This is the introduction for The Wayfaring Stranger. It is followed by the opening chapters.
Prologue
"It is Difficulties that show what men are. "
-Epictetus
A journey is defined as traveling from one place to another over a long period; sometimes it is called a passage, which can mean progress from one stage to another.
Normally we consider a journey a trek of physical miles and distance. However, the greatest journeys seem to be those of the heart—not just of the feet. This is a journey on the inside of a man or woman—in his/her soul and heart.
Come join Joseph Moore on this journey. . .
Introduction: “Just One Day”
I’ve now lived for over half a century among the piney woods of Southwestern Louisiana. Over these years, I’ve heard countless friends passionately say, “If I could go back in time for one day—just one day—I would walk under the virgin longleaf pine forests of Louisiana in the 1800’s .”
I remember my own great-grandmother describing the open forests of that time: “Baby, except in the creek bottoms where the hardwoods grew, all of the upland areas were covered in large majestic ‘yellow pines,’ which is what we called the longleafs. My, my—there weren’t any limbs until way up high, and the tops of the pines seemed to reach to heaven. Their tall canopies kept out the sunlight as well as undergrowth.
The ground was so clear under the trees that many times I watched my poppa ride his horse at a full gallop through the open forest.
Grandma Iles would continue, “The carpet of pine straw was so thick under the trees that wagons would roll quietly along on the cushion of needles. The quietness was only broken by the pines ‘singing’ as the wind blew in their tall tops.”
A far-off look in her eyes would seem to be re-capturing a vision of the woods from her youth. Then she would quietly sing a line of the old song, “In the Pines”:
In the pines, in the pines
Where the sun never shines,
And you shiver when the cold wind blows
I’ve never fully recovered from her descriptions. Even though I will never walk under those huge trees, The Wayfaring Stranger is my attempt to recreate on paper what my mind and heart have visualized since childhood.
So come join me as we travel to an area called “Ten Mile”—deep in the piney woods of Central Louisiana.
My great grandmother, Theodosia Iles by The Old House in Dry Creek. Painting by my uncle, Bill Iles.
Curt in his
"Piney Woods Office"
near his house.
This is where much of
The Wayfaring Stranger
was written.
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