Placed by Cache Owner goose2553 in 2008, the Legend of Sleepy Hollow beckons.
As we step into the Arctic freezer, coordinates pull us north, turning east at Mansfield.
Deep in the woods, wind-bowed trees lurch, while homeowners replace siding lost in the June tornado.
Down the road, forest staggers and falls, not to tornadoes, but to logging operations, spy-glassing the coming wave of hungry home-buyers.
The appeal to self-interest, founded on rise of personal income, mutely but fiercely struggles with self-interest dependent on nature, beauty, stewardship of land, plants, tiny creatures, and fresh air.
With the aging of generational owners, eyes are suddenly opened to the forest disappearing around them, melting into infrastructure for inflatable Santas and remote offices. In a county-sized reenactment, timber is scythed by 1700s pioneers, now reincarnated as 2020s developers.
As ravenous real estate agents offer land owners undreamed-of wealth, love for their homesteads climbs to the top of the pyramid. Vast acreages are released, not into the market, but to existing preserves for protection and public use.
Around the corner, sun-washed fields are restored by grazing cattle, enriching the soil, bringing contentment to the heart, and adding new meaning to “grass-fed”. Restorative grazing moves cattle among designated areas, maximizing absorption of cow products back down into soil starved from overfarming. Deep-rooted perennial grasses return, turning the landscape into a sponge for water retention.
Coordinates drive down a gravel road, where off-road tracks tell us new home building is underway. Gated lanes and influx of nonlocals slowly tame rural ruckusing.
In 1960, Hidden Hollow Camp moved in next door, purchasing land with our cemetery thrown in. Zealous counselors brought with them the celebration of Walpurgis Night, an ethnic holiday marked by skeletons and skulls in the camp dining room, grave stones in the ball fields, and games of sawbones rally and witch torture at the swimming hole. In the perfect marriage of opportunity and intention, a real live graveyard, now owned by the camp, provided a spectacular Spook Hike to end this summer camp Halloween.
Mary Jane Hendrickson died in 1898 from cancer, aged 72. Her tombstone, lovingly placed under a towering spruce, set the stage for the 1960s ghost tale, leaving Mary swinging from a limb of the spruce as a convicted witch, and a curse on any who dared touch a stone in the graveyard.
Over the next 50 years, the tale grew to MJ screeching at the stake, cursing the righteous as she died. The ancient spruce became the blank slate for blackened graffiti and good luck charms. Finally set on fire, the scorched bark rose above graves now smashed and broken. Teens parked at the dead end lane, drank, smoked, and drove, ending in a tragic car crash down the road.
In 2008, a cache is placed, and Cache Nation begins to sort it out. Local cachers retell their own fears of the cemetery, growing up as campers at Hidden Hollow. Their fear walks them to the cache, and they walk away free, with a smiley. Others clean up trash and hallow the stones with their own anger and sadness.
In 2014 the crippled spruce is finally cut down. Mary Jane’s grave has long ago disappeared. A lone cacher encounters teens in a car as she angles her way to the back of the cemetery. I’m going to college, one tells her, and means, Please don’t think that we’re all like this. Or maybe we’ve grown out of it. And have better camp counselors now.
The bond between cemeteries and cachers resonates. Respect for the past, for those lives lived, for the time each has, for the CO who brought others to a quiet and peaceful place, together weave a knotted network of strength. Without malice, a log asks where those who did this will find their final rest.
Quietly we leave Mary Jane Hendrickson in peace, and all who come, and all who remember.
OH Love Of Geocaching 