Make Your Mark: Or, why ghosts like spray paint

I discovered the ghosts by accident.

I was somewhere south of Adrian, Michigan, clearing my brain after a court hearing in a murder case I’m following. Nothing much happened at the hearing, but the day still seemed to call for a little back-country therapy. As is often my goal on such occasions, I intentionally got myself as lost as possible, reveling in the woods and fields and occasional cow.

I was getting ready to turn right when a quick peek at Google Maps informed me that, if I turned the other way, I’d reach something called the Haunted Trestle. I turned left, of course, and In short order I found myself facing a railroad overpass slathered in color.

The place has obviously been a go-to destination for teens for decades, if not generations. Thick layers of spray paint cover every inch of the cement and steel structure, words and simple drawings and squiggles layered atop one another in a glorious explosion of self-expression. In several places, the paint peels back, revealing another — and then another — layer, colors upon colors upon colors.

(A side note, here: My 45 seconds of online research indicates the overpass isn’t actually a trestle. But I’m going to call it that. Who am I to argue with Google Maps?)

Some of the spray-painted words are vulgar. Some are encouraging. Initials in hearts ache with young love, and oversized letters exclaim the name of their painter. Other letters and scribbles and swirls mean nothing to anyone except the person who brought them to life with the swoosh of a paint can — the artist who, for that frozen moment, joined the throng that came before and made their mark.

I don’t know the backstory of the hauntedness of the trestle. I could probably look it up, but, at least for the moment, I don’t think I want to know.

To me, the ghosts hovering about that remote, quiet place in the middle of nowhere are the young painters — it must be hundreds of them, over years and years — yearning to matter, to be seen, to believe they belong and have a place on life’s canvas. 

A weedy pulloff just north of the trestle fits exactly one vehicle. Scrabbly but functional paths, worn by many feet, lead from the road up to the top of the trestle, where the ghosts laugh and drink cheap beer and lie on the tracks to feel brave and wonder what lies ahead for them. Next to the tracks, standing sentinel above the colored wall, a white pipe juts up from the gravel, probably with some purpose or another. 

Red paint forms block letters wrapped around the pipe:

WE

BE

HERE

Yes, they be. They be here, those young people full of fear and hope. They be here, hidden under the layers of all that came after, their glory days long forgotten in the hustle of adulthood and jobs and family and old age. New artists have swarmed in, made their mark, obliterated what came before. But it’s still there. It formed the foundation for what was to come, laying down color that made other scribbles and scrawls all the richer.

My worries and accomplishments and to-do lists all seem so big when I look at them from the inside, where I and my brief span are all I can really see. But every once in a while time opens herself up like a hillside of maples and you realize how many, how many, how many people came before, and how many will come after, and how infinitely, infinitely, infinitely small you are, and how your life is only a whisper in the fall wind.

I don’t want to live forever. Not in my body, and not in people’s memories, either. When my time here is done, I’m happy to cede the floor to the next round of humans ready to make their own mark, live their own lives, scrawl their own to-do lists and wonder if they matter.

But I be here now. And what I do lays a foundation for what comes after.

My kind word smooths the surface. My encouragement covers over anger and insult. My squiggle that’s just for me makes someone else braver, more ready to make a mark of their own.

I’m haunted by the hurt I see in the world and my inability to do anything about it. The problems and trauma and injustices and barriers are so layered and complex and inextricable from one another, nobody can fix it all. I walk past Valerie in her spot on the sidewalk outside the post office and I slip her a few dollars and inwardly writhe in shame because I don’t know how to change her life.

But mine is not the only paint can. I’m not an artist in the night, commissioned to create a Work of Greatness. I am infinitely small, and so are you. But I’ll make my little mark, and you make your little mark, and together we’ll create a layer on which others will build, 

and build, 

and build.

Maybe on this Halloween night, a car will roll to a stop in the little parking spot at the foot of the trestle, and a group of giddy teens will tumble out, paint cans in hand. I hope so. Contribute to the tapestry, you who are bursting with life and big dreams. Paint with abandon, you who don’t know if your little bit matters

It does.

Make your mark.

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I said I don’t want to know the trestle’s backstory, but I kinda do. I just don’t want to look it up online. If someone knows the actual story, for goodness’ sake, share it with us in the comments section.

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After I left the trestle, I found myself in the small town of Hudson, a little south of Jackson. There I discovered, to my utter delight, that a restaurant named Rumors (it’s right on the main drag, you can’t miss it) installed a tiny little house in a former vent in the front of the building. If you lie down on your stomach on the sidewalk and look inside, you can spend the best five minutes of your week looking through the windows. It made me incredibly happy.

Apparently the restaurant also has other tiny objects hidden around the inside of the restaurant, including one nobody has ever found. It was closed when I was there, but I’ll definitely be back.

The town also boasts a museum which, according to a sign on its door, is “One of the finest museums one could find for a town our size in Michigan,” and “A good place where kids can see interesting things.”

I’m a pretty big fan of Hudson.