Beaver Pond

Beaver Pond was a little muddy body of water tucked away into the southern part of the state forest in my hometown. It might not actually be called Beaver Pond, that was just what everyone called it. I guess I never really asked, just took it as one of those things that you never really questioned. It was high school, after all. But after hangouts there were established, I hoped to hear word nearly every weekend that there would be a gathering.

Thankfully, the boy I was dating was able to garner me an invite by being involved the right crowds. He was the captain of the lacrosse team. He lived in an unfathomably large house, and owned every video game console known to man. Besides me, there were other girls who had crushes on him (and maybe even a boy or two). He was effortlessly accepted, and being his girlfriend- I was accepted too. So that was nice.

Trust me, I don't know how we got to be dating either. It wasn't that I was a total dork in high school, but it is hard to be invited to all the cool parties when you're busy with singing in the school chorus, writing for the lit magazine, heading up far too community service events. I was the type of girl that actually kind of enjoyed studying, though I probably never would have admitted it out loud. I was in the musical every year, for goodness sake! Running for the track team and being on varsity soccer could never fully counteract singing show-tunes, at least in the popularity contests. But long story short, I was sometimes invited to weekend night gatherings at the super-hyped Beaver Pond. And I was thrilled.

The boys who organized the gathering were the type of boys that you would expect. They played sports, and were the first to experiment with drinking. They smoked pot, and taught themselves to play acoustic guitar. They considered themselves edgy. Every school has these type of boys, and mine was no exception. They were just cool, and others treated them that way. It was high school.

On Friday a word of mouth call would go around indicating that Beaver Pond was on that night. My twin wasn't so into the parties, as she sometimes felt the boys to be pretentious and contrived. Looking back, it's not hard to see why. But I was enamored by them and their friend group. I had been teaching myself guitar, mostly because my dad is a rock star and genius with the instrument, but I longed for the day when someone around the fire would ask if anyone wanted to play and I could bust out my version of Oasis' Wonderwall. It never happened, but I still sometimes practice it in case it ever comes up in the future. I will be prepared.

The twin was a good sport to come with me and play designated driver, though the maybe beer and a half I would drink would hardly qualify as drunk driving. But, like other sheltered teens, I was absolutely terrified of getting into trouble with the law, let alone my mother. The twin was also my backup in case I got shy (which I often did). She was carefree spirit with the gift of gab that knew she was above all the high school bullshit. And because of this, the twin was very much loved within that group. She was sassy, she was sarcastic, and she sang along with the boys as they played on their guitars.

To get to Beaver Pond, we parked along a quiet road and had to walk into the forest. At the time, I felt super stealth, but twenty-some odd random cars on a small residential street is a tad conspicuous. I'm sure we fooled very few people. The Pond's neighbors seemed cool enough with it. Or maybe they just didn't care what a bunch of teens were doing. Either way, we never got caught.

The walk in the woods took about fifteen minutes along the train tracks. We walked guided only by the light of our open cell phones, checking the ground. Cell phones, from experience, do not provide a great deal of light, so we mostly stumbled blindly forward until we hit the forked tree on the right. From there, you would stumble forward until you could see the light of the bonfire. And then you had have arrived: welcome to Beaver Pond. I never saw anyone with an actual flashlight, but everyone seemed to get there alright.

The parties brought together kids from all three different high schools in my town, and even some private schoolers. There were a lot of kids I recognized, and some I didn't. Like most small towns we had a lot of gossip, so some of the people were so notorious that I had heard of them well before I met them. The six boys from the catholic high school who called themselves the Untouchables. The Sexy Seven, seven self-entitled upperclass girls from my own school. (Even then, I thought it was a lame name. There are thesauruses, people.) Everything was just kind of chill. Sometimes people mingled, sometimes they didn't. One of the boys used to bring out his guitar and play requests throughout the night. To this day, I love when people play guitar by bonfires. The collective effect of music and staring at a fire is so comfortable that I could have sat there mesmerized for hours. It also could have been the effects of the smoke inhalation and the first intoxicating sips of teenage rebellion and beer. But I chose to think it was the former.

At the end of the night the biggest concerns did not always focus on getting caught. Getting hit by the train, though, did rank high up the list. The train usually trucked its way through at least once during the night, which was cool in the way that I had never been so close to a moving train before. I respected its power, and kept my distance. But I do remember one night when a (stupid) girl got it into her head that she "had" to touch the train because it was "so beautiful." I'm pretty sure her only drinks that night were O'Douls, a non-alcoholic beer selection bought by the boys to give to girls to see what they would do when they were "drunk." Mean, but also kind of funny. While I was secretly hoping that darwinian selection might prevail, someone eventually stopped her. Which, looking back, I guess was the right idea.

The beer at Beaver Pond was usually terrible. I can't remember since then when I've actually had Goldschlauger or Pabst Blue Ribbon and been excited about it. Even if it was free. But at the time, I reveled in the fact that I was being illicit. I was drinking in a forest, with other subversive peers, rejecting societal laws. No matter that I had perhaps one drink a night- I was clearly a rebel. I also never had to pay, which was a nice precedent to set for my future college years. I was a cheap rebel. Viva la resistance.

But if no one tried to touch the train and everyone got home safely, it was a good night. I remember lying in bed, smelling a bit like bonfire smoke and just absolutely adoring life.

We were never caught, which was definitely a good thing. But it's not like we were doing anything too revolutionary or life-altering: we were just a group of kids with nothing to do in a small town who got together and had a bonfire, more or less. Everyone was pretty responsible with drivers and carpooling, so nothing terrible ever happened. I think every kid should have a little bit of a defiant background. And I look back on these memories as a pretty good picture of modern youth, feeling very cool and chill and nonconformist by hanging out with some friends in the middle of a forest.