Croquet heaven: “A mythical state or region where all attempted roquets are successful and all wicket strokes are achieved on the first try and all rushes are executed with perfect precision.” — United States Croquet Association
About two months ago, high on the hope promised by a much-anticipated double dose of vaccine, I wrote about gambling on the future. Not big risks — my gamble was in the form of a pair of tickets for a plane trip to Boise, Idaho, where my then-girlfriend’s family lives. My sister and brother-in-law joined us for the trip, which we took just last week.
One morning, we decided to take a short walk along the trail to Goose Falls. It was supposed to be an easy, two-mile hike. So we drove up a mountain to a parking area, dutifully read the signs warning us of what to do to avoid becoming a snack for a bear, and started on our way down the only evident trail. We clomped downhill, occasionally commenting on the sound of unseen water, falling into silence, and then startling out of our reveries when my sister would boldly state her name and place of origin. You’re supposed to “announce yourself,” you see, to avoid surprising a bear.
After about three miles of walking with no sign of the falls in sight, we decided we had taken a wrong turn. Scenic trails through the mountains tend to wind and weave, to meander along picturesque views, but we were following a dusty road steadily downhill, haunted by the sounds of an unseen and apparently unreachable river. So we turned around and began the climb back up the trail. Before long, we were forced onto the side of the road by a Jeep making its way downhill.
“Are you all looking for the trail to Goose Falls?” asked the older woman in the Jeep.
“Yes,” we said in chorus, aware that we looked like dusty idiots who had mistakenly walked for miles on a “scenic” service road. Because that’s exactly what we were.
“It’s back up the hill and across the road,” she told us, adding, “The signs they put up aren’t worth anything.”
So we walked back up the service road. And across the parking lot and across the road and all along the (much more picturesque and blessedly shaded) path to Goose Falls. Somewhere along the way, our two-mile hike quadrupled in length, but the falls, when we reached them, were lovely. That might have been when and where I proposed, except we were all covered in dust and sweat and we hadn’t brought enough water — and anyway, I had other plans.
First, I had to call Sydnie’s father. Not to ask permission, of course, it being the 21st century, but I owed him at least a heads up. So, while everyone else was away from our little rented cabin on the mountain, I attempted to have a heartfelt conversation, made all the more difficult by Ryan’s responses sounding as though they were mumbled through a bad vocoder on the other side of a long, metallic tunnel. I was on the verge of asking him to tap the receiver twice for “you have my blessing” when Sydnie, Coleen, and Justin pulled up in the car and the phone went totally silent. I looked at the screen to find that my phone had connected to the car’s Bluetooth. Isn’t technology lovely?
Later, phone call finished, in the middle of a game of croquet — right before the middle wicket, in fact — I proposed to Sydnie Blair Hammer with a substitute ring because the one she wanted was delayed somewhere in the mail. She accepted.
Why during a game of croquet? It’s the Davis family obsession. As family legend has it, before she was a grandmother, Grannie hoarded Greenbax Stamps and bought the family a croquet set — a game of their very own! Decades later, the Davises are the kind of weirdos who play croquet by the negligible light of the full moon or in the rain — without anyone suggesting quitting. So, with Sydnie’s family there to witness, along with my sister and brother-in-law, and playing the Davis family’s favorite pastime, it seemed right. A way to say without words that we see each other fully, with all our strange traditions and history, and we love each other all the more for them. You don’t just marry the person you know — you take all the selves they have been and will be, too. It’s a frightening time to make plans, these days, when each decision feels like a gamble, so better to move forward with eyes open.
It was my way of saying I know there’s no “croquet heaven” where things work out “with perfect precision.” We’ll take the wrong road, get lost, and come across our fair share of substitute rings and sticky wickets.
And truthfully, as long as we’re together, I can’t wait.
Jesse Davis
jesse@memphisflyer.com
