The Drummer
There aren’t many dirt roads left in Lazarus County. People got tired of them. They said paved roads were better for the body. You didn’t have all that dust flying into your lungs for miles and miles on. Your bones weren’t shattered every ride down the streets. That’s what they said, but we knew that wasn’t what they meant. It was children like me that realized paved roads were better for cars. And all them rich folks in Lazarus County loved their cars. The paved roads were better for business and the fast track of life. Folks said times were changing; property would be more valuable on paved roads. It was kids like me that lost the most.
Looking back, I remember we spent all our summer days and many of our winter ones (Lazarus County was a very warm place) in the woods. I wouldn’t be an honest man today if I didn’t say it was more than a playground, it was our heart beat. We believed a drummer lived in the forest. He kept the forest alive.
With all the hate of losing a friend like the forest, we never blamed her. She tried to do good by showing people what they really wanted. But people are mysterious, they saw right through her but she never knew that and we never told. All her arguments backfired and she made a winner out of a most unlikely scenario. Some days I wish she had never seen me and other days I was glad she had. She was driving down that lonely road, the only road in this part of Lazarus County. “Excuse me sir” she said in voice that you knew had been prepped and mastered so that even her stutters would at least sound like it was a word, and you the listener would believe you just weren’t on the same page in the English dictionary as this women “Can you tell me where this road is going?” I looked at her in her sleek leather black Cadillac, a car that would raise up every family in Lazarus County out of debt for at least a quarter of a year. I looked down the road, I don’t know why. I live on this road. I could read it like a book. It wasn’t saying anything today though. I looked back at her and said “The road don’t look like it go’n nowhere.” She just smiled; she had meet people like me before. “You know what I mean” she said.
“It don’t matter where it’s go’n, you won’t get there today”.
“Is it that long?”
“No. The bridge is out five miles from here. You couldn’t get that car across unless it can fly”
“Look here…ah… sorry I don’t know your name”
“The names Douglas” I said as I put out my hand. “Sonya” she said. “Well Sonya, where do need to be?”
“Lazarus County”
“What part?”
“Kipaco”
“You can’t get there from anywhere around here. Your gona have to turn around and go back. But either way you won’t make it today”
“That’s great, just great. And I really appreciate the encouragement”
“You’re welcome”
“You ever heard of sarcasm?”
“No. Who is he?”
And that is how I met Sonya, the one who burned Lazarus County. It turned out she wasn’t just anybody. She was the chair of a committee requested by the Lazarus County mayor. This committee from the state was on visit to Lazarus County to advise the citizens in responsible sustainable economic growth, what ever that means. The committee killed the forest and they killed the drummer. We found him by a tree stump. He didn’t look so good but then neither would I if I had a run in with a chainsaw. The committee advised the people to invest in business, infrastructure, and development. They said towns like Kipaco, and Otiwa need shopping malls and large streets. But it didn’t end there. They said we need cars to fill the streets, mills to make products for the shops, factories to make the cars, and large luxury hotels to attract the rich. The worst part wasn’t that it sounded bad or that the change would reshape the landscape of Lazarus County unlike it has been for the last two hundred years, the worst was that they believed them. My own county, my own family, friends, and neighbors believed them.
I left Lazarus County soon after that. I had to get away from the smooth dirt roads, the trees bending over those roads, and the fresh air that never seemed to fill the space. It was all going to be gone soon and I didn’t want to see them go. I traveled all over the country, east to Vermont and Maine, then south through Virginia and North Carolina, after that west by Kentucky, Utah, and ended in the Pacific Ocean. Hey it was a bleak journey. I tried to run from something I could not stop and found that everywhere I went already had it. I wasn’t going back. I know seeing a change at home would be harder than seeing a change in the rest of the world.
I saw a picture that reminded me of home the other day. It was a simple picture of a dirt road through a forest. In my mind the forest was alive but the road wasn’t. I hated that painting. It was ugly. It was wrong. The paint job was terrible. Trees don’t look like a stick with one giant leaf on it and roads aren’t that perfect. They have divots that you drive your car into, potholes you fall through into some unknown cavern deep below, and they have the scent of cars. The roads are hungry for cars. The more cars the more popular the road and who doesn’t want to be popular?
I heard from friends back in Lazarus County the other day. Apparently there aren’t many left there. Most people in Lazarus County come for good life promised by all of the Lazarus County Economic Council media propaganda. Lazarus County has changed alright and it wasn’t for the better. Everybody in Lazarus County is rich or so I hear. They buy rich cream from a farm two states away, drive in Cadillac and Rolls Royce on nice paved roads, and no one is unhappy. That’s what I hear. But if truth be told the town can’t hold. There is not such thing as sustainable economic growth. The people are poor, there pockets are full but they are dirt poor.
The news of home put me in the dump. It was while I was walking through the redwood forests I met an old friend. He said he couldn’t stay long, he had things to see and places to be but he wanted to share something with me. He told me wherever roads thrive, forest die. When the forest dies the drummer dies. Without a drummer there is no heart beat. He tired to give me his drum but I told him I played off beat. He smiled and pointed to my heart. “That is your drum. Let people hear it” he said as he disappeared into the forest. To this day I am not sure what the drummer looked like or whether I really met him. I realized then I didn’t even have a cent to my name but unlike the people of my hometown I am the richest man in the world.
I didn’t expect to see her again. I didn’t recognize her; she had changed so much. She had lost that stern business like appearance but she had noticed me. She said I hadn’t changed a bit. This was the day I learned she didn’t start the fire that consumed Lazarus County. We did. The citizens of Lazarus County did it. She said it was never suppose to go that way but when she showed them what Lazarus County would be as big city and what it was like then, the city seemed to appeal to them more. Strange really, none of them had even ever been to a metropolis. Sonya is an artist now. She showed me one of her paintings. It was that one of the dirt road. I told her it dripped of sour honey. “You know it’s called kindness not to say things if you don’t have anything nice to say” she said.
“No” I said “I think that’s called wisdom”
“Really now? Does that mean you lack wisdom?”
“It might but I try not to think too much about it”
“It might help”
“What?”
“Thinking”
“Oh” I said. We stood there in silence there for while. She had nothing to say and I was glad. Then I noticed another picture on the wall behind her. It was of the beach and the ocean. There was a small child squatting on the beach. The child was all alone. It was just him, the sea, and the beach. I pointed at and said “That’s beautiful”. She just smiled and said thanks. I moved on and noticed that her gallery had a courtyard in back. In the middle was a large beautiful rowan tree. Sonya came to the window and said “It’s for drummer”. “I know” I said.
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