After Adrian Hoover becomes ill he and Helen spend two months in northern Minnesota, but when the time comes to go home they decide to stay (this is in 1954). In Chicago Adrian worked as an art director of a publishing firm, and Helen was a research metallurgist in a laboratory.
Someone later tells Helen: ". . . but you might as well know that some people up here have been betting - really betting, I mean - that you won't stay the winter"
This is hardly surprising. While Adrian is the ultimate handyman, and it seems they have visited this area before, both Helen and he are strangely naive about living there. For instance, it seems it has not occurred to them that they might need warm clothes in winter. Helen also hadn't realised she does not need a fridge or freezer: Adrian sat down and laughed till he choked. Finally: "How were you ever so good in science? Look:"He waved a hand at the window. "Out there everything is frozen and will stay that way, in the shade at least, until spring". I do like Helen for telling us all this.
Their time in the woods starts with a series of mishaps.The first cabin they buy, which is not very well made, is damaged by heavy rain and floods which wash away part of the basement (this coincides with a very scary visit by a bear when Helen is on her own). By one stroke of good luck they find someone to make repairs, and by another the neighbouring cabin is for sale. This looks much nicer, plus it comes with lots of furniture that they like. But there is one thing they haven't taken into account: this cabin is only built for summer use. So it is back to the first cabin again for winter, and they head into town (a three hour drive in good conditions) to buy provisions, warm winter clothes and to collect their mail order purchases, which include two stoves. On the way back to the cabin, they collide with another car. Running out of money, recovering from the accident and stuck in the cabin without a car, Adrian misses an appointment to sign a contract which could have earned him a lot of money. But as Helen says: "if he had been there on time to sign the contract we'd have had an easy life and another car. And it is very possible that I should never have written anything except letters to my friends".
They adapt to life in the cabin, getting to know the land and the animals that live there. One morning Adrian calls Helen to come outside. "Frost, he said in an awestruck voice. "It's frost". I've always thought of frost as something white sprinkled on grass like sugar, but this was a feathery miracle. Every twig was fringed by it, every branch festooned, every bud tufted. Delicate ice plumes hung inches long from our eaves. The windows were barley sugar and the cabin logs were netted over by tiny ice fans.
The snow stopped before dark, as suddenly as it had begun and Ade and I stepped out to look at the fresh white. The silence was so deep that I could hear my blood throbbing in my ears. The air carried a scent like the taste of snow. A feeling of being watched from the white forest was very strong. "They're all around us", I said. "The natives. We're a minority of two". During the winter they get to know some of those natives, among them mice, deer, birds, squirrels, weasels and an animal I had never heard of: the fisher (see picture below).
They need to find a way of making money and buy a mimeograph, which they use to produce note paper decorated by Adrian. This sells well. He also manages to sell woodwork. Another small source of income is taking care of a rain gauge for the US Weather Bureau. By the end of the book Helen has sold a few articles to magazines.
During the winter Adrian reads from David Copperfield while Helen crochets or embroiders. Copperfield was a fortunate selection because from it came the motto that for several years was tacked onto a log in the kitchen: SOMETHING WILL TURN UP. J.Wilkins Micawber.
The winter passes. Helen looses track of time and is astonished it already is 19 February. I looked up and across the lake to the clear blue above the far hills and thought about my disorted time sense that seemd to have lost me three weeks. But it wasn't really distorted and I hadn't lost anything. I'd just been seeing things in a way that was new and different to me, a way that I'd probably known in early childhood and forgotten.
They are happy with what litle they have.
A Chicago friend wanted to know when we were coming back to civilazation. I looked out of the window and up through the bare lacework of a birch top to the blue, blue sky. I smelled the faint fragrance of balsam smoke from the stove. I listened to the querulous piping of some nuthatches. I thought of the woodpiles and my white ceiling and the stored groceries - all of the fall work behind and the winter chores ahead. Of the dim, tantalizing glimpses of possible independent careers. Civilization? We were as civilized in our forest setting as my friend was in het concrete beehive, but it would be useless to try to tell her so.
I could quote from this book endlessly. A recent acquisition and an instant favourite, it has everything: domestic and financial detail, hardship, nature, animals, the kindness of strangers and of course a map. Helen wrote 7 books for adults (also some children's books). The Years of the Forest is another book about their cabin life, which I will cover in a future post.
