Dara, Chapter One.
The front door creaked on its hinges as Dara inched it open. With her father working all week, she wanted to let him sleep in. In fact, she enjoyed having weekend mornings to herself, and especially enjoyed having today.
The sun was warm on her face and the highlights of her strawberry blonde hair glistened like specks of gold; it was the perfect October morning. And it was going to be a fine day by the look of things.
She took in a slow, deep, belly breath, the kind that helped her deal with the everyday stresses of this life - only now she did it to consume the beautiful sunshine and fresh air, exhaling the negative energy her nighttime fears had awoken her with almost every day for the past few years. Easing the door shut behind her, she took it all in – the strength and immensity of the oak tree in her front yard; the brightness and warmth of the morning sun; the rakes and lawn bags strewn across the neighboring yards, which were already becoming an afghan of fallen leaves.
Good morning, world. And happy birthday, Dara.
Dara allowed the door to close the rest of the way, the bolt catching with a gentle click. She waited momentarily, took one last breath, and satisfied she had executed her escape without waking her father, skipped down the porch steps.
A gray squirrel, clinging to a single acorn, ran in front of her. Dara smiled as it bounding across the driveway and up the oak tree, sending the swallows in the reddish-brown canopy into a raucous harmony of chirps and flapping wings. Dara cut across the side yard toward the woods, and the path that would take her to her destination.
Moose Wood Pond.
“Today is going to be a special day,” Dara exclaimed to the vast sky above her. Today would be different than all the days, and birthdays, that preceded it, that led to it, that laid the foundation for this day of days.
Dara’s birthday had always been bittersweet, commemorating both life and death. But there was something different about today. She could feel extra excitement in the tiny hairs on her neck, each one prickling her skin as if charged with electricity. What would today bring?
She couldn’t remember from anatomy class how many muscles it took for a face to form a smile, but she felt each and every one of them now, and knew that if she tried hard enough, she would be able to identify each one.
She saw her orange mountain bike on the side of the barn, the one that she still rode whenever she went downtown or just on a ride to get away. She never did feel comfortable driving Dad’s old pickup. Walking and riding her bike kept her connected to the world. She didn’t need the distraction of stop signs and radios.
Today Dara was eighteen. And though everything seemed picture-perfect on her little morning safari into the woods around Moose Wood Pond, lingering in the back of her mind, like a shadow in the corner of a cold, dark room, there was something that told her all was just as it should be, and that with the thrill of excitement lay the anxiousness of the unknown that was before her.
Because Dara knew from experience, that nothing was ever good for very long, especially on her birthday.
Dara had everything she knew she would need. Her backpack was filled with the requisite first aid items, a bag of homemade trail mix, three almost-frozen bottles of spring water, and the antique compass that had been in Dara’s mother’s family for generations. Dad would be bringing the flowers and picnic basket later.
Dara spotted her walking stick next to her bike and practically sprinted to it. She loved this knotted old stick. It had also been her mother’s. Dara couldn’t help but love nature and the outdoors. With her mother being a self-proclaimed “tree hugger” and her father having the relationship with the natural and spiritual world that she too inherited, Dara didn’t have a chance, and that was more than fine with her. Dara’s father gave her the compass and the walking a few years ago when he thought she was finally responsible enough to use the compass and tall enough to use the stick – or “guide” as Dara like to called it. And though it had seen better days - the weather having bleached it a chalky-white color - the two had shared enough adventures for her to even consider finding a newer one.
No, this was her stick, her guide, her protector. She had even added a rawhide wrist strap threaded through its grip where she and her father had taken turns whittling a hole by hand with their Swiss Army knife. Their initials were on it, as well as her mother’s, darkened with age, but perfectly legible, in fact, better than she remembered them.
Yes, this was a special day. This was to be their first adventure of her eighteenth year, the birthday she becomes an adult, the birthday that would begin a brand new phase of the journey. Dara wondered, “Old stick, can you feel just how important this day is?” A slight breeze blew tenderly past her, the swallows became louder, and another squirrel scurried by almost as if jumping for joy.
She looked at her watch – 8:00am – plenty of alone time before her father met her at Moose Wood Pond. She cherished her alone time; it allowed her to experience things that sometimes her dad couldn’t see. But even though she was now an adult, and knew the things she knew, and could see the things she saw, she knew she needed her father still. She felt there was still something important they were meant to do together. She felt like today might be that day she finally found out.
Dara started down the trail, her guide leading the way. The awakening woods, dressed in a thin morning mist, and shrouded in early morning shadows, swallowed her. And she willingly allowed it, breathing in all the senses around her until she came to the clearing.
Dara loved Moose Wood Pond. Her favorite place was underneath the magnificent oak tree that stood directly in the middle between the pond and the cemetery. Yes, she loved this tree. And she knew the tree loved her. He had been waiting for her and his leaves gently blew, whispering hello in a voice only she and her father could hear.
The magnificent white oak had become her favorite place since her father first brought her here on her fifth birthday. That was the morning she first walked with him from their yard to the trail that led through the woods to Moose Wood Pond and the clearing that held the giant oak tree. They had been to the cemetery many times, but accessing it from the dirt road down the street from their house.
From the first moment Dara spotted the oak, she knew he was special. He was the largest Dara had ever seen, larger than the one in her front yard. He stood in the clearing reaching towards the heavens, alone except for the wild flowers that grew near his roots. The woods surrounding the clearing and the oak seemed to stare at, as if waiting for something important to happen. Somehow Dara knew she and the oak would always be very good friends.
She loved the oak’s broad leaves and his strong, furrowed plates of grayish bark that covered him. She loved how he tenderly held the acorns until they were mature enough to fall to the earth. She loved how, even though his autumn color wasn’t as bright as the red maple’s, his leaves clung to him further into the autumn months, showing he could outlast them all.
But mostly, she loved his outstretched branches, arms that embraced every ray of sunshine, caught every drop of rain, and stood strong against every flake of snow that touched him.
Dara picked her guide off the ground and walked around to the front of the tree and touched his bark ever-so-gently with the whole of her hand and closed her eyes. “Good morning,” she said as gently as she was touching him. She heard, “Happy Birthday, Dara,” in the breath of the blowing leaves and opened her eyes. At the foot of the oak Dara noticed a odd, almost deliberate, pile of leaves. She somehow knew that under those leaves she would find something special.
“What’s this?” Dara asked. Even though she should be used to these kinds of things, every one filled her with the same sense of surprise. She looked up at the oak and sensed his joy as the sunshine beamed through his broad cover. She bent to the ground and, placing her guide by her side, sat cross-legged on the ground and began picking up the fragile leaves, one by one, trying hard to make sure they didn’t crumble in her hand.
“OH!” Dara gasped. “How beautiful.” Underneath there was a beautiful Tiger’s Eye pendant attached to the same kind of rawhide strap that was on her guide. She no longer questioned who these gifts were from. She knew they were part of her destiny, and she knew she could never question that.
Dara was now more excited than ever. She took the Tiger’s Eye necklace and placed it around her neck. The rawhide was warm against her neck, and as she let the Tiger’s Eye fall against her chest, she could feel its power surge through her and its protective aura surround her. Dara smiled. She was more certain than ever that this day, her eighteenth birthday, was exactly the day she thought it would be. A day filled with journey and discovery, and maybe even a little magic for good measure. That both frightened and exhilarated her.
