Alisal

The Alisal is a small stream and valley on the eastern side of the Salinas Valley, at the foot of the Gabilan Mountains, that serves as the setting for a crucial romantic and symbolic picnic between Cal Trask and Abra Bacon in the spring of 1918. Its wild azaleas, which bloom only briefly, become a fixed symbol for the couple's deferred happiness, and the place itself is the site where Cal confesses his guilt over Aron's death and Abra chooses to stand with him rather than abandon him.

Geography and Setting

The Alisal is a pleasant little stream that gurgles against the Gabilan Mountains on the east of the Salinas Valley. The water bumbles over round stones and washes the polished roots of the trees that hold it in. The smell of azaleas and the sleepy smell of sun working with chlorophyll fill the air. It is a place of natural beauty and seclusion, a short distance from the town of Salinas, and it was a traditional destination for Sunday School picnics on May Day. The wild azaleas that grew in the skirts of the stream were a part of that tradition, and their blooming was a signal for celebration.

The Azalea Picnic as a Symbol

Cal Trask had made the blooming of the azaleas the signal for his long-planned picnic with Abra. Once the symbol was set, it could not be violated. The winter of 1918 seemed reluctant to let go its bite, hanging on cold and wet and windy long after its time. The May Day picnic was drenched out of existence by a freezing rain, and there was not an open blossom on the azalea trees. Two weeks later they still were not out. Cal had not known it would be like this when he made azaleas the signal, but he refused to go without them. Lee, who had been alerted to make sandwiches when the day came, grew tired of waiting and stopped buying sandwich bread every two days. He urged Cal to just go anyway, but Cal insisted, "I said azaleas." The Silacci boys, who lived out there and came into school every day, reported that it would be a week or ten days. Finally, at the end of May, the Silacci boys brought the news that the salmon-pink blossoms of the azaleas were breaking free. On a Wednesday, as the nine o'clock bell was ringing, they told him. Cal immediately faked a nosebleed in English class to get out of school, met Abra, and they broke into a run to buy bread at Reynaud's Bakery and joggle Lee into action.

The Picnic and Its Aftermath

Cal and Abra drove to the Alisal in the Ford, which sat on the bank breathing softly from its overheating, its back seat piled with azalea branches. They sat on the bank among the luncheon papers and dangled their feet in the water. Abra reached over and took Cal's hand, breaking the barrier of his fear. But the idyll was interrupted by the weight of what Cal had done. He told Abra, "I've killed my brother and my father is paralyzed because of me." She took his arm and clung to it with both hands. He insisted, "My mother was a whore," and she replied, "I know. You told me. My father is a thief." He said, "I've got her blood, Abra," and she answered, "I've got his." They walked to the end of the pavement, to the end of the streetlights, and Cal wanted to go into the willow tree with her, the same willow tree where Aron and Abra had once hidden. Abra refused, saying, "Not if you're running away—no, I don't." She insisted they go back to his father's house, and Cal agreed. The Alisal thus becomes the place where Cal's attempt to escape his guilt is rejected, and where Abra's commitment to him is sealed not in a fantasy of innocence but in a shared acknowledgment of their flawed inheritances.