Secret Reaches of the Soul

I have a recurring dream in which I find secret rooms in my house. Sometimes the rooms are basement spaces filled with stashes of possessions which could be classified as trash or treasure if I would only sort through it all. Did I know I had these stores? Other times the rooms are spa-type bathrooms with an array of plush towels and expensive lotions, or a secret meditation lair, or better yet--a seemingly Virginia Woolf-inspired Room of One's Own in which I can write and paint in private. Sometimes, I find multiple rooms that are arranged in a labyrinthine swirl. Wonderment is always at the center of these dreams. I awaken to feel slightly vexed that these amazing new discoveries are so quickly taken from me. But then I sit to analyze the dream, and the fun begins. I've come to think of these dreams as representing untapped regions of my sub-conscious or new areas of development in my personality. The location of the room represents what part of my life requires further exploration.

Living in the Ardens, I have had a similar, waking experience. The Ardens don't make a huge footprint on the map, yet, I find myself constantly finding new spots that I didn't realize existed before within our borders. Is this still considered the Ardens? I ask the people in my hiking or walking group. The Ardens themselves are a hidden room to some. I have a good friend who grew up in Wilmington, but has since moved to North Carolina. She had heard of Arden, but didn't know where it was. She described where she lived, and then I showed her on a map that I live a mile away from the spot. That's Arden? Unlike other housing developments, the Ardens are hidden from view because of all our trees. I've heard Arden compared to Brigadoon, that magical town not found on any maps that only exists for a day out of every 100 years, but then disappears into the mists. Arden even gets lost on Google Earth. Rumor has it that Lady Bird Johnson flew over Arden in an airplane and asked about all that green down there. "What is that exactly?" When she was told about Arden, she wanted to protect it. That is why we only have southbound access to I95. Travelers from Philadelphia can't get off at our exit.

Sunday's hike found us on the Sunnyside Tract, the wedge of forest area that is between the B. & O. Railway and I95. This is still part of Ardentown? I was assured that it was. Trails exist in this part of the woods in theory and only during certain times of year. Come summer and the height of plant growth, even theoretical trails will be a wash in underbrush.

"I feel as though I am in the middle of nowhere."

Tunnel under the Tracks, photo by Joe del Tufo

The tunnel under the train trestle showed a pinhole of light back to the area of Arden Woods with which I was familiar. This other new forest seemed bigger and deeper somehow. It still followed Naaman's Creek and Naaman's Creek still had its spattering of boulders necessary for hop-rocking across the creek in an area where there are no bridges. Clay, one of the few native Delawareans in our hiking group, told me that the boulders were a result of glacial outwash. He is a former park ranger, and I have no reason to doubt this particular claim. Unlike some of Clay's other conspiracy theories, this one rings true. He is the oldest in our hiking group, and I am the youngest. Clay tells me things with a sparkle in his eye which makes me feel like I need to treat him as if he was one my older cousins--with a thread of suspicion. I remember one Easter when I was young, my cousin Craig told me that the green beans I was eating were grown in cow poop. It was worse than if he had told me the Easter Bunny didn't exist. My mother had to explain the subtleties of fertilizer to me before I would eat any more of my beans. I have been wary about the big kids feeding me a line of shit ever since.

Larry, our unofficial hiking leader and higher up on my trust scale, informed me the that New Castle County deeded the Sunnyside Tract to Ardentown about ten years ago. Knowing that the Ardens believed in the conservation of green spaces, it was one way to preserve the land in the face of future New Castle County commissioners who may or may not experience "green" in the same context. Just ask the folks over the line in Pennsylvania who battled and lost against their elected officials over the development of Beaver Valley lands put into a trust for conservation. I'd like to believe that under Ardentown's watch, this land is safe from that outcome.

Trout Lily, Photo by Joe del Tufo

It did indeed feel as if we were "between the worlds" for that hour or so we spent exploring that particular swath of land. We didn't see other hikers though we did nudge a Claymont neighborhood on the other side of the stream. Only one home seemed to acknowledge the gem in its back yard, and it did so with the placement of a two-person swing near the bank of the creek. I could imagine sipping a glass of wine there at the end of the day. Larry stopped to chat with the woman who lived at the house. (He is also our unofficial hike ambassador.) He asked her about the flood plain of the creek. She had taken her own hike through the woods earlier that morning with her two Shelties. They were protective over their back yard and all of all of us who were trekking through it. The woman was the only person we encountered in the woods, either on Sunnyside or on the side of the tracks which is the traditionally known Arden Woods. I was sad to think that nobody else had thought to come out to experience the short bloom of the trout lily now appearing in golden droplets on the forest floor. Their loss. It was a beautiful spring morning in which to consider the untapped potentiality that exists inside and outside the human shell.