January 18, 2021
In the middle of the Pisgah National Forest, near where North and South Carolina meet, I hiked down a steep flight of stone stairs to Looking-Glass Falls. The white water thunders some 60 feet into Looking Glass creek, sending a soft mist drifting across the rocks to where I stood. The creek crashes over boulders and rushes southward for a couple of miles to the Davidson River, which joins the French Broad River just east of Brevard, N.C.
Where, exactly, were we? I had only a vague idea. We drove to Waynesville, N.C., that morning, Wednesday. The idea was to get out of town after an information-packed hour with the radiation oncologist, the “rad-onc” who’s taking my case, following up last month’s operation. The doc ordered a PET (positron emission tomography) scan. PETs are more precise than CTs and MRIs in detecting bad news. I’ve had two of ‘em.
So it was time to go to the mountains. The GPS route was up U.S. 25 to I-26 near the state line to Asheville, then 20 miles west on I-40 to Waynesville, which calls itself the “gateway to the Smokies.” They rise sharply in the northwest, topped with recent snow. We hiked up and down Main Street in coats and gloves against the biting mountain air, admiring the local flavor: Mountain Quilts, Wildflour Blue Bakery, Spenceberry Antiques, Blue Ridge Beer Hub.
I wanted to stay longer, but it was time. For the return we found U.S. 276, which winds south out of town. “Does this get us through the mountains?” I asked somebody. It’s fine, he said.
The first ten miles meandered through gentle hills past homesteads and small farms along the swift-flowing Pigeon River. We entered Pisgah, the forest closed in. Civilization fell away, we started climbing. As we puttered up the switchbacks I looked nervously at the sheer, snowy cliffs ahead. Some miles in we inched past an intersection with the Blue Ridge Parkway, which continues west across the state to Cherokee. We both held our breath as we climbed and climbed, then descended slowly, then more slowly through thick forest that rose up the slopes, nearly straight up around us.
We had never been this way before, which starts innocuously as Pigeon Street then becomes the Cruso Road. It passes Wagon Road Gap and Wagon Road Ridge, then Pisgah Ridge, Justus Cove, and Sliding Rock. This is wilderness, empty and desolate in mid-January. The road winds and cuts back between narrow cliffs and descents, the heights fade into the thick, shadowy forest. Then we rounded a bend and saw the falls.
Looking Glass Creek appeared. I drove a short way past and pulled over. We stepped out, catching our breath against the sharp air. Through the trees we heard the water’s thunderous cascade into the creek and through the sluice of the rocks below. It echoed against the forest solemnity. I stared, hypnotized by the collision of sound and stillness. The raw wildness of the rushing torrent and the rising mist conveyed a mysterious, undefinable beauty, the beauty of a mountain church, telling of the nearness of God.
I stood looking at the creek for a while. The sight and sound of the pure, luminescent wild water eased the tension of the previous day’s appointment. The doc walked us matter-of-factly through my CT scan images on his wide-screen computer monitor, pointing out my problems as of last March, then the evolution forward to October. The technology, I thought, is impressive. Impressive—but for me, ominous, foreboding, full of meaning.
“I’m proposing probably 30 sessions,” he said, talking about radiation. “The PET will tell us whether chemo, given concurrently, also will be appropriate. I’ll discuss with the med-onc (medical oncologist).”
So there was that, back in Greenville, and the rush of bulletins from Washington reporting the Trumpian barbarism along the Mall and in the Capitol. Arrests are being made, National Guardsmen are deploying, perimeters are being set up. We’re reading about social-media psychos, heavily armed, among us.
Refreshed by the cool spray on my face, I tramped slowly back up the hundred steps to the road, panting and wheezing. We pushed on. “Not out of the woods yet,” I thought, then frowned at the ambivalent metaphor. I decided to keep it to myself. Sandy stared straight ahead.
We wound on through the towering forest out of the mountains, passing a trailhead and a campground, then the Pisgah National Forest visitor’s center. Then a busy intersection, and we were in Brevard, a good-sized town. My cellphone buzzed. The rad-onc’s scheduler had an appointment for the PET in a week. The doc wants to see me the next day to discuss the results. I thanked her.
With Brevard behind us the forest closed in again. We were on the Greenville Highway, which zigzags southeast then southwest, tacking toward South Carolina’s mountains. We saw the state line and the sign, “Greenville County” perched amid the trees. We passed Ceasar’s Head State Park on a sharply angled switchback, then Table Rock. Twenty more miles got us to Traveler’s Rest, and the outbound rush hour. A day on the road, getting our wilderness fix. Looking Glass, a sudden exhilarating stab of beauty, reminds us that beauty exists. It exists, forever, and the sadness fades.
On the Road 