WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.200 --> 00:00:08.119 Hello, I'm welcomed stories all the time. The lad you 2 00:00:08.160 --> 00:00:11.839 are here, Let's get into it. It started trivially enough, 3 00:00:11.960 --> 00:00:13.839 with a festival trivia packet and a mug of too 4 00:00:13.880 --> 00:00:16.640 hot tea. I was sitting at my guard kitchen table, 5 00:00:16.760 --> 00:00:19.399 patchwork of plays mus beneath scattered duplicate fliers about the 6 00:00:19.399 --> 00:00:21.679 Wilhelmre Festival, wincing a bit at the heat, enjoying the 7 00:00:21.760 --> 00:00:24.920 hush that happens in a house before summrise. Outside the 8 00:00:25.000 --> 00:00:27.239 river Miss presided a soft and hurry, the kind of 9 00:00:27.320 --> 00:00:29.359 June morning that made me nostalgic for the field trips 10 00:00:29.359 --> 00:00:31.960 I had orchestrated as a geography teacher, bundles of children, 11 00:00:32.039 --> 00:00:35.280 all compasses, and every time a riverside work that proved 12 00:00:35.359 --> 00:00:37.159 at least to me that a map isn't just a 13 00:00:37.159 --> 00:00:39.759 piece of paper at a living memory. I didn't feel 14 00:00:39.799 --> 00:00:43.200 quite so philosophical that morning. My team, three time defending 15 00:00:43.200 --> 00:00:46.359 trivia champions of Badge, my teammates Kuigan Sandra Wore, with 16 00:00:46.359 --> 00:00:48.439 bursts of pride and embarrassment, were counting on me to 17 00:00:48.479 --> 00:00:51.560 come through the new festival question set. I did as 18 00:00:51.600 --> 00:00:54.679 was my ritual, annotating margin notes and bracting questions I 19 00:00:54.719 --> 00:00:56.880 thought might stump the Archdart High School is rumored to 20 00:00:56.920 --> 00:00:59.399 be gunning for us this year. Halfway through the local 21 00:00:59.479 --> 00:01:02.799 landmark's my pen stopped short. Where was the willowm of 22 00:01:02.840 --> 00:01:06.120 footbridge built? The question reyed, cheerful as ever, I sepped, 23 00:01:06.280 --> 00:01:08.040 maybe too quickly, burnt my lip and blinked at the 24 00:01:08.079 --> 00:01:10.799 answer printed just below, as always provided for the judges 25 00:01:10.799 --> 00:01:14.640 and volunteers, by the willow grove near Harborson's mill, down 26 00:01:14.680 --> 00:01:17.760 stream of the boat house. That was plainly, flatly wrong, 27 00:01:18.319 --> 00:01:20.480 not even a debatable sort of rome, not the kind 28 00:01:20.519 --> 00:01:22.719 of rural legend that gets puffed up by five townies 29 00:01:22.799 --> 00:01:26.760 or to handans over Coalbier's Wilhelmmere footbridge, I would have argued, 30 00:01:27.159 --> 00:01:29.400 was built just upstream of the town green, beside the 31 00:01:29.439 --> 00:01:31.560 oldest willow, the one with the nott shaped according to 32 00:01:31.560 --> 00:01:34.400 playground law like a hawk's eye. You could stand on 33 00:01:34.480 --> 00:01:37.159 that bridge and see north and west the back path 34 00:01:37.200 --> 00:01:39.840 to the library in Southwark, the very field where thirty 35 00:01:39.879 --> 00:01:42.280 years ago Gregg broke his arm daring Sandra to leave 36 00:01:42.319 --> 00:01:45.599 from the railing. Had I imagine that? I thumbed through 37 00:01:45.640 --> 00:01:47.799 the rest of the pack, expecting more errors, maybe some 38 00:01:47.879 --> 00:01:50.879 clever festival committee trick, but the rest fell into sensible order. 39 00:01:50.920 --> 00:01:52.959 The marble angel on the church or at obelisk, the 40 00:01:53.040 --> 00:01:55.159 years of the great floods, the number of bells in 41 00:01:55.159 --> 00:01:58.040 the town holky polo, which was invariably one fewer than 42 00:01:58.079 --> 00:02:01.239 people guessed. Yet everywhere the bridge appeared it was down 43 00:02:01.280 --> 00:02:04.239 stream by Harbison's mill. I set the packet on the table, 44 00:02:04.400 --> 00:02:07.760 wiped my glasses reflexively, and pulled the thick festival flya closer. 45 00:02:08.439 --> 00:02:11.479 It too, boasted winking illustrations, a float shaped like the 46 00:02:11.479 --> 00:02:15.919 bridge children, someone costumed as a fish, the bridge unmistakably 47 00:02:16.000 --> 00:02:19.159 bob beside the red clapboard boat house, willow branches arching 48 00:02:19.199 --> 00:02:22.039 from my distance. I flicked over to the town website 49 00:02:22.039 --> 00:02:24.719 on my laptop found the landmarks of willelmer Page and 50 00:02:24.759 --> 00:02:28.479 un yes, same again aneath the mail labeled willelmy foot 51 00:02:28.479 --> 00:02:31.280 Bridge E. S D. Nineteen o six, down stream by 52 00:02:31.280 --> 00:02:33.960 Harbison's Mill. This was not the sort of air one 53 00:02:33.960 --> 00:02:37.120 simply corrects with the phone call. My cup was already colling. 54 00:02:37.680 --> 00:02:40.599 I quick stepped to the fridge, run fingers over fading magnates, 55 00:02:40.759 --> 00:02:43.280 and zeroed in on the hod Putcher family snapshots, trivia 56 00:02:43.360 --> 00:02:45.520 night photos, and either at the edge, a blurry shot 57 00:02:45.520 --> 00:02:47.000 of a town parade from what must have been the 58 00:02:47.039 --> 00:02:49.759 late nineties. It would have been perfect, but the crowd 59 00:02:49.759 --> 00:02:52.759 blocked the bridge almost entirely. Maybe the very tip of 60 00:02:52.759 --> 00:02:55.719 the railing shirt may be not I appeared, hoping for 61 00:02:55.759 --> 00:03:00.400 contacts clues. Was that no, just Sander's outlandish hat, not 62 00:03:00.520 --> 00:03:02.840 even a sliver of willow or boat house for reference. 63 00:03:03.599 --> 00:03:05.919 Standing in the kitchen with the refrigerators hum in the 64 00:03:05.919 --> 00:03:08.719 brightening sky outside, I had a distinct, irrational sense of 65 00:03:08.759 --> 00:03:13.479 something misaligned. Of course, towns changed, rivers shifted their courses, 66 00:03:14.120 --> 00:03:17.159 but bridges, their places felt in my mind as fix 67 00:03:17.199 --> 00:03:20.120 as the names of my childhood friends. Still here was 68 00:03:20.159 --> 00:03:23.199 every one else, flyers, web sites, perhaps the very past 69 00:03:23.199 --> 00:03:27.199 itself insisting otherwise, That morning became for me the opening 70 00:03:27.240 --> 00:03:30.599 of a mild, persistent ditch. Not panic, certainly not fear, 71 00:03:31.319 --> 00:03:34.319 something much stranger, gentler at the world arranging itself, ever 72 00:03:34.400 --> 00:03:37.199 so slightly differently than I remembered. It would not be 73 00:03:37.240 --> 00:03:39.479 solved by rummaging in my kitchen. Of the high was certain, 74 00:03:39.919 --> 00:03:42.439 but it was a start. Will Omeer is the sort 75 00:03:42.520 --> 00:03:44.800 place most people imagine when they picture a typical in 76 00:03:44.840 --> 00:03:47.520 New England's Moltwn, except that no two residents can agree 77 00:03:47.560 --> 00:03:50.800 which particular features give it the feeling were famous in 78 00:03:50.840 --> 00:03:53.400 a modest way, it really means unremarkably steady for our 79 00:03:53.479 --> 00:03:56.479 river side landscape, clapboard houses and the sort of flower 80 00:03:56.479 --> 00:03:59.039 baskets that sprout over night along fences in lamposts every 81 00:03:59.039 --> 00:04:02.039 early June. The river a generous snake of water curves 82 00:04:02.080 --> 00:04:04.719 right through the heart of ten Though here too argument 83 00:04:04.759 --> 00:04:07.360 creeps in, since some residents claim it by sex wilhelmyre 84 00:04:07.360 --> 00:04:10.520 while others insist it only skirts alongside. All of us 85 00:04:10.560 --> 00:04:13.879 agree at least that the footbridge matters. It's difficult to 86 00:04:13.919 --> 00:04:16.600 overstate to outsiders how constant A presents the bridge is 87 00:04:17.240 --> 00:04:20.519 before phones, before GBS, before a town wide WiFi experiment 88 00:04:20.560 --> 00:04:23.040 that flop with comic grindor wilhelmyrefoot brige served as on 89 00:04:23.120 --> 00:04:27.800 nucleus alink literally and symbolically between neighborhoods, between generations. The 90 00:04:27.839 --> 00:04:30.759 annual River Festival re enacts roughly to building of the bridge. 91 00:04:30.920 --> 00:04:33.600 Every third business features a stylized arch in the window 92 00:04:33.680 --> 00:04:36.759 or a water colored mule homage Our school's logo is 93 00:04:36.800 --> 00:04:40.759 a cartoon bridge. I have in my house coasters, mugs 94 00:04:40.800 --> 00:04:44.279 and even an umbrella festuned with little footbridges. Trivia night 95 00:04:44.480 --> 00:04:46.680 when we becked the championship, it was with a question 96 00:04:46.720 --> 00:04:48.959 about the nineteen sixty eight refit of the handrails, a 97 00:04:49.040 --> 00:04:51.240 question now up until that morning, I have bet my 98 00:04:51.279 --> 00:04:55.319 reputation on the calling perfectly. I am Ellen Arkwart. I 99 00:04:55.319 --> 00:04:57.720 taught geography at Wilolmire Middle for thirty three years and 100 00:04:57.759 --> 00:04:59.639 have lived on Kele Street, two blocks from the river 101 00:05:00.000 --> 00:05:02.399 once before I married Henry Hugh. For all his accountants 102 00:05:02.439 --> 00:05:05.680 precision never much cared for town linemarks unless they factored 103 00:05:05.680 --> 00:05:08.360 into a spreadsheet. It is impossible to walk through my 104 00:05:08.439 --> 00:05:11.959 daily routines without encountering the river or its crossing. Mornings 105 00:05:12.000 --> 00:05:14.199 find me pacing the same loop of trace for decades, 106 00:05:14.240 --> 00:05:16.439 down toward the weeping willow at the first bend over 107 00:05:16.639 --> 00:05:19.519 or Nero impertinence, the spot where the bridge once or 108 00:05:19.560 --> 00:05:23.079 always was past ELS's vickery, still run by Elsa's granddaughter, 109 00:05:23.319 --> 00:05:25.399 just as formidable, Then back up through the greenwood the 110 00:05:25.399 --> 00:05:28.519 town hosts its summer concerts. The roles in my social 111 00:05:28.560 --> 00:05:32.000 circle are equally fixed. Gregg allis my friend since before 112 00:05:32.040 --> 00:05:34.879 the town voted in colored recycling Bins helms the circulation 113 00:05:35.000 --> 00:05:37.600 desk at the library and remembers every overdubic bus scent 114 00:05:37.680 --> 00:05:41.279 and story, if not by call number. Sandra Marsden Hardware 115 00:05:41.279 --> 00:05:43.680 Mavern and sometimes sparring partner Winter Bates heat Up at 116 00:05:43.680 --> 00:05:46.000 the coffee shop, possesses a memory for ob all local 117 00:05:46.079 --> 00:05:49.160 history details that leaves most people flabbergascided, though truthfully she 118 00:05:49.199 --> 00:05:53.199 sometimes embellishes with as much confidence as accuracy. Another fixture 119 00:05:53.240 --> 00:05:56.040 is Lenn Farrell, head of the Willemere Historical Society. No 120 00:05:56.120 --> 00:05:58.480 One for his near fanatical insistence on cross checking every 121 00:05:58.519 --> 00:06:01.720 anecdote against original sources, be a century old handbulls or, 122 00:06:01.759 --> 00:06:04.160 in one case, a what proof section of fence rumor 123 00:06:04.240 --> 00:06:07.240 to have survived the thirty four flat, then's opinions run 124 00:06:07.240 --> 00:06:09.839 to the particular. He neither indulges rumors nor discounts at 125 00:06:09.879 --> 00:06:12.160 what most people say can be oppotent force for error. 126 00:06:12.759 --> 00:06:14.720 I've known him to squint through a hundred photos of 127 00:06:14.759 --> 00:06:17.240 the same event, hunting one missing lamp post rather than 128 00:06:17.240 --> 00:06:21.639 conceded detail, and lately, under the festival's blossoming Marsilynn has 129 00:06:21.639 --> 00:06:25.240 burst onto the senor dynamo hire to coordinate floats, manage schedules, 130 00:06:25.319 --> 00:06:27.680 and create color coded plans that put even my methodical 131 00:06:27.720 --> 00:06:31.439 mind to shame. Marsi arrived a decade ago, young, breezy, 132 00:06:31.560 --> 00:06:34.279 with the diplomat's neck for smoothing conflicts before others even 133 00:06:34.319 --> 00:06:38.040 noticed Fisher's forming. As the festival approached, Wilhelm misweled with 134 00:06:38.079 --> 00:06:41.759 anticipation and routine. Children rehearsed acts for the parade. Neighbors, 135 00:06:41.800 --> 00:06:45.439 tide bunting, sweat stoops, baking, probable quantities of lemon bars. 136 00:06:45.879 --> 00:06:48.040 My river walks grew lively as floats took shape and 137 00:06:48.079 --> 00:06:51.279 driveries voices carrying rumors willow mere specialty about which goal 138 00:06:51.319 --> 00:06:54.040 would win best display whose garden had best survived the winter. 139 00:06:54.759 --> 00:06:58.120 The bridge naturally occurred in almost every conversation, as if 140 00:06:58.120 --> 00:07:00.759 no event could begin or end without referencing its existence. 141 00:07:01.439 --> 00:07:03.959 I overheard everything from will meet you by the bridge too, 142 00:07:04.199 --> 00:07:05.920 don't forget the new banner. It got the bridge right 143 00:07:05.959 --> 00:07:08.279 in the middle. As ever, through it all I was 144 00:07:08.319 --> 00:07:11.639 haunted by something subtle enough kilder, the grassy verget what 145 00:07:11.680 --> 00:07:14.360 I still inwardly defensively called the old bridge. Sight always 146 00:07:14.360 --> 00:07:16.959 seemed oddly empty, as though the space remembered more footful 147 00:07:17.040 --> 00:07:19.920 laughter or mischief than it now sustained. It was as 148 00:07:19.959 --> 00:07:22.680 if the land itself mourned some secret absence. Even as 149 00:07:22.680 --> 00:07:26.040 the tide of community ebb and swelled all around. That Saturday, 150 00:07:26.079 --> 00:07:29.480 with questions gnawing, I set out to investigate directly. There 151 00:07:29.480 --> 00:07:32.040 is security in a walk along familiar pass. Even so, 152 00:07:32.360 --> 00:07:35.680 every footfall that morning felt uncommonly deliver. I carried neither 153 00:07:35.720 --> 00:07:38.000 my phone nor notebook, wanting instead to let the river 154 00:07:38.079 --> 00:07:40.399 at the land and the s p plainly. When I 155 00:07:40.480 --> 00:07:42.199 arrived at the spot. In my spot, I found only 156 00:07:42.199 --> 00:07:45.079 a low sweep of grass, punctuated by driftwood deposited during 157 00:07:45.079 --> 00:07:47.959 the last mild flood. The willow stood as I remembered, 158 00:07:48.079 --> 00:07:50.319 though its girth was subtly different. The double knot in 159 00:07:50.360 --> 00:07:53.600 his trunk seeming less pronounced. The river bent gently, just 160 00:07:53.639 --> 00:07:55.439 as my memory claimed, but there was no hint of 161 00:07:55.439 --> 00:07:58.560 bridge abutment, no stone work, no railing, not even vitrified 162 00:07:58.560 --> 00:08:01.879 gravel that might suggest decades long combaction. I pressed myttow 163 00:08:01.920 --> 00:08:05.920 into the damp sward, an indentation perhaps where something once 164 00:08:05.959 --> 00:08:08.920 sat for. Perhaps rain and roots conspired to create everyday lumps. 165 00:08:09.680 --> 00:08:12.839 I found nothing conclusive, nothing objective, only a vacuum of 166 00:08:12.879 --> 00:08:14.879 evidence where I was certain a structure and my own 167 00:08:14.959 --> 00:08:18.560 past had intersected. A part of me hoped foolishly for 168 00:08:18.639 --> 00:08:21.759 the odd nail or rodden plank. In geography class, I 169 00:08:21.800 --> 00:08:24.199 told my students that landscape is layered with stories. In 170 00:08:24.199 --> 00:08:26.439 that moment, it seemed those layers could slide apart with 171 00:08:26.480 --> 00:08:29.240 no more warning than sleepless night. I made my way 172 00:08:29.279 --> 00:08:32.840 down stream, reasoning that skepticism acquired at least one counter example. 173 00:08:33.399 --> 00:08:36.039 The current footbridge, a cheerful span with white painted railings 174 00:08:36.039 --> 00:08:38.240 and half a dozen flower baskets stir pres I see 175 00:08:38.240 --> 00:08:40.120 where the fly is said by the red board house 176 00:08:40.120 --> 00:08:43.679 and the ever crowded public. Landing children skip across, tossing 177 00:08:43.679 --> 00:08:47.200 breadcrumbs to eager ducks. An elderly couple posed half way 178 00:08:47.240 --> 00:08:50.799 to sit, as if in concerned by the structure of provements. Lingering, 179 00:08:50.960 --> 00:08:54.200 I listened to the passing talk. Parents pointed, see the 180 00:08:54.200 --> 00:08:56.559 butt launch. That's where granm But taught me to fish. 181 00:08:56.879 --> 00:09:01.240 Right by the bridge, teenagers skateboarded off the landing edge 182 00:09:01.279 --> 00:09:04.039 nothing about the scene betrayed any sense of displacement or confusion. 183 00:09:04.519 --> 00:09:07.000 On a hunch, I looped back toward the library, its 184 00:09:07.120 --> 00:09:09.600 entrance shadowed by a deteriorating alm and a bright, almost 185 00:09:09.679 --> 00:09:13.840 garish river crossing then and now banner heralding its historical photographs. 186 00:09:14.480 --> 00:09:17.639 I wandered through the display glass cases, reflecting my furrowed brow, 187 00:09:17.759 --> 00:09:21.279 reading placards assembled by Len and his crew. Photograph after 188 00:09:21.279 --> 00:09:24.279 photographs cbia and color, with the flourishes of amateur composition, 189 00:09:24.360 --> 00:09:27.399 showed the bridge always at the current site, the birdhouse looming, 190 00:09:27.519 --> 00:09:31.200 sometimes larger, sometimes smaller, vestival floats of yesterday crossing it, 191 00:09:31.279 --> 00:09:34.279 fourth grade dark projects depicting its cheerful arch. To one side, 192 00:09:34.759 --> 00:09:37.360 there was curiously a tourist map mounted in the corner, 193 00:09:37.440 --> 00:09:40.720 labeled drawn by Melissa Kinge, class of three. Melissa had 194 00:09:40.720 --> 00:09:43.360 been in my second year geography section, shy and careful, 195 00:09:43.600 --> 00:09:47.679 fascinated by river deltas. I remembered her sketches, besize lined 196 00:09:47.720 --> 00:09:51.200 with careful measurements and annotations. And yet here too, the 197 00:09:51.240 --> 00:09:53.120 bridge was clear as daylight at the new spot, with 198 00:09:53.240 --> 00:09:55.679 no trace or note of its uxtreme cousin. I went 199 00:09:55.720 --> 00:09:58.720 to the circulation desk and Gregg reading glasses perched as 200 00:09:58.720 --> 00:10:01.240 always halfway down. His nose looked up with an affable grin, 201 00:10:01.759 --> 00:10:05.879 collecting ammo for trivia. He tease thy my expression. I hesitated, 202 00:10:05.919 --> 00:10:09.399 then plunged in Gregg. Do you remember kids jumping off 203 00:10:09.440 --> 00:10:12.519 the old bridge near the willow before they moved a downstream? 204 00:10:12.679 --> 00:10:14.480 My words felt odd, as I said, then, as the 205 00:10:14.519 --> 00:10:17.600 floating layers of memory to the surface. He laughed, but 206 00:10:17.639 --> 00:10:20.879 not unkindly. It's always been here, Ellen, since before we 207 00:10:20.919 --> 00:10:23.799 had what colored bins the upstream crossing. Maybe your thinking 208 00:10:23.799 --> 00:10:26.399 of the old old footpath before Harberson's dad had the 209 00:10:26.399 --> 00:10:28.399 mill by the boat house, But not a bridge. Must 210 00:10:28.440 --> 00:10:31.759 be someone's tail there. It was so firm, so certain, 211 00:10:31.799 --> 00:10:34.759 as though the town's gravity bent to even recollections into uniformity. 212 00:10:35.360 --> 00:10:39.039 The breeze outside rattled the library shutters. I left, blinking 213 00:10:39.039 --> 00:10:41.399 in the morning sun. I could not deny what I 214 00:10:41.440 --> 00:10:44.799 had seen, the existential doubling of documentary fact and private certainty. 215 00:10:45.399 --> 00:10:48.080 Either my memory was falty possible, if not probable, or 216 00:10:48.080 --> 00:10:50.320 some more subtle game was afoot, or rivers flow shifted 217 00:10:50.320 --> 00:10:53.879 by time, or an old legend calcifying into consensus. These 218 00:10:53.879 --> 00:10:55.879 were not answers to pin down in a single day, 219 00:10:56.399 --> 00:10:59.240 but my curiosity, already a persistent force in my life, 220 00:10:59.320 --> 00:11:02.480 would not be so so easily relinquished. For the next week, 221 00:11:02.600 --> 00:11:06.480 curiosity grew restless. I carried my battered field notebook everywhere, 222 00:11:06.480 --> 00:11:09.159 compulsively jotting sketches and maplets, as if each drawing could 223 00:11:09.159 --> 00:11:12.879 clarify my foggy conviction. My after breakfast walks mutated into 224 00:11:12.879 --> 00:11:15.720 a series of investigations, measuring by stride the distance between 225 00:11:15.720 --> 00:11:19.120 willow and water, mentally overlaying remembered scenes with current shadows, 226 00:11:19.200 --> 00:11:21.120 Hunting for clues in the jittery song of red wings 227 00:11:21.159 --> 00:11:23.360 over the half bury bricks that surfaced after a rain, 228 00:11:23.960 --> 00:11:25.840 I drew the bend where the bridge should be, over 229 00:11:25.919 --> 00:11:29.240 and over. I included the lop sided sycamore, now missing 230 00:11:29.279 --> 00:11:31.080 in the flesh, but vivid in my memory. At Treso 231 00:11:31.159 --> 00:11:34.120 awkward it was the local standard for measuring awkwardness and teenagers. 232 00:11:34.840 --> 00:11:37.279 I tried valiantly to match my sketches to what stood 233 00:11:37.279 --> 00:11:40.840 before me. Each time the proportions slipped, the river curved, 234 00:11:40.840 --> 00:11:44.120 and ways subtly impossible to trace her single crossing photos 235 00:11:44.159 --> 00:11:47.120 from my own arc has proved infuriating, brought smiles framing 236 00:11:47.159 --> 00:11:49.519 the bridge, but the context was never quite clear enough. 237 00:11:50.120 --> 00:11:53.679 Field's overlapped background detail shifted depending on year and cropping. 238 00:11:54.200 --> 00:11:56.480 The upstream willow sometimes layer from the corner or not 239 00:11:56.600 --> 00:11:59.960 at all. Eventually, frustration nudged me back to the historical 240 00:12:00.039 --> 00:12:03.000 society lends santum fragrant with lemon oil and dust every 241 00:12:03.000 --> 00:12:07.000 horizontal surface covered in document boxes. Our relationship, forge ine 242 00:12:07.039 --> 00:12:09.679 debate is built on the mutual suspicion of simple answers. 243 00:12:10.320 --> 00:12:13.080 Then glance up as the bell chimed, thick black eyebrows raised, 244 00:12:13.720 --> 00:12:16.759 checking our sources are we? He gestured to a cherot 245 00:12:16.799 --> 00:12:20.639 of summoning a sparring partner. I explained, with professional neutrality, 246 00:12:20.720 --> 00:12:23.879 the contradiction playing out between my memory and the documentary evidence. 247 00:12:24.639 --> 00:12:27.000 Len Grin then rummaged for a set of cigar boxes 248 00:12:27.039 --> 00:12:30.919 marked misk postcards and old festival programmed. I watched him 249 00:12:30.919 --> 00:12:34.120 flip card after kt braufurode as his scowned for anomalies. 250 00:12:34.799 --> 00:12:38.080 That's odd, he finally said, tapping an old hand colored postcard. 251 00:12:38.720 --> 00:12:40.519 I'd a sworn I saw one up by the willows. 252 00:12:40.519 --> 00:12:43.240 A painty group girls in hats pre war he earth. 253 00:12:43.799 --> 00:12:46.399 He held the card at arm's length. Seems it's by 254 00:12:46.440 --> 00:12:48.440 the boat house, though all the rest to hear look 255 00:12:49.200 --> 00:12:52.200 sack after stack. The visual evidence mounted any scene with 256 00:12:52.200 --> 00:12:54.720 a bridge, regardless of age, placed it squarely at the 257 00:12:54.720 --> 00:12:59.360 now accepted sight. Then shrugged, bemused. Sometimes these stories fall 258 00:12:59.399 --> 00:13:02.120 back on themselves. Allan, you remember what you want, and 259 00:13:02.200 --> 00:13:05.919 sometimes the paper greas sometimes not. I pressed him further, 260 00:13:06.600 --> 00:13:09.960 Did he remember anyone speaking of the old crossing? Then pause, 261 00:13:10.039 --> 00:13:13.840 tapped his chin. A few tales, maybe usually more about 262 00:13:13.879 --> 00:13:16.919 lost dogs on midnight meetings than bridge locations. But every program, 263 00:13:17.120 --> 00:13:19.399 every official record has it here by the boat house. 264 00:13:19.480 --> 00:13:21.720 Maybe you're blending the old fish's path. My uncle used 265 00:13:21.720 --> 00:13:24.039 to tell tall tales about secret plank over the narrows. 266 00:13:24.080 --> 00:13:27.080 Nothing built, just local mischief. Back on the street, I 267 00:13:27.120 --> 00:13:29.679 found Sandra t hiding a flower box outside her shop. 268 00:13:30.200 --> 00:13:32.679 I approached the subject lightly. Wasn't the bridge over up 269 00:13:32.720 --> 00:13:35.840 the hill by that enormous willow? Sandra frowned and pushedlos 270 00:13:35.879 --> 00:13:38.840 dirt back into place. You know that do sound familiar? 271 00:13:38.960 --> 00:13:41.720 Didn't it used to be up there? Her gaze turned distant, 272 00:13:41.799 --> 00:13:44.240 uncertain or am I confusing? It with the old sled 273 00:13:44.360 --> 00:13:46.960 run h M, well, I suppose not. My pictures always 274 00:13:46.960 --> 00:13:49.679 showed down by the launch. A flicker of doubt gone 275 00:13:49.679 --> 00:13:53.519 in a blink. Sandra's confidence wavered consequences rippling as she 276 00:13:53.559 --> 00:13:55.919 glanced toward the festival banner's strong A law in the street, 277 00:13:55.960 --> 00:13:58.519 each one friendly, familiar, and arranged so that the bridge 278 00:13:58.559 --> 00:14:02.120 always sat where the town expected. The younger festival coordinator 279 00:14:02.159 --> 00:14:05.039 at MARSI provided resolute certainty when I next saw her 280 00:14:05.080 --> 00:14:09.759 wrangling volunteers. No mystery, there was sys arkray. She retained 281 00:14:09.759 --> 00:14:12.360 Stobhin for Maladi, a sign I believe of respect for 282 00:14:12.480 --> 00:14:15.279 my teaching years. Our bridge is right by the red 283 00:14:15.279 --> 00:14:18.320 boat house, always has been since I moved here. She 284 00:14:18.399 --> 00:14:21.240 topped clipward under her arm, breezy as ever, and shepherd 285 00:14:21.279 --> 00:14:24.320 of children into ranks for the float rehearsal. I tried, 286 00:14:24.440 --> 00:14:28.120 sheepish to rephrase the question, but she only laughed. Everything's 287 00:14:28.159 --> 00:14:30.440 in the archivath Glen. I had to go check myself 288 00:14:30.440 --> 00:14:32.399 when I was planning the parade route. There's never been 289 00:14:32.440 --> 00:14:34.720 a bridge north of the green knot on the records anyway. 290 00:14:35.399 --> 00:14:41.200 Official records, photographs, witnesses, a town synchronized to a single 291 00:14:41.279 --> 00:14:44.320 version of its own topography, Yet hints of contradiction flashed 292 00:14:44.320 --> 00:14:47.480 in the corner of each conversation, quickly dismissed, then submerged again. 293 00:14:48.039 --> 00:14:50.360 That evening home under the slow rotation of my sealing 294 00:14:50.399 --> 00:14:52.639 fan A grabb the oldest photo album on my shelf. 295 00:14:53.200 --> 00:14:55.039 It was a wedding gift for my mother, A brittle 296 00:14:55.080 --> 00:14:58.840 arm scrapic at lasting two generations. Photographs from the nineteen 297 00:14:58.879 --> 00:15:02.240 thirties through the nineteenth sixties willomire by river and bridge, 298 00:15:02.279 --> 00:15:05.480 summers and storms. The images were sharp enough, crowds on 299 00:15:05.519 --> 00:15:09.200 the bridge bunting perage, but maddeningly every photograph pointed to 300 00:15:09.200 --> 00:15:12.679 the current bridge location. Yet in nearly every scene the 301 00:15:12.759 --> 00:15:15.360 landscape had strangers, had built in, unfamiliar as stand of 302 00:15:15.360 --> 00:15:18.759 birch that, by my memory never flanked the botas. Some 303 00:15:18.919 --> 00:15:22.200 images had depth, but the background felt rearranged, incongruent to 304 00:15:22.240 --> 00:15:24.320 tilt in the minds logic that could not be named. 305 00:15:25.000 --> 00:15:28.320 I shut the album, frustrated, my friend's voice echo, It's 306 00:15:28.320 --> 00:15:30.840 always been here. But if so, then why did part 307 00:15:30.840 --> 00:15:33.919 of me ache convince something finer? Some alignment of childhood geography, 308 00:15:33.960 --> 00:15:37.240 thrill and comfort had been displaced. I could feel the 309 00:15:37.279 --> 00:15:40.759 contradiction evolving. It was beyond a matter of misremembered directions 310 00:15:40.879 --> 00:15:43.799 or a misplaced field trip. The bridge, in a sense 311 00:15:43.840 --> 00:15:46.639 more real than mere recollection, seemed to resist being pinned 312 00:15:46.679 --> 00:15:49.720 to a single version of history. One evening with cloud 313 00:15:49.720 --> 00:15:52.519 street gold and the trembling sense of urgency, I remembered 314 00:15:52.600 --> 00:15:55.200 I had taught this. I had stood before a chalk 315 00:15:55.240 --> 00:15:58.080 wered decades of lesson plants, students yawning and chattering, and 316 00:15:58.200 --> 00:16:01.159 used as a pedagogical anchor. The ridge by the willow tree. 317 00:16:01.600 --> 00:16:04.159 The location was deliberate and a monic tool, out stream 318 00:16:04.240 --> 00:16:06.080 by a willow marked with a small circle on every 319 00:16:06.120 --> 00:16:08.759 map I hand it out. I could picture myself in 320 00:16:08.840 --> 00:16:11.799 sensible shoes and an nflattering skirt, pointing it out, drawing 321 00:16:11.840 --> 00:16:15.360 it in white shock, students scribbling notes. The bridge is here, 322 00:16:15.480 --> 00:16:18.480 I'd say, notice how it lines up with the playground 323 00:16:18.480 --> 00:16:21.240 fits and aagine crossing it toward the library. Geography is lived. 324 00:16:21.679 --> 00:16:23.960 In a sudden rush, I caught it down to the basement, 325 00:16:24.000 --> 00:16:27.120 to the file drawers of my career, syllabi featureless Manila folders, 326 00:16:27.320 --> 00:16:31.320 lovingly curated lesson locks. Surely if my memory was robust. 327 00:16:31.360 --> 00:16:34.159 The records would show it. The fold labeled Rivers Town 328 00:16:34.240 --> 00:16:37.159 Layout nineteen ninety three nineteen ninety six crackled as I 329 00:16:37.159 --> 00:16:40.440 took it open. A first lesson plan typed anatated red 330 00:16:40.600 --> 00:16:42.960 activityhought the path from green to boat house fire footbridge 331 00:16:43.000 --> 00:16:46.279 location by Horbison's mill dance room. The next marked in 332 00:16:46.320 --> 00:16:48.600 red pen students to sketched a route from library to 333 00:16:48.600 --> 00:16:52.039 footbridge at the dock. No mention of the willow, every 334 00:16:52.039 --> 00:16:55.279 logistical note, every space of description, dance stream, not upstream, 335 00:16:55.399 --> 00:16:57.480 and certainly not beside the tree that had angered thirty 336 00:16:57.559 --> 00:17:00.440 years of private topography. I sat on the floor, page 337 00:17:00.480 --> 00:17:03.879 after page, fluttering, palm sweating. Had I so thoroughly revised 338 00:17:03.879 --> 00:17:06.559 the past in my own mind, I'd have bet anything 339 00:17:06.559 --> 00:17:09.200 that I'd written the bridge into the upstream narrative reinforced 340 00:17:09.200 --> 00:17:12.000 over years. Yet here I was faced with an overwhelming 341 00:17:12.119 --> 00:17:15.960 numbing banality. The documents agreed intriplicate with the current world. 342 00:17:16.559 --> 00:17:19.359 Back upstairs, I found in my keepsik boxy yellowed essay 343 00:17:19.400 --> 00:17:22.400 from a favorite student, spring by the willow bridge. I 344 00:17:22.440 --> 00:17:25.200 slid it from its envelope part, pounding it moved with 345 00:17:25.240 --> 00:17:28.160 a whisper, as if hesitant to reveal its content. The 346 00:17:28.200 --> 00:17:30.759 prose was lovely in meditation on new leaves, shadows on 347 00:17:30.799 --> 00:17:32.799 the water, the creak of shoes on planks. But nowhere 348 00:17:32.799 --> 00:17:36.079 did the bridge's position become explicit. The child's words called 349 00:17:36.119 --> 00:17:39.000 round sensory impressions, leaving only the flavor of spring and 350 00:17:39.039 --> 00:17:42.880 vakins at location. Had I, in nostalgia, infused it with 351 00:17:42.880 --> 00:17:46.960 the certainty of extreme geography. Gregg, ever reliable, visited that 352 00:17:47.000 --> 00:17:50.759 evening with Sandra, bearing pie and gentle skepticism. I'd swear 353 00:17:50.759 --> 00:17:53.160 you taught us the bridge by the willow, Ellen, Gregg said, 354 00:17:53.319 --> 00:17:56.240 except every met by unsays otherwise maybe a remembering Hazel's 355 00:17:56.240 --> 00:17:59.559 old camplank or the holiday raft crossing. Sandra tugged the 356 00:17:59.640 --> 00:18:03.359 essay from my hands, read silently, and shrugged. I remember 357 00:18:03.359 --> 00:18:05.440 the willow as the breath ticking spot. Sure, but the 358 00:18:05.480 --> 00:18:07.599 bridget looks the same in all my pictures, all from 359 00:18:07.599 --> 00:18:11.279 the boat house side. Per voice, gentle, but final, I 360 00:18:11.400 --> 00:18:14.400 tried haltingly to explain my sense of dislocation, not mere 361 00:18:14.440 --> 00:18:16.920 nostalgia or the bruise pride of mistaken expertise, but the 362 00:18:16.960 --> 00:18:19.880 alienation that comes when maps stories, and even the terrain 363 00:18:19.920 --> 00:18:22.559 itself slipped from their anchors and rearrange in silent harmony. 364 00:18:23.000 --> 00:18:26.119 The house was quiet for a time. Maybe Gregg goffered 365 00:18:26.200 --> 00:18:28.680 everything justile lines when you are not looking, like when 366 00:18:28.680 --> 00:18:31.240 the grocery shelves rearrange after a renovation and you can 367 00:18:31.279 --> 00:18:33.359 almost remember where the bread used to sit, but the 368 00:18:33.359 --> 00:18:37.440 store insists otherwise. We all laughed, not in nervousness, but 369 00:18:37.480 --> 00:18:40.079 the shared relief of people who find their own fallibility musing, 370 00:18:40.359 --> 00:18:44.039 not humiliating. Still, something else gnawed at me. If I 371 00:18:44.039 --> 00:18:46.279 could not trust the permanence of my written records, if 372 00:18:46.279 --> 00:18:49.359 the evidence of photographs that's in plans and countless small 373 00:18:49.400 --> 00:18:51.400 momentos now disagreed with what I would have called a 374 00:18:51.400 --> 00:18:55.000 bedrock memory, What then was this simple error, collective forgetting 375 00:18:55.119 --> 00:18:57.759 or something stranger? Kind of quiet ongoing correction with no 376 00:18:57.799 --> 00:19:01.240 obvious hand at the teller? Did record shift gently invisibly 377 00:19:01.240 --> 00:19:04.599 to reflect a drifting consensus? Could the past itself be 378 00:19:04.799 --> 00:19:08.440 in some way alive and responsive that suspicion, once formed, 379 00:19:08.480 --> 00:19:11.559 would not dissolve. I found myself turning it over and over, 380 00:19:11.880 --> 00:19:15.079 not with fear, but with a peculiar, ungovernable fascination. I 381 00:19:15.160 --> 00:19:17.279 decided to test it, not in the big terms of 382 00:19:17.279 --> 00:19:19.799 a private meditation, but with a methodical curiosity that had 383 00:19:19.839 --> 00:19:22.720 served me so well in the class room. Over several days, 384 00:19:22.799 --> 00:19:25.759 I undertook a survey that was, if not scientific, perhaps 385 00:19:25.839 --> 00:19:28.200 the next best thing single woman could attempt. With limited time, 386 00:19:28.319 --> 00:19:32.000 resources and access to cookies for briding neighbors. I talked 387 00:19:32.000 --> 00:19:34.480 to young parents, slowing them on their weight to float rehearsal, 388 00:19:34.559 --> 00:19:36.519 and persuaded a few to draw histy maps on the 389 00:19:36.559 --> 00:19:40.079 backs of receipts. Most pointed confidently to the side by 390 00:19:40.079 --> 00:19:43.440 the bill pers I cornered Gary, wild haired gardener of 391 00:19:43.519 --> 00:19:46.160 seventy years who lived by a river's mouth, and handed 392 00:19:46.200 --> 00:19:49.279 him a battered notebook. He sketch. After many weight, let 393 00:19:49.279 --> 00:19:52.119 me think pauses a crossing by the willow, he said, 394 00:19:52.200 --> 00:19:54.559 of course, it's always been up there, having ye seen 395 00:19:54.599 --> 00:19:58.920 the plaque. When oppressed, he frowned, uncertain and muttered about repairs, 396 00:19:59.160 --> 00:20:01.240 or maybe that was the lamp posts they moved, not 397 00:20:01.359 --> 00:20:04.440 the bridge. Middle aged jogers gave me blank looks saw 398 00:20:04.519 --> 00:20:06.799 with the mold alarm of people presented with questions both 399 00:20:06.799 --> 00:20:09.960 too trivial and too slippery to resolve. I phoned Neider, 400 00:20:10.000 --> 00:20:13.039 who moved to the city decades prior. She recounted firmly 401 00:20:13.119 --> 00:20:15.480