The Rock

Dollar and I couldn’t be kept caged in Hillside for long.  As soon as I obtained my driver’s license and a mode of transport (a beat up old Chevy Le Mans, 4 door, in forest green and rust) we struck out for the hills.  We hunted wherever and whenever we could.  It soon became obvious that we needed to find a place to spend the weekend, as our hunting trips were ending entirely too soon.

The first place that we took over as our own was a rock outcropping in the old iron mining hills of Hibernia, NJ.  I had been in and around this area for most of my young life, courtesy of my uncle.  I knew we could roam far and wide without being harassed by non-hunters, game wardens or any other undesireables.

Dollar and I scoured the area looking for a cave because this surely was cave country.  Eventually we found a reasonable facsimile thereof.  It needed a roof, but once that was constructed, we had us a dry, well hidden, semi-comfortable place to dwell.  It was on the very edge of something like a 40 ft. rock outcropping.
Thus, The Rock.

I remember the day we found what was to be our home-away-from-home for the next couple of years.  It was a beautiful spring day, warm and sunny.  We were free climbing up the rock faces and rappelling down by rope, in and of itself some pretty cool stuff.  Occasionally a cascade of ice would tumble past, as huge melting icicles let loose from above.  It pushed the entire experience over the edge.

Getting to this place was a challenge in itself, and that is exactly what we wanted.  A normal person would not willingly hike up the rock face, as it was quite steep.  Nor would one go down the rock face from above, because it was treacherous and didn’t look like you would make it to the bottom any other way than by express (falling).  In this way our hidey-hole was well hidden and escaped detection for years.

Problem with this area was the huge Hewlett-Packard plant across the street.  Being that they were working on top-secret government projects and all, (like laser printers and fax machines) and despite the fact that the entire facility was fenced in, with constant security and surveillance, they didn’t like us parking overnight on the short dirt road that led into the woods.  So they would call the police.  The police would come and, depending on their mood, either ticket the vehicle or flatten the tires (yes, both happened).

We would drop off our canned food and lesser equipment prior to our trip, in the daytime, then employ my sister to covertly drop us off after dark, where we would hike up our perishables and gear.
Fully camouflaged.
Because we were stealthy like that.

Now Dollar, he has a sixth sense when it comes to direction.  At least when he’s sober. More on that later.  But when it came to getting to The Rock, he could lead us in full dark right to the escarpment.  Then we would separate (to avoid falling rocks) and climb up.

It was a campsite on a rock face.  You slept in the cave, but only had a narrow ledge to move out along for maybe 5 feet.  Then you either climbed up or down.  Up to the fire, down to go home.  If you lost your grip on your beer, it rolled away, off the edge of the escarpment.  If you fumbled your breakfast, it splattered down three feet of barren rock.  If you lost your lunch, same.  If you lost your balance while relieving yourself in the middle of the night, the safety rope we strung up might hold you, but I wouldn’t have counted on it.

There is probably a hundred ways to die or get seriously injured up there.  Everything from the obvious, like falling off of a cliff, to the not so obvious, like falling into an abandoned mine shaft.  Then, of course, there are all the usual camp hazards, like getting cut with an ax or your boot knife, slicing your hand open on a damned can of tuna, getting stung multiple times by the wasps that lived in the crevice or even getting shot by some turkey hunter.  And all the more hazardous by the constant 30 degree slope we existed on.

But we were young then, and tough.  And stupid.  Ignorance is bliss, so they say.

What we did know was that the Rock was ours alone.  We liked being there so much we began to hatch a scheme that would bring us family wide notoriety for a long time to come.  And that scheme was:

Thanks-giv-o-fest.