Discovering John Law's homestead
January 2009
A Jaguar sedan sped along Route 2 with a map of old Acton laying on the passenger seat for reference. The driver was researching the past of John Law, his distant ancestor, trying to pinpoint where he settled some 350 years earlier. This direct descendant had spent his youth twenty miles west of Acton and frequently traveled Route 2 into Boston. The Concord rotary was an approximate midpoint between Boston and his home. The road used to change noticeably at the rotary. To the west, there were rural towns and a divided highway, and to the east, suburbs and an undivided highway, littered with stoplights and congestion. The farmland just west of the rotary had changed little since he first saw it in his youth. No matter how often he passed by the farmland, he always had peculiar sensations. Often those sensations reminded him to adjust his speed. If he travelling east, slow down and endure the congestion, and if travelling west, open it up and look out for cops.
Those sensations, which he hadn’t felt for quite a while, returned as he turned south onto School Street, the last street in Acton before the Concord rotary. He drove between open farmlands, portions of which were now soccer fields. As he drove further, the road carved into the woodlands. He went down a hill, around a curve and arrived at a T intersection. A green road sign with white lettering that read ‘Laws Brook Road’ was across the road from him. He parked his car on the shoulder and got out. He was struck by the solitude, and those peculiar sensations intensified. He wondered if those sensations, all along, had never meant for him to adjust his speed, but for him simply to stop for something important. The whirl of Route 2 had ceased once he descended the hill. The gurgling of Law’s Brook was now ubiquitous. There were scattered houses in the wooded lands. An occasional car whizzed along Laws Brook Road and across a small bridge. But he didn’t see or hear them. He was no longer in 2009.
A Jaguar sedan sped along Route 2 with a map of old Acton laying on the passenger seat for reference. The driver was researching the past of John Law, his distant ancestor, trying to pinpoint where he settled some 350 years earlier. This direct descendant had spent his youth twenty miles west of Acton and frequently traveled Route 2 into Boston. The Concord rotary was an approximate midpoint between Boston and his home. The road used to change noticeably at the rotary. To the west, there were rural towns and a divided highway, and to the east, suburbs and an undivided highway, littered with stoplights and congestion. The farmland just west of the rotary had changed little since he first saw it in his youth. No matter how often he passed by the farmland, he always had peculiar sensations. Often those sensations reminded him to adjust his speed. If he travelling east, slow down and endure the congestion, and if travelling west, open it up and look out for cops.
Those sensations, which he hadn’t felt for quite a while, returned as he turned south onto School Street, the last street in Acton before the Concord rotary. He drove between open farmlands, portions of which were now soccer fields. As he drove further, the road carved into the woodlands. He went down a hill, around a curve and arrived at a T intersection. A green road sign with white lettering that read ‘Laws Brook Road’ was across the road from him. He parked his car on the shoulder and got out. He was struck by the solitude, and those peculiar sensations intensified. He wondered if those sensations, all along, had never meant for him to adjust his speed, but for him simply to stop for something important. The whirl of Route 2 had ceased once he descended the hill. The gurgling of Law’s Brook was now ubiquitous. There were scattered houses in the wooded lands. An occasional car whizzed along Laws Brook Road and across a small bridge. But he didn’t see or hear them. He was no longer in 2009.
