way of diversions, nowhere to buy a book or
even a magazine that didn't involve speedboats, customized cars, or guns and ammo. The
town was full of hikers like us who had been driven down from the hills and had nothing
to do but hang out listlessly in the diner or launderette and two or three times a day make
a pilgrimage to the far end of Main Street to stare forlornly at the distant, snow-draped,
patently impassable peaks. The outlook was not good. There were rumors of seven-foot
drifts in the Smokies. It could be days before the trail was passable again.
I was plunged into a restless funk by this, heightened by the realization that Katz was
verily in heaven at the prospect of several days idling in a town, on vacation from purpose
and exertion, trying out various attitudes of repose. To my intense vexation, he had even
bought a TV Guide, to plan his viewing more effectively over the coming days.
I wanted to get back on the trail, to knock off miles. It was what we did. Besides, I was
bored to a point somewhat beyond being bored out of my mind. I was reading restaurant
place mats, then turning them over to see if there was anything on the back. At the
lumberyard I talked to workmen through the fence. Late on the third afternoon I stood in
a Burger King and studied, with absorption, the photographs of the manager and his
executive crew (reflecting on the curious fact that people who go into hamburger
management always look as if their mother slept with Goofy), then slid one pace to the
right to examine the Employee of the Month awards. It was then I realized I had to get
out of Franklin.
Twenty minutes later I announced to Katz that we were returning to the trail in the
morning. He was, of course, astounded and dismayed. "But it's the 'X-Files' on Friday," he
sputtered. "I just bought cream soda."
"The disappointment must be crushing," I replied with a thin, heartless smile.
"But the snow. We'll never get through."