An Obituary :: Chrottästei

Photo: A road near Toad Rock damaged by the heaviest summer rains in recent history of the Swiss Alps (courtesy Korporation Unterägeri)

The Stumbling Block Is Gone

Some say, it will last another thousand years. Others believe with the next big rains, a giant of a hundred tonnes will roll and destroy us all. Since the dawn of humanity, the villagers have shared divided opinions.

“It really does look like a toad,” a Father says to himself, although aware he has an audience. “It used to be a test of a boy’s courage to jump off it. An initiation into a gang,” he continues, now directly to his eldest son. “It really does look like a toad,” says the Father.

It is a stone, sitting in the forest. On the hillside, a few hundred metres from the village. Engulfed by trees. Covered in moss. Rooted in the soil. Boys crouched on their hands and knees to glimpse the gnomes living underneath. The first leaps of faith - by generations of boys – were taken off the rock into the foliage below.

Village elders walked with their grandchildren to the rock, and stopped in front of it: “See that toad there? This is where we used to test our courage.” The stone has always been there. No one put it there. It was just there. Prominently perched for passersby to ponder, for boys to plunge. Courage tested, imagination flexed. Until now, nobody had ever asked: “Who put it there?” or “Why?”

“It really does look like a toad,” the Father tells his eldest again, whilst rummaging for a pair of scissors. “I have to keep this photo. This is historic,” he proclaims, before cutting out this first and last photo (and article) of a rock that had never before interested the media. A fact the article nonchalantly admits: “This block of rock has been under observation since the end of August of this year.” The rest of the newspaper filled with success and failure, lands in the bin. “This has to be pegged to the wall. This rock is memory,” exclaims the Father, exasperated.

The rock’s age is apparently of no relevance in its own obituary. Age is imperative: just ask James Dean. The age of dear relations, like the rain, is also nowhere mentioned. It’s approximate girth and weight are what is recorded: “With its size of almost 40 cubic metres, it weighed about 100 tonnes.” The danger it poses, is what has blasted it to stardom and the executioners overnight.

“A bulldozer broke the rock into bits, and deposited them at the Hole-In-The-Bucket,” the Father is reading from the article to his perplexed firstborn. So the Father explains: “The Hole-In-The-Bucket is a spot nearby in the forest.” The son chuckles. “All the forest has names. Like the Little Paradise. I used to know all the names, of every path, every feature.”

“The Stumbling Block Is Gone,” announces the newspaper headline, and concludes with the sober sentence: “As such, Toad Rock will live on in the memory of the local villagers.”