Place 11: Opening

Tuesday November 17, 2009 1:32pm

On the way to the clearing today I noticed the evergreens in the cemetery more than ever before. When the deciduous trees still had their leaves the evergreens faded into the background. For the first time today I started to notice the different shapes and colors of the evergreens – full and pyramidal or spindly and asymmetrical, with undertones of blue or violet or rust. The shapes and attitudes of the bare trees are becoming more familiar too. I notice that some have straight, smooth branches splayed heavenward like gigantic brooms and others are twisted, knobbly and curving. With some practice I think I might be able to identify them even in winter.

Today is windy and colder than it looked from inside my car, despite the blue skies and warm sunshine. As I enter the clearing the wind gusts strong and rattling, blowing away the sun that is trying to warm me. The clearing feels so much more open this week, like the walls have all come down. Now on every side I can see clearly the landscape beyond the trees. The boundaries of this place have all but disappeared. When I look towards the gate, this is what I see:

Looking into the ravine this week, the way down is perfectly clear. All obstructions have vanished. I see another part of the cemetery stretching out below and I see streets and houses beyond that. Next week I want to finally go down the ravine to explore.

Although most of the branches in the clearing are bare, some leaves still hang on. When the sun hits these leaves they shine out golden against the backdrop of gray branches crisscrossing sky.

There aren’t nearly as many fallen leaves on the ground this week. They must have been raked up or blown away with leaf blowers. I saw several groundskeepers blowing leaves when I came into the cemetery. The clearing floor looks better than it has in a long time – it has reverted to the dry, cracked light-brown soil that it had when I first came here. The tire tracks and the puddles that had collected in them are hardly visible. The expanse of dry soil soothes me.

I wonder how I would have conceived of this place if I had come to it first in winter; maybe I wouldn’t have called it a clearing at all. The way we first see something has such an effect on how we view it after that. I think this is true with people as well as places. When I’ve known someone for a long time, I see them as a kind of composite of their past and present selves. I lose the ability to see them with new eyes. When I look at my clearing now it is with an awareness of its other seasonal identities. I see it lush with green leaves; brilliant with yellow, orange and red; bare and open – all at the same time. Time and repetition create this layering. Having spent almost my whole life in Pittsburgh, I walk through these layers everywhere. But the layers are internal too – I’ve walked into them in first-time places, and on the other side of the world.