Moonlight and Magic

Photo copyright Charley Freiberg 2016

Eddie B, our out-back neighbor (naybah, if you want to pronounce it properly), has a fine eye for enhancing his natural surroundings, as well as building interesting stuff. After he accidentally burned down the old farmhouse he'd bought (turns out you really shouldn't burn a field when there's a breeze), over the years he has slowly restored the barn into a thing of beauty, cobbled together several small huts into a very interesting cottage, built a footbridge or two over the brook that runs mossily past barn and cottage and beyond, cut back crowded trees so there's a pastoral distance on which the eye can rest, and turned some really mucky spots into lovely ponds by scooping out enough dirt so the natural springs could form an outletted pond or two.  At one point, he even installed in his flower garden a hot tub heated by woodstove, which gave rise, before we knew better, to the hopeful rumor that he was building a still.

I should back up a moment and tell you, first, that the husband and I live on a small in-land island, which we share with the next-door neighbor and the across-the-street neighbor. The brook that runs down the state road and eventually turns into the interesting marsh that spreads out behind the town hall and library before tumbling downhill, in a faster and more furious pour, to eventually join the Blackwater River, splits just north of the marsh, and one branch runs under the road, makes a small pond next to my kitchen door, travels in a half circle under the trees behind my house, then forms another pond before running back under the road and joining the marsh. Along the tree-shaded, secret banks of our "moat" grow marsh marigolds, cattails, ferns, swamp alder and skunk cabbages,  and deep within live tree frogs, spring peepers, a summer chorus of toads, the occasional duck or heron or beaver, probably some fish, definitely some water lilies, and one heck of a big old-lady snapping turtle who emerges around this time of year to lay her eggs in the sandy spot near my front door, where she's laid them for what could be 50 years or longer.

Years ago, we tugged a discarded telephone pole across a narrow spot in the moat, and used it to get to Eddie B's swimming pond through our wooded back 40. We don't go that way anymore (ticks); one wicked slip and nasty sprained ankle (ticks) convinced me, at any rate, that going the long way around, down the state road past the last island pond then down the dirt road that curves behind our woods (ticks) and past Eddie B's barn, is the better way to go, and the aging dogs agree (ticks, ticks, ticks). 

There's another reason to go the long way: Eddie has strung the whole length of his property along the dirt road, and all around the swimming pond, with electrified lanterns that hang from trees. In the dusk they slowly come on, and by dark they're a lovely sight to see.

When mosquitoes, ice, or freezing temperatures aren't too bad, Abu Dhoggi and I will take a full-moon walk to Eddie B's pond, late enough in the night so we're unlikely to meet any late vehicular travelers. I put a flashlight in my pocket for just in case, but we want to travel solely by moonlight if we can, because the world, on a full-moon night at midnight or later, is a truly magical place. On a likely night, I'll tiptoe up to Abu (we don't want to wake up his brother hound, who would bark all the way there and back) and mouth "Wanna go for a walk?" He knows - he tiptoes behind me to the door, stifling excited  throat noises, and once we're out the door, starts to dance with full-moon joy. 

My driveway is long, and the streetlight next to the across-the-street neighbor's house is pretty well hidden until we emerge from the trees at the end of the drive. Before we get that far, our field is lit up almost bright as day, with sparkling diamonds overhead. On a full-moon night, it can be bright enough to see individual leaves on trees; birches shine; it can be almost bright enough to see color. The color is there, but it's very different from daylight color, and the dark places, under the canopy of the trees, can be very dark, indeed. There is adventure, and strangeness, and unknown things, all around.

Sounds are heightened: the summer night chorus of toads trilling their songs could lead you on and on, into the dark stream, luring you into enchantment. The little snuffling noises on all sides - a sudden lingering, musky scent - a crackle and snap to one side - my imagination skitters into memories of all the stories I've ever heard about humans who stumbled onto fairy doings and were carried away, never to be seen again. Finally, we're at the road, and for a few yards until we turn onto the dirt road, the streetlight almost normalizes my senses. But soon we come to the part of the road where the tree canopy closes over us, and cuts off the light from the moon above, and we've walked beyond the lit-up land. It's dark - it's very dark - and far ahead, as if through a veil, I can see light, where the tree-tops open out at Eddie's pond, and just before, where little glimmers from the lanterns wink palely like the eyes of watching creatures.

At this point, I freak out - which, honestly, is part of the entertainment. There's a place half-way between the street-light bright corner and the moon-light glowing open sky, where distance and depth perception and common sense all fail, especially when it's one of those gloriously beautiful nights when ground fog slips across the fields, winds through the trees and whispers into the road, and mist rises from the pond like a living being. My brain goes all primitive, I try to take comfort from Abu, whose nose has detected nothing stranger than the night creatures who move through the dark, but in and out of my mind flash: Aliens! Monsters! Run, run!

I don't - nor do I pull out the flashlight. Walk through the veil, into the light, I tell myself; and eventually, we do: and the glitter of the stars above, and the glitter of the lanterns ringing the pond, and the starkly glowing shapes of trees and rocks and the curve in the road by Eddie's barn, where the sleepy noises of goats and hens are barely audible, is like a thunderclap of beauty in my heart. This walk is soooo worth it!

Photo copyright Charley Freiberg

One moon-walk night, in the spring, on a warm evening after a rainy day with a huge moon hanging overhead, as we passed through that veil from deep darkness into light, my heart jumped into my throat. There, in the road, were dozens of glowing yellow spots, all moving! Not possible! my mind screamed. And yet - there they were! A quick look at Abu, who was totally unconcerned and wanting to get to the pond. Out came the flashlight - the yellow dots were all on black, nearly invisible creatures! Argh! Run!

It took a few moments, but eventually my rational mind convinced my primitive mind that these bizarre creatures couldn't be something scary - after all, I hadn't been eaten yet. And yet - and yet-

Later, safely back home, a quick search identified the magical moving dots: they were yellow-spotted salamanders. They are shy creatures that travel at night, in spring, after rain has made their paths wet enough for safe journeying. Ever since, I've hoped that on another full-moon walk the stars, or spots, will be in alignment and I might get another glimpse. 

Our world is a magical place, and the night world even more so, where toads sing arias, yellow spots glow under the moonlight and travel to ponds, and unseen wildings snuffle and sigh around trees whose bark shines brightly and whose leaves look wholly different from their day-time selves. I'm fairly certain I grow a little furry myself, during these full-moon walks.

Originally printed in the Concord Monitor, June 29, 2016, as “The Magic That Lurks.”