The Clearing

It was, at times, most dreary and dreadful of a place - hung with webs that the sun shone through, illuminating odd patches of weeds and roots - and, yet, though the contrasting times were not dominant, it could hold all the splendor of a ball's rich gayety. Such is this place - a place that one, if with but the proverbial seed of faith, could believe in.1

Let us look more closely into the circumstances of our imagined scene. Thus far described, we behold the area - the dreadful clearing - to be haunted. And indeed it may be! But, if we were to look more closely - to examine some rather large, though hardly occurring, events - we would find the scene to house more than a just few ghastly apparitions.2

Near the far end - by the trees, for it is in New England's woods - a small carousel spins round, chirping its melodic bells. And on this carnival entertainment, with faces most happy, shouts a small group of children with no apparent reason for being there other than to defy the gloominess of their very surroundings. They are such a chipper group that one would think them to not even exist - surely, the depression of their adult counterparts must seep into their heads when they are within their dark and graying homes. 3

But perhaps they have no homes! Perhaps these children, these champions of happiness and seekers of where it is lost, abide within the clearing itself, and all this time - unawares - we have been describing not a clearing of a haunted wood, but a clearing of the grown man's soul and mind. These children - as most of us have seen from the beginning their introduction - are not normal. Therefore - lost themselves in the dark eaves of depression - they must be the drugs of a drunken man!