As an English major and a writer, I find metaphors in just about everything I do. Just as I referenced the metaphor of Kemper on the path in yesterday’s post, this photograph of divergent paths struck me when I came upon it during a solo hike in Garrapata. Kemper had decided that three days of strenuous hiking in a row was enough daddy-son time, and he sat that morning out—with the express condition that I bring a cinnamon (pronounced “cimminum”) roll for him on my way back through the village.
I love this photograph, not for the intrinsic compositional value of it, but because it is the literal embodiment of Frost’s poem (sans the yellow wood). I took the one less traveled by, and indeed it did make all the difference. It has, quite probably, scarred me for life. Not exactly the effect that it had on Frost, but this is reality and Frost’s poem was a metaphor.
You can see in the bottom right corner, if you zoom in on the photograph, the incipient bunch of tripartite leaves of what, it turns out, is poison oak. It was so prevalent along the paths, that certainly no one in their right mind would have traipsed through virulent shrubbery, and so I paid it no further thought until a few days post-hike. Further, I am used to poison ivy, which grows on a vine rather than a bush of regret and sadness. Sadly, some of the evils of the West Coast are disguised as hedgerows.
The path was, at the time, a fun little adventure. It meandered closer to the edge of the cliffs’ edges, while keeping a respectful distance from the precipice in most spots. There was a dodgy stretch, but some travelers, as disinclined to stride along a hare’s-breath of path juxtaposed against a sixty-foot plummet, had cut a secondary looping jaunt (through the damnable undergrowth) that avoided the cliff’s edge and certain death. This was acceptable to me, and quite lovely, on account of the omnipresent, verdant, and then-innocuous shrub of despair.
When Anna, Nora, Kemper and I came to Garrapata later that day, I took Kemper on a small section of the secondary trail. He was reticent to follow, but, ultimately, he did. I told him only “big kids” could come on the path, and this was enough to carry the day. Luckily it was chilly, and he was wearing jeans and a jacket – fully armored against the chaparral of anguish.
By Kemper’s age (6.5 years) I had already broken both of my wrists, sliced my thumb to the bone with a utility knife, and cracked a few toes; but he has, heretofore, not suffered any major bodily injuries. He is cautious of the unbeaten paths, for which I am grateful. In Frost’s poem, the narrator does not rush headlong down the path less traveled by. Instead, “long I stood / and looked down one as far as I could / to where it bent in the undergrowth.” As impulsive as he can be, this is Kemper’s general approach to life choices. It will serve him well.
ST. AMAND PHOTOGRAPHY 