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epitome of incomprehensibility
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My parents' backyard leads into a forest, if a forest can be a nature park with paths. Not far into one of the paths, I meet a square-jawed man with a grizzled grey and black beard. I've never seen him before, but he says he's my grandfather. He looks too young and I say so. Ah, he says, you'll see. Farther into the forest, you'll find your great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather.
The atmosphere is supposed to be scary and mysterious. I can tell by the setting, by the darkness and denseness of the trees, as if this is a dream_movie. But "scared" isn't the right world for what I'm feeling. Curious, yes. I don't know *why* I seem to have a supernaturally long-lived line of ancestors, but they don't seem sinister. A lumberjack (apparently he's a lumberjack) with a jutting chin and a bit of a paunch, with ordinary gruff friendliness, won't attack anything but trees. And his grandfather, whom I glimpse through the trees - short, stooped, white-haired - isn't scary, unless other people's old age is scary.
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