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Authors: Jordan Fisher Smith
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pursuit of a hatch of dragonflies.
On the far side, we turned left on a dirt track through a line of boulders next to a sign that read MINERAL BAR CAMPGROUND . The campground consisted of seventeen campsites laid out along the track, about half of which were occupied by a collection of faded tents, sagging blue plastic tarpaulins, and wasted-looking old cars, pickup trucks, and vans. I couldn't see a single human being. Somewhere on the other side of a line of alders along the riverbank I heard the hum and rattle of a gold dredge.
"They must be out mining," I said helpfully to O'Leary.
"Uh-huh." He nodded noncommittally. He was a quiet man.
We idled slowly through the campground. Where the road dead-ended I saw two campsites below us, in a dusty basin separated from the river by a windrow of boulders cast up on the riverbank by nineteenth-century miners. In one camp, I saw people.
"Those are the Hallecks, a whole family of them," O'Leary said with no apparent pleasure.
A faded wall tent slumped at one end of the site. From it, a short man, his grubby shirt unbuttoned and his pale belly overhanging the waistline of his grimy cutoffs, made his way toward a short woman in a faded, multicolored muumuu. Her long hair hung forward in greasy strands as she bent over a frying pan on a camp stove. The ground was littered with beer cans. The man was yelling something I couldn't make out, and the woman yelled back, waving a corpulent arm. Continuing toward her, the man threaded his way through four dirty-faced children playing on the ground. They seemed oblivious to the domestic strife. I was remindedâand instantly I was ashamed, for these were
people,
I thoughtâof looking down into one of those pits at the zoo, where some poor creatures pace out their irritable lives in whatever is the opposite of a state of nature. This was not nature, I thought. This was not a park. My career had hit bottom.
O'Leary got out with his clipboard and bank bag and walked down a little footpath from the road to the campsite. I stood above at the edge of the embankment to watch. Below me, O'Leary greeted the inhabitants with genuine politeness. He waited patiently while they dug around in their filthy duffels and disheveled tent for the camping fees. When they finally pieced together enough change and counted it into his hands, he produced a little receipt, which he filled out and handed to the man. Then he made his way back up the path. When he arrived at the top, he was wiping his hands on his green jeans.
"Even the money was dirty," he said quietly, opening the door of the Jimmy.
We circulated back through the campground one more time, trying to find someone else to shake down. At one site O'Leary left a warning note for nonpayment. At another, a wisp of smoke rose from a scorched milk carton and some potato peelings sizzling on the coals of an abandoned campfire. A pump from a gold dredge lay in pieces next to the fire ring on a grimy tarpaulin.
"Where are they? Mining?" I asked O'Leary. I retrieved my canteen from the Jimmy and poured water on the hot ashes, stirring them with a stick. The fire sputtered and steamed.
"Cheese Day," O'Leary replied, squinting at me through the acrid smoke. He turned to walk back to the truck.
"Cheese Day? What's that?" I asked, following him. We got in.
"That's where they give out government food up in Colfax and Auburn. You know, Department of Agriculture surplus commodities for indigents and welfare minersâgeneric cheese, dried milk, generic macaroni, sacks of beans."
"Oh?"
"So if you want to collect fees, don't bother coming here on the morning of the first Thursday of the month," he said, putting the Jimmy in drive. We left the canyon, headed back to our office.
Back in the ranger station's kitchen, O'Leary chewed a takeout taco he had picked up on our way back through Auburn and absorbed himself in a paperback Louis L'Amour cowboy novel. I studied him in silence, munching sandwiches I
On the far side, we turned left on a dirt track through a line of boulders next to a sign that read MINERAL BAR CAMPGROUND . The campground consisted of seventeen campsites laid out along the track, about half of which were occupied by a collection of faded tents, sagging blue plastic tarpaulins, and wasted-looking old cars, pickup trucks, and vans. I couldn't see a single human being. Somewhere on the other side of a line of alders along the riverbank I heard the hum and rattle of a gold dredge.
"They must be out mining," I said helpfully to O'Leary.
"Uh-huh." He nodded noncommittally. He was a quiet man.
We idled slowly through the campground. Where the road dead-ended I saw two campsites below us, in a dusty basin separated from the river by a windrow of boulders cast up on the riverbank by nineteenth-century miners. In one camp, I saw people.
"Those are the Hallecks, a whole family of them," O'Leary said with no apparent pleasure.
A faded wall tent slumped at one end of the site. From it, a short man, his grubby shirt unbuttoned and his pale belly overhanging the waistline of his grimy cutoffs, made his way toward a short woman in a faded, multicolored muumuu. Her long hair hung forward in greasy strands as she bent over a frying pan on a camp stove. The ground was littered with beer cans. The man was yelling something I couldn't make out, and the woman yelled back, waving a corpulent arm. Continuing toward her, the man threaded his way through four dirty-faced children playing on the ground. They seemed oblivious to the domestic strife. I was remindedâand instantly I was ashamed, for these were
people,
I thoughtâof looking down into one of those pits at the zoo, where some poor creatures pace out their irritable lives in whatever is the opposite of a state of nature. This was not nature, I thought. This was not a park. My career had hit bottom.
O'Leary got out with his clipboard and bank bag and walked down a little footpath from the road to the campsite. I stood above at the edge of the embankment to watch. Below me, O'Leary greeted the inhabitants with genuine politeness. He waited patiently while they dug around in their filthy duffels and disheveled tent for the camping fees. When they finally pieced together enough change and counted it into his hands, he produced a little receipt, which he filled out and handed to the man. Then he made his way back up the path. When he arrived at the top, he was wiping his hands on his green jeans.
"Even the money was dirty," he said quietly, opening the door of the Jimmy.
We circulated back through the campground one more time, trying to find someone else to shake down. At one site O'Leary left a warning note for nonpayment. At another, a wisp of smoke rose from a scorched milk carton and some potato peelings sizzling on the coals of an abandoned campfire. A pump from a gold dredge lay in pieces next to the fire ring on a grimy tarpaulin.
"Where are they? Mining?" I asked O'Leary. I retrieved my canteen from the Jimmy and poured water on the hot ashes, stirring them with a stick. The fire sputtered and steamed.
"Cheese Day," O'Leary replied, squinting at me through the acrid smoke. He turned to walk back to the truck.
"Cheese Day? What's that?" I asked, following him. We got in.
"That's where they give out government food up in Colfax and Auburn. You know, Department of Agriculture surplus commodities for indigents and welfare minersâgeneric cheese, dried milk, generic macaroni, sacks of beans."
"Oh?"
"So if you want to collect fees, don't bother coming here on the morning of the first Thursday of the month," he said, putting the Jimmy in drive. We left the canyon, headed back to our office.
Back in the ranger station's kitchen, O'Leary chewed a takeout taco he had picked up on our way back through Auburn and absorbed himself in a paperback Louis L'Amour cowboy novel. I studied him in silence, munching sandwiches I
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