First Journal and Reading

The email should've gone to my spam folder, but it didn't. I took that as a sign. The Bridge Literary Journal, which published near my hometown, sent out a call for submissions. I had just the story for them-my childhood growing up in rural western Pennsylvania.

It took a few months to hear that my short essay had been accepted. I would be published in the annual journal, my first one. I was invited to read my work in front of a crowd in Oil City, among them some of the best poets I'd ever heard.

It was a magical night, one where I wore a fancy dress because it was my first reading, and I wanted to look nice. Many people complimented me on my writing and encouraged me to keep going. My response was always the same - "That's the plan."

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A Day in the Valley

By Brooke Dorsch

“Brookie, I have to go potty," Casey said from her bed, which sat only a few feet from mine. She didn't like to go to the outhouse alone.

I looked down at my Rainbow Bright nightgown. Casey wore a flimsy pajama set that was blue, her favorite color. Being the older sister, I could say no or act like I didn’t hear her, but I didn’t. Shivering, I lifted my comforter.

Casey needed help with her boots and coat. I walked her out into the chilly, early fall morning. We stumbled from the house to the gravel path, holding hands to comfort one another. We feared the dark and what might come out of the woods.

Getting to the outhouse first, Casey pulled open the door and climbed into the small structure, only big enough for one person. There was no light switch, no bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. We didn’t have modern conveniences in the valley, like they had at Victory Elementary, where I went to learn to read and write. I knew other people had bathrooms and TV’s, but we didn’t have either.

I stood in the entrance to the outhouse, so Casey wouldn’t get lonely in the smelly space. The odor filled my nose, a combination of waste and the organic tang of earth.

“I’m done,” she said.

We switched places, and I took my turn on the cold seat that hung over an inky hole. I never looked down there because I didn’t want to know how deep it was.

When I was done, the short rays of early morning filtered through the trees, dotting the hills on either side of the valley. The creek roared below, swollen after recent rain showers. It curved around itself, then joined a bigger creek further down my parents’ property. The sound of water always played in the background, a never-ending soundtrack of nature’s white noise.

We went inside to change our clothes and waited for Mom to wake up. She usually slept in on Sundays since she didn’t have to work at the hospital. I read aloud from my library book, Where the Sidewalk Ends.

Toward the end of the poem For Sale, which made us giggle (One sister for sale!), Mom emerged from her bedroom, covering a yawn. Casey and I ran to the kitchen and waited patiently for Mom to wake up completely.

“Good morning,” Mom said, filling the kettle with spring water from a pitcher on the counter. Daddy must’ve collected the day’s water before he’d left for work.

After a breakfast of oatmeal and bacon, which was cooked over an old-fashion gas stove, Mom announced we were going blackberry picking. This being one of our favorite activities, we rushed to pull on our rubber boots and grab a pot from the cupboard.

The mud at the edge of the creek squished underfoot as we searched the banks for thorny treasure. The sun was warm, and I followed my mother’s outline towards the perfect spot. It was like the fruit had a beacon that only Mom could hear. Grabbing like thieves, we snatched the precious fruit from the branches. Our little, white hands turned purplish black from juice. Casey’s pale mouth was ringed with berry bits and violet residue. Mom laughed at the meager amount of knobby, black circles at the bottom of my pot.  

When my mother deemed that we had finally gathered enough, she struggled, alone, back up the ridge with the pots. She would make her way to the house to boil sugar and gelatin for blackberry jam. My sister and I lagged behind wanting to stay and splash in the creek. Like a family of beavers, we built a dam with rocks and stones that we had excavated from the creek bed. Rust-colored grime slicked every surface.

Daddy had fought the power plant upriver to stop the pollution from seeping into the water. Casey and I had never seen a fish in Scrubgrass Creek, which was why we constructed the dam. We wanted to catch one to show Daddy that all his hard work saving the watershed had paid off. 

The afternoon sun started to dip, and the shadows stretched in the valley. As I worked a large piece of slate from under the water, Casey said, “Brookie, I’m thirsty,” except it came out more like “firsty.”

Covered in water and with rust stains on the seat of our pants, we trudged back up the hill to the house. We were tired, soaked, and parched. I pulled on Casey’s tiny hand to help her walk.  She was too big to carry. Once we got in sight of the house, a saturating, sugary, smell lingered in the air, coming from the open screened door. The aroma hovered like a sweet fog. Casey dropped my hand and raced in front of me with her golden blonde hair flying behind her. I jogged to catch up.  

We pushed through the door of the small stone cottage and rushed to dip our metal mugs into the water bucket sitting on the kitchen counter. I slurped down the cool liquid, which had a crisp flavor you can only get from pure spring water coming out of a mountain. 

Mom stood over a pot with a perplexed look on her face. She kept stirring and stirring, murmuring to herself with every turn of the battered wooden spoon.

“Something’s wrong,” she said, aloud. “I don’t think it set.” 

Lifting the spoon and letting the thick liquid drip back into the pot, she shrugged. “I guess we’ll put it on pancakes for dinner.” My hippie mother had to learn to adapt and overcome while living in rural Western Pennsylvania with no modern conveniences.  

As soon as Daddy got home, we all ate about a million pancakes with blackberry syrup.

After dinner, Mom lit the gas lamps, and Daddy turned on the battery powered radio. They tuned into the Pittsburgh Steelers game with Myron Cope’s gravelly voice screaming out the plays. Without electricity, this was the only way my parents could follow their favorite team.

Mom warmed a big kettle of water on the stove. Casey and I got our bathing basins. Mine was pink plastic, and hers was blue. Once it was cool enough, Mom poured the water over our curls with a metal pitcher while we hugged our knees to keep from shivering. Since sundown, the temperature had dropped twenty degrees. 

Later, we crawled into bed in our shared, loft-like bedroom in the rafters of the house. I fell into a content sleep, listening to the creaking of the floorboards and the drone of the football game below, and wondered what tomorrow would be like in the valley.