Tales of life, death and mice at Meekertown

NORFOLK — Photographer Hunter Neal spent two weeks in a cabin deep inside Great Mountain Forest (GMF, which is in Norfolk and Falls Village) last June.

The cabin has no modern conveniences — no electricity, minimal plumbing, no running water.

It does have an upholstered couch that is home to a thriving colony of mice.

A resident can drive to it, however, down the four and a half miles of what Neal called “one of the longest driveways in Connecticut.”

Neal was speaking at the Norfolk Library on “Two Weeks at Meekertown Cabin: Convenience and the Quest to Avoid It” on Saturday, Feb. 13.

He was accompanied by Andrew Thomson, who played improvised piano during the second part of the program.

There are other cabins in the forest, but they are accessible only by foot.

“I decided to be rustic but I didn’t want to go to the cabins I couldn’t get to in a vehicle, for the very good reason that I needed convenience.”

Neal brought some equipment, including a propane stove.

“I could have eaten salads for two weeks, but ….”

The cabin has a wood stove and plenty of firewood, which was handy, not so much for heat, but for damp.

And Meekertown cabin — and vicinity — in June gets damp.

Neal said he fired up the stove “to get the edge off” and to dry his clothes.

Neal brought a laptop computer and his digital camera equipment, which required batteries. So he brought a big battery designed for a recreational vehicle and a solar charger.

He brought a kerosene lamp.

And, sensing that he might well become more intimately acquainted with Meekertown’s thriving insect community than he cared to be, he intelligently packed a roll of leftover window screening.

For bathing purposes, he purchased a camp shower — a black bag, holding a few gallons, which is left in the sun to heat up. Then the aspiring and perspiring bather hangs the arrangement in a tree, and stands under it, directing the hose to the strategic areas of the body.

“I thought I was pretty crafty,” said Neal.

However, he filled the shower bag with swamp water, which was brown.

Anyone who has ever tried one of these contraptions can guess the rest.

The valve wouldn’t shut off, so the bather had to lather up frantically before the hot water gave out.

And the lovely brown swamp water, laden with minerals, proved to be a less than ideal bathing medium.

“The soap laughed at it,” said Neal. “It was like being tarred and feathered.”

Neal wound up driving up to Great Mountain Forest’s Norfolk compound for usable water. “That was the real comeuppance.”

Neal was accompanied by his dog Lulu for the first week.

“After she left I still wasn’t alone.”

He was with the mice.

Neal spent his days hiking and photographing. He had advice and directions from GMF staff, but he often found himself bushwhacking and arriving at the cabin after dark, with a fair amount of carnage on his bare legs.

In another nod to convenience, he brought a head lamp for these expeditions.

He found what he believes to be an old charcoal hearth — a flat 30-foot circle in an otherwise wooded hillside.

(He briefly considered, and rejected, the possibility of the circle being a landing site for a UFO.)

Subsequently, he discovered that a) there was indeed a charcoal operation in the vicinity and b) in March of 1832, the battered body of one Amos Root was found there.

Jeremiah Orton, age 25, was questioned in the matter.

“I’m glad I didn’t know that when I was there,” said Neal.

He got philosophical. If history is defined, to some extent anyway, by the progression of innovations, are people getting better — smarter — with each generation?

He said there is a school of thought that believes that humans are getting dumber, because of the proliferation of conveniences.

“We don’t have to do as many things” in order to survive.

As he made his way around the forest, Neal said, “I felt like a visitor or tourist. And not a very smart tourist.”

He noted that, since the time of Socrates, older people have complained that subsequent generations don’t know how good they have it.

Neal expressed it thus: “We couldn’t afford [a commodity] so instead we [improvised].”

“Now it’s come full circle,” he said, noting that his smart phone has an application that alerts him to the fact he is using too many applications.

He said there is an inverse relationship between the ease of a task and the sense of accomplishment.

“So my hat is off to the original settlers of Meekertown.”

For the second half of the program, Neal showed his Meekertown photos and some video footage — of a very trouty-looking stretch of stream, of the dog Lulu snapping at bugs — and of a frustrated Neal, trying to get some sleep but unable to do so because of the activities of a big white mouse.

Andrew Thomson provided accompaniment on the piano, and played the theme from “In the Hall of the Mountain King” during the mouse sequence.

During the question period after, Neal admitted the white mouse was a ringer. The actual mice were small, brown and invisible.

“We cheated,” said Neal. “I never said it was a true story.”