Ghost Lake

Posted On November 20, 2025

Author’s Note:

I penned the first drafts of this story as a poem in the summer of 1983, while working out of Lake Colden’s Interior Headquarters as a trail hand on the NYSDEC trail crew, during one the two summers I served as assistant to Lake Colden’s caretaker. I reworked it into a short story in 1991, after resigning my commission & leaving the service to embark on what I hoped would be a long & prosperous writing career.

In the end, life’s reality set it, & I realized I was never going to experience anything approaching the financially sustainable success I had hoped for as a writer.

Thus this tale, in its short story format, has remained buried in my archives for the last thirty five years.

I’ve always felt that “Ghost Lake” in this format, more than any other piece I’ve ever written, best defines me & my career as a writer.

For no reason in particular, I decided that now was as good a time as any to finally share it.

Life’s circumstances may have taken me out of the mountains, but my soul never left.

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Ghost Lake

It happens in the evening when everything’s still.  The mist settles low over the water.  The marsh air is pungent.  The mountains close everything in, headstones marking an industrial grave.

     Ghostly bubbles rise silently to the surface, rippling a pristine looking glass world.  I close my eyes and listen quietly.  The “Kerplash!” of a hungry trout echoes in the distance, absorbed by the shadowy cedar tree shore.

     I am surrounded by the cool, solitary hypnosis of a high peaks mountain lake.  Far from civilization, I piece together my battleworn rod.  The eyelets are scarred, the reel dented and scratched.  My calloused hands gently caress each spoon, carefully choosing the evening’s first warrior.

     The ancient rowboat groans softly as I begin my journey onto the lake.  Red squirrels scold me from the shoreline.  A single loon wails eerily in a vain search for food.  The condemnation burns my ears.  Oars creaking rhythmically, I slide through the mist.

     “Hey old man!”  “Gonna catch a big one tonight?!”  Giggles rain across the lake, descending madly from a world outside my own.  They don’t understand.  They come and camp, bringing saws and soap, taking trees, leaving garbage.  Their life is electric, their god is green.  I smile softly at their ignorance.  Men of knowledge, conquering nature.  What is it worth when the vanquished have died?

     I cast out towards my favorite rock.  The lure darts teasingly back towards the boat, reflecting dim twinkles of light from below.  Suddenly, the line goes taut.  A flash of silver grabs my spoon.  My heart races, the drag whines in response.  Rodtip up, I reel against the struggling trout.  It breaks the surface ten feet from the boat.  It’s a beauty!  Net ready, I skillfully let the fish play itself out.

     A deft scoop snatches my trophy from the water; a pound and a half, maybe two.  The trout flops loudly in the bottom of the boat – protesting – gasping for life.  I admire its beauty for a moment, then gently release it, a fleeting rainbow of color.  It flips its tail and darts back into memory’s depths.

     It’s getting harder.  Each time out I cast a little deeper.  It’s futile, I know, but old love dies hard.  The memories are still so vivid.  My mind won’t let me rest.

I cry sometimes – sad, angry tears; knowing that someday my charade must end.  Rowing back across the lake, I reach again for the past, reliving a time when ripples were more than illusions, trout more than dreams. 

**********

Until Our Trails Cross Again:

ADKO