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Good Night, General Sherman, Good Night

by Morgan Harvey

October 2010

The streetlight below conducted its own show. From green to yellow to red and back to green again, it danced alone, shining on the empty streets. This was a rare occasion. Usually the streets were littered with cars, but tonight, Los Angeles was dead. The spurts of rain showers earlier in the evening scared everybody inside, leaving the asphalt damp, ringing with the fresh smell of wet dirt. Carly stood on her balcony, overlooking the abandoned city. She breathed in the rain smell, even after a thorough cleaning of showers, it still smelled of smog; it was so rare during these stale summer months that the drizzle refreshed Carly’s stagnant mood. The streetlight changed to red. A lone city bus careened to a halt. It was the perfect target for a perfect cure of boredom. She now wished she hadn’t made brownies earlier today, using up all the eggs, all her ammunition. But with her roommates either away or napping, egging buses just didn’t bring the same joy. She couldn’t bring herself to throw eggs at one of the lost souls that gleamed sullenly out of the dirt streaked windows. Carly, her elbows resting on the railing as her wavy auburn hair escaped from behind her ear, continued to stare at the street below. The light finally changed back to green and the bus, slow to accelerate, sulked forward.

The front door opened as if surprised and slammed shut. Carly heard her roommate Ryan drop his bag loudly in the living room, waking up Liam who slept on the couch. She turned from the deserted night and entered the room, teetering for a while on the threshold.

“Whatisit?” said Liam. His eyes were half-closed as he tried to locate the intrusion on his nap. He was always comatose for five minutes after initially waking up, resembling either a mummy or a giant panda, stumbling around the apartment with pillow marks creased onto his cheek.

“Let’s do something right now,” said Ryan in a huff.

“Why? What’s wrong?” asked Carly, shutting the sliding glass door behind her.

“I don’t want to talk about it now. Let’s just go somewhere.”

“Where? The beach?

“Roscoes?”

“A scavenger hunt around L.A.?”

“No,” intervened Ryan. “Someplace farther. Let’s go on a road trip.”

“The Grand Canyon?”

“Seattle?”

“Petersburg, Kentucky?”

“The moon,” said Carly. This was her automatic response when asked what to do. As a kid, when bored at her Grandma’s, she watched It’s a Wonderful Life and fell in love with the part when George Bailey said he would lasso the moon. Now, out with friends, or bored at home, stumped as what to do, she always made this unfathomable suggestion. Nobody has yet to take her up on it.

“How about Sequoia National Park?”

The three just stared in contemplation at the thought of driving to a park at midnight. It would be impossible to see anything, nature was to be viewed in the daytime. It might even be closed. It was as if this one decision was the biggest decision of their twenty-year old lives. After a minute silence with no objections, nervous energy rang through the apartment, like a kettle boiling up, ready to explode with confetti. Within five minutes they had decided on this random, nonsensical road trip and within another fifteen they had gathered jackets, directions, fueled up Carly’s car, bought ten energy drinks and a bag of chips between them and were heading north on the 101.

As they left the city, the tall buildings that perpetually had a magical glow, like the flame that attracts moths, slowly dimmed. It was a flame that enticed millions to Los Angeles each year, a flame that Carly, Liam and Ryan were finally able to turn away from for the night. Stars were not yet visible as they ascended the Grapevine, still smothered by the neighboring smog. The car momentarily drifted to the right as Carly tried to change the radio station; she couldn’t listen to anymore Journey. Carly quickly readjusted her car before the white Pontiac next to her had time to realize that they just avoided a fatal accident.

“You really are the worst driver,” Liam mused from the back seat. It was a general consensus among Carly’s friends that a senile 80-year-old grandma missing her glasses and both hands was a better driver than she.

“I think you both have a death wish, always having me drive,” Carly said, as she finished her first energy drink.

“Just don’t kill us before we get there. You can go ahead and drive this car into a brick wall afterwards, but not before we see General Sherman,” said Liam.

Carly smiled to Liam through the rear view mirror. It was an odd sort of camaraderie the three friends had. Carly never thought after high school she would end up in Los Angeles. In the past year she had lived in New York and L.A., unable to really find a place that fit, a place she knew she belonged. Her hometown, a little beach getaway that some referred to as Ventura and others as that shitty place, was filled with toner-stoned surfers and bros with their respective hoes. It was a crusty old town that swallowed people whole and turned them into soccer moms. If you didn’t escape early, you never would. Carly needed to get out, experience that thing called life that the movies make look so much fun.

Right after high school, with friends’ tearful goodbyes and promises that they would keep in touch, Carly flew to New York City. Instead of starting her freshman year at some university, she deferred, wanting to take a year off, to get away from the textbooks and pop quizzes that ruled the last thirteen years of her life. As she descended into JFK, the Manhattan skyline looked grungy peering through the airplane window. The city wasn’t filled with elegant, geometrically refined buildings, but instead bulged with the dumpy oblong, unimaginative ones that obscured the Chrysler Building and even the Empire State Building. There was no Miss Holly Golightly enjoying an éclair outside Tiffany, or even an heiress enjoying a jelly donut. But as she drove through Queens, Carly told herself it would get better; it had to get better.

And for the first month it was. Carly got a job as a receptionist for some Wall Street company, enough money to keep her comfortable, or at least scraping by. She shopped in SoHo, ate in Little Italy and went to clubs in the Meat Packing District. But through the bubbly intoxication and the smoked filled haze that danced around the nightclubs, New York became the same lost feeling. She was sacrificing meals for nights out, wanting her money to stretch as much as possible. At bars in the Village she would talk — or listen — to pretentious NYU film students about the mundaneness of the latest summer Blockbuster. On the subway, standing on the Q going to Brooklyn, she would stare at lost faces that looked like Monet pictures from close up. The sad, vacant eyes told the same story of coming to New York to find life, but finding nothing instead. After the champagne fizzled and the haze sauntered out the door while winter and snow approached, Carly was tired of the monotony of this life. New York was supposed to be exciting. It was supposed to be Rent or Annie Hall or even Sex and the City. But in the city that never sleeps, where stars were born and lost spirits even had fun, Carly was always sleeping.

“Carly. Hey, Carly,” shouted Ryan.

“What? Oh, sorry, I must have been zoning,” said Carly as she straightened out her car to actually align with the 99. She finished off her second energy drink in order to stay awake. Liam slept in the back.

The streets were getting curvier and towns became nonexistent as the threesome edged closer to the woods. They passed a lone gas station that looked untouched, even unthought of, since the ’80s. A thick coat of dust was shellacked onto the windows and the gas pumps seemed as if they would dump two gallons of stale air and dirt into the tank before the gas could make its way to the nozzle. A sign decked in red and blue hunched in the window. It read, Vote Carter in ’77. While the gas station was begging, pleading, for a “for sale” sign — heck, it would even settle for a “Caution: About to be Demolished” sign — a board illuminating the deathly price for gas in bright fluorescents indicated this lumpy station was actually open.

They quickly passed the gas station, their last base of life for miles to come. Ryan picked up the map, trying to figure out how much longer until they entered the park. “We should be there soon,” was all he could come up with. “I hope we see a bear or at least a deer.”

“I don’t,” said Carly. “I’d be afraid it would attack us. And let’s face it, who in this car would defend me.”

“We would throw Liam out first as bait and then we would just run. Obviously,” said Ryan.

“Fine. I just don’t want to run into Sasquatch,” said Carly. “He is a bit harder to run away from. He could eat us.”

“Sasquatch isn’t going to eat us. Big Foot lives around here, not Sasquatch. He lives in Canada,” said Ryan.

“Well fine, but I still don’t want to get eaten by Big Foot.”

“Actually, you would probably get eaten by a carnivorous deer, before Big Foot showed up,” corrected Ryan.

“Why am I the one getting eaten here,” Carly said.

“I don’t know, your womanly smell. Or something like that.”

“You’re not going to get eaten by a deer or even Sasquatch,” interjected Liam mechanically. He sat upright, half opening his eyes.

“I thought you were asleep,” said Ryan.

“Nope, just tired.” Liam rested his head against the cool window, occasionally being bumped as the car trod over potholes. His sandy colored hair flopped over his eyes, but Liam was too lazy to sweep it away as he naturally did to show off. For the summer, Liam was working as an intern in a cubicle for a development company that was nothing more than a straightjacket on the light hearted. He repeatedly complained about the bitch work and long hours, but stayed for the oh-so-coveted job experience. Instead of cherishing the longer days and Junebug nights where the smells of ten barbeques intertwined with the constant shots of premature fireworks that racked his summer memories as a kid, he just came home and slept. He came home from work and slept on the couch, slept in his bed, slept in Ryan’s bed, even slept while making macaroni and cheese for dinner. In three weeks, Liam went from a fit 20-year-old to a beer-gutted, on the verge of a mid-life crisis, 40-year-old man.

“Oi,” Liam groaned, as his face smacked against the window one more time, as Carly took a sharp turn a little too fast. Liam had yet to get used to Carly’s bad driving combined with the winding road of the 198. As soon as they rounded the corner, however, a sign welcomed them to Sequoia National Park. They drove by an empty toll booth with its bar already raised, went over a speed bump and entered the forest, free of charge. Little sequoias, about 200 feet tall, littered the entryway. The green branches with tentacles for leaves reached out like a giant oozing Swamp Thing. A slight wind stirred the leaves, making the Thing look like he was going to attack. The narrow one lane road began to arch up hill, curving and twirling skyward. The trees were getting denser and denser, the only light was provided by beautiful blinking Central California peaking through the gaps of trees below the hill. The town, Fresno, maybe, seemed so big and so small at the same time, a million blaring lights condensed in one spot and then surrounded by darkened farmlands on all sides. It was as if life was only in that 20 mile radius. Carly, Ryan and Liam disappeared between the sequoias, leaving any form of civilization behind.

Too perplexed by this magical world, Carly’s eyes were, unfortunately, on everything but the road ahead. She finally noticed the little orange light glaring at her.

“Shit. The gas light is on.”

“Haha, that would make my life,” Ryan laughed.

“I told you to fill up back there, at the gas station,” said Liam.

“No, you didn’t,” exclaimed Carly.

“Oh, I must have thought it then. My bad.”

Ryan, trying to find a radio station that played something other than lyrical static or Christian talk radio, finally turned it off, humming to himself instead. He was unusually calm for the looming fact that they might be stranded in the park. Ryan, after all, was that guy who would overreact and throw a fit if the baristas at Starbucks screwed up his order. It wasn’t entirely Ryan’s fault, though; being raised by a mother who’s a doctor and a father who’s a lawyer, they wanted Ryan to be their very own Rudy in their modern day white version of the Cosby’s. From what classes he would take at college, to the suit he would wear on his first job interview to even the date of an emergency appendectomy, Ryan’s whole life was planned all the way through his second marriage.

Ryan and Liam met freshmen year of college. They had a GE class together, writing something or the other. Ryan would make a joke and Liam would contribute a side punch line. It was usually something inappropriate about their teacher or the sorority girls in their class. The remarks were rude, but they generally received a few snickers from surrounding students who were comatose from the lectures. When freshmen year ended and they were allowed to leave the all important dorm experience, they moved into an apartment off campus. In need of one more roommate, Ryan remembered his friend from high school was starting college in the fall after a year in New York and hoped she would complete their college family. At first it was awkward being one girl and two guys, but after they defined the rules of putting the toilet seat down and doing your own dishes, and the flirtations finally tired out from seeing the same face everyday, Carly completed a very odd, but compatible, trio.

“Wow” and “Aww” were the only things heard from the car. They stayed silent for twenty minutes with only those random interjections of astonishment. The park seemed completely empty except for their car humming along and the occasional deer cautiously peeking between the trunks of the trees, reinforcing the saying that deer really do get stuck in the headlights. It was an omnipotent feeling to be — or at least to think they were — the only ones in the park, the only ones to see these majestic beasts at night. Their tall statures only silhouetted by headlights and stars.

Carly almost drove the car off the road as she stared in amazement at the trees, wondering how anything grew that tall. Then, suddenly, a loud put-put crescendoed over the rhythmic whispers of the wind singing through the trees. Then nothing. The car stopped. In the middle of Sequoia National Park. At night. Nobody said a word, letting the obscenities yelled by crickets and toads absorb the air. Then Liam let out a long string of expletives, ranging from shit to fuck to damn to ass to mother. As he paused, running out of air, a giggle, that was nothing more than a mouse’s squeak quickly building to a lion’s roar, exploded from Ryan. His smile was contagious, triggering Carly to laugh, collapsing in his lap, and Liam to forgo his tirade. It seemed like a joke, unfathomable to be stuck in the park twenty-five miles in all directions from gas. When the laughter ceased to a whimper like the last gulps of air being let out of a balloon, and tears wiped from faces and stitches sewn up, Carly asked the all important question of what now.

“Let’s go explore,” Ryan said.

“We can’t leave the car.”

“It’s not like there is anybody around. And, ehh… we’ll lock it. Let’s just go and see General Sherman. We drove all this way because we were bored. We can’t leave without seeing the world’s tallest tree.”

Liam and Carly, whether out of compassion for Ryan or out of boredom, finally agreed. They pushed Carly’s car over to the side of the road, just in case some other car decided to drive by, and locked it.

A sign up ahead indicated General Sherman was to the right. They left the main, paved road and started walking on a dirt offshoot. Little bushes outlined the trail, saving the taller trees as hidden treasures for those who wished to venture further. Even in the dark, Carly had never seen such green in her life. There were so many trees and so many branches and so many leaves, she could barely decipher where one tree’s branch ended and the other’s started. They were tangled in together as if holding hands. Her only experience with forests were the seaweed growing on beach dunes and that one tree in Downtown L.A. She felt like an intruder into this secret world. The smell of the air was even astounding; it hurt to breathe in properly clean air, like swallowing jagged glass that cut away at her smog filled lungs.

“I wish we would have brought a flashlight,” said Liam. He stumbled out of the way of a lingering branch that attempted to hit him. There was a general consensus that light would have been a great way to spot the signs pointing to the General.

“I told you to bring a flashlight,” said Carly.

“No you didn’t,” retorted Liam.

“Oh, my bad. I just must have thought it.”

But with the moon growing higher in the sky and their eyes adjusting to the dark, a flashlight was no longer needed. They walked for another twenty minutes, getting lost at points and trying not to get snagged by branches. Just as Liam got hit by another draping branch, suggesting they turn back, Carly spotted General Sherman. With the three constantly staring skywards at the trees, stuck in darkness, the General sprang in front of them. There was no warning — the biggest tree was at their feet.

The base of the trunk was as big as a house. The roots looked like elephant feet and the bark, even with the lumps and the knots, was smooth as foil. Carly looked up, but got lost. The tree shot straight into the heavens without stopping. In the darkness there was no clear separation of sky and tree. The green speckled canopy shielded all the other trees, like a mama bear guarding her cubs. Carly sat on the ground, craning her neck, but ignoring the pain that came from staring at the tops of creatures that scratched the sky’s roof. The stars, stars that Carly forgot could be so bright, waved down at them.

Ryan and Liam sat next to Carly in the dirt.

“I just can’t believe these trees have been here for so long,” said Carly in awe.

“The General is over 2,000 years old,” said Ryan.

“How do you know that?” asked Liam.

“I don’t know. I read about it somewhere.” That was one of Ryan’s many talents; he just knew random facts. One of his favorite hobbies is looking up words in the dictionary to see their Latin roots — just for kicks.

“Can you imagine living that long? Just being around for all that history. To grow so big and not have anything stopping you. This tree either has good roots or was just very lucky to be planted in this spot. It avoided the fires and the storms and pioneers hunting for new territory. It is just so…” Carly trailed off.

“Big,” finished Liam.

“Yeah.” Carly wanted to say something profound, something prolific about this trip, but she just sat there. For the first time in a long time, Carly knew she was in the right spot. Right here. In the dirt. At the foot of General Sherman. At night. She grew up in the TV generation, but while most other kids realized those were just actors playing out a plot written for them, Carly though that was how life was supposed to be, that’s how everybody else but her lived. It didn’t matter that the most exciting thing that happened to her best friend was when she got her meal supersized for free; everybody had an exciting life. Kids stayed out all night, going pool hopping in their underwear before heading to Denny’s for pancakes at 4 a.m.; kids had rollercoaster romances where they met the love of their dreams at 17; kids got pregnant and had drug addictions — all the fun stuff. But for now, she wasn’t wondering what everybody else was doing or if they were having a better time. She was content, an often underrated emotion.

They sat in silence: Carly trying to find the Bid Dipper through the crowded leaves, Liam trying to follow the maze of branches and leaves to fit their rightful owner, Ryan sitting between the two, watching an airplane as it came in and out of view behind the crocheted green canopy. The moment was far from perfect, a rock was jetting into Carly’s butt as she sat on the ground, and a jacket would have decreased the chances of hypothermia.

Carly looked skyward for a while, glad to be sitting between her friends. The moon finally managed to fight through the General’s giant arms, casting a spotlight on the forest ground. The giant orb was a couple days shy from being a full moon, filling in the traced circle completely, as if following a connect-the-dot pattern. But instead of the bright orange glow that accompanied the full moon, it was a gleaming silver. They sat there, not thinking of another life, of growing up too quickly, or of dying too early. It might have been minutes or hours, but unrelative to time, a pink, luminous ball rose through a hazy dew, shining sunlight on the trees. The magic of the night and mystery of the sequoias was quickly vanishing.

“What’s next?” asked Carly.

“Let’s go to the moon,” Ryan said.

“It’s not that long of a drive. We are almost there,” Liam said. “Almost.”

A graduate from the University of Southern California, Morgan Harvey has written for the Daily Trojan and LA. Direct Magazine, and currently lives in Los Angeles.