Fog has settled in on this winter evening: that thick, damp, impenetrable low-lying tule fog typical of the valley at this time of year. Fog that seeps through the skin to the inside of your bones, so opaque it presses against your vision. People around here gauge its thickness by the number of center lane dashes you can see in front of your car.
Tonight it’s a three-dash fog. I drive slowly, unfamiliar with the surrounding farm territory. Was that the large barn where I’m to make a left turn? There are no streetlights on this road, only fog-dimmed porch lights on farmhouses set far from the road. Road signs are scarce.
I’m a city girl. Have been driving on the same well-marked, well-lit streets since my learner’s permit, more than five years ago. Then just last year—1968—I moved to Davis to attend the university. The campus and town are surrounded by farm country. The boonies, I told my city friends, I live in the boonies!
My new friend Judith invited me to spend the weekend with her, her husband, and a few other people, friends of theirs. They live in a farmhouse, fifteen or twenty miles from our college town. It was way past sundown when I left my apartment. The end of a harrowing finals week. I threw my overnight bag into the back seat of my ten-year old Chevrolet. With Judith’s directions to the farm I had jotted down on the back of an envelope—left at the large barn, right at the white fence—I drive out of town, looking forward to the weekend, eager to be with my friends.
As I leave the lighted streets behind, my neck cranes forward as my head looks side to side. The windshield wipers are on, the defroster is on high. Its loud whapping noise breaks the night’s stillness. Fog has swallowed up all outside sounds. I make the left turn—a driveway? Must be. It’s too narrow to be a road. My Chevy creeps along, tentatively. On both sides of me high hedges emerge from the fog. I review the directions in my head, now muddled by disorientation. But I don’t want to stop, turn on the interior light to check the directions; I’ll lose too much time. Besides, I’m already running late. So: shift into reverse, turn around, get back on the road, go to the next crossroad and turn left.
Gravel. Judith had warned me that some roads were unpaved. But is this the one that leads to the white fence, where I’m to turn? I keep on this road, hoping it’s the right one. At least it’s flat and straight, and the impression of rough sandpaper as my tires travel on the gravel reassures me that I haven’t veered off the road.
Farmland on both sides. By the mounds of dirt against the road’s edge I presume the fields have been recently plowed. The road narrows, becomes ruttier, gravel now gone, ground turned into mud. Did I miss the white fence? I never saw any intersecting road, neither left nor right. This is altogether wrong. I look for a place to turn around. Aha! I see a widening in the road, or is this a field? Turn off the noisy defroster, I tell myself, and concentrate. The car’s movement feels unsteady. Better to take the turn slowly. A small lurch forward, back a little, yank the manual steering wheel. Oops.
The Chevy sinks into slimy, wet soil. I wrestle with my car, forward and reverse, but only hear that high wheezing noise spinning wheels make. Not good. I crank down the now steamed-up window to get a better look: the fog outside has thinned, somewhat. I am in the middle of a plowed field.
All is silence. The profound silence pulses in my ears. I wait. I need to think. A faint sound comes into my awareness. It’s a dog barking in the distance. The sound grows, moving in and out in angry shapes: a low growl, a deep throaty snarl, then back to a persistent, unrelenting bark. At what? And where from? I can’t see a thing as I look around as far as the fog allows.
Beyond the field through the murky atmosphere I see a wane, yellowish light. A farmhouse? Barn? Or just a storage shed? Maybe, just maybe, it’ll be a porch light at the front door of a family home. What to do? Either sit in the car for the remainder of this cold, damp night, or walk across the field toward the light, and hope to find a house where I can ask to use the phone and call Judith for help. Yes, that’s what I have to do. I certainly don’t want to spend the entire night stuck out in the middle of an unfamiliar, inhospitable place inside a cold car.
But the dog, where is it?
Dogs don’t like me. I must emit an objectionable smell. Fear offends them, I remember now. They can smell it coming. I know to stay away as far as I can from almost any type of dog, Pit Bull or Chihuahua. I’m afraid of them.
Cautiously, I get out of the car, sink in the soft wet soil, and listen in each direction. The barking continues, somewhere, everywhere. I have no flashlight, so walk carefully, aiming straight for the lamp. I will not think about the dog, I will not sink far into the wet, mushy ground. I will walk without fear, my eye on the light. One foot up, out of the mud, the other down into it, over and over again, slow motion. Cold mud seeps into my shoes, through my clothes.
My childhood fears of the dark descend on me as I trudge across this field: blood-thirsty monsters, human-like amphibians from black lagoons, ghosts. I’m a little girl again, afraid of that hidden creature lurking under the bed or the one in the half-open closet, waiting for me to step down off my bed, to walk across the room on my way to take a pee.
“Mommy!” But I’m not a child and I’m not in the comfort of my bed and my mother’s not here to protect her little girl.
Finally. I reach a house, illuminated by a yellow light on a lamppost—like a streetlight but without the street—shining down on an empty cement patio to the side of the house. A porch light over the front door is also on, and I can see lights on inside. The dog’s snarl grows louder and angrier now. I still can’t see him.
I knock on the door. No one comes. I knock again, and then again, louder each time. No answer. I wonder if I should look for a neighboring house? But I see no neighboring houses, and no other lights. I will not go any further. The low growling nears. Try the door, just in case.
To my surprise, it’s unlocked. Do I dare? With trepidation and muddy tracks, I enter, closing the door behind me. “Hello?” Silence. Louder: “Hello. Is anyone home?” I look around, many lights are on, it’s warm and cozy in here. I’ll just poke around a little, not too far. Mud tracks follow me no matter how light my step. Beyond the living room I enter a hallway and see a small table with a telephone on it. A miracle, this black rotary dial phone.
I dial Judith’s number, and practically cry into the phone. “My car got stuck in the mud, I’m somewhere in a house I don’t know where, I’m cold, I’m too scared to walk back to my car. Can you come get me?” Judith, her voice cool and calm, asks me to look for the address of the house, or the name of the people who live here. I shuffle through papers on the desk, my hand unsteady. What if the owners walk in and find me here? They’ll find a stranger, a trespasser, a wildly disturbed woman steeped in mud, ruffling through their belongings: not to be trusted. They might even reach for a gun. Surely every farmer out here has at least one. I hear a loud clanging then a low growl right outside the door. Did the dog break his chain? Did I shut the door tightly?
Stop! I tell my myself. Focus. Look for the address. The mail. There, on the telephone table. Here’s an envelope. Whew. Give to Judith. I take a deep breath and read out the address into the phone’s black receiver. “Are you still there? Judith?”
“I… I don’t recognize that address. Never mind. Stay where you are; we’ll find you and tow your car out.”
“I can’t stay here. Someone will come home and think I’ve broken in. Besides, I’m all muddy and making a mess in here. I’m going to walk to my car. I left the headlights on. Look for my headlights in the field opposite this house.”
Breathing again, I open the front door with happy thoughts of the coming weekend and the stories I’ll be telling my city friends. Oops. An angry sound reminds me: I forgot about the dog. I step back into the house. Before closing the door, I glance out at the field and see my headlights, off in the distance, dimming. Is the fog growing thicker? Or is the battery running low? Growls and barks and chain clanging assault my ears as I watch headlights fade into an impenetrable fog.
