The Old Coot takes his medicine - water.
By Merlin Lessler
I’m sitting here on an expansive lawn behind Belhurst Castle
in Geneva, NY looking down at Seneca Lake; I would guess it’s 30 or 40 feet
below me. The sun is gleaming across the surface. It’s 8 am, Sunday morning,
the day after our nephew, Jared Cady, married Jesseca Parsons in this same
spot, followed by a reception in the ballroom that lasted well into the
evening. Not a soul is here on this manicured landscape, except me. (I went to
bed early)
To the north, two wind generators slowly revolve in a light
breeze. Across the lake to the east, the sun is peeking through scattered
clouds, shinning a spotlight on a hillside dairy farm. A string of cottages are
scattered below it, hugging the lakeshore. I came fully equipped – a pen, a
notebook and a container of coffee. The ultimate way for an old coot to start
the day, especially with a scenic lake dotted with ripples at my feet.
That’s a long introduction to get to the subject at hand.
Water! What is it that makes sitting on an overlook, gazing at a body of water,
so calming, so therapeutic to ones soul? Today, it’s a lake, but any body of
water will do. I get the same sedation from a river or a stream, a pond or a
puddle and especially an ocean, which has the greatest soothing powers of all.
Water even did its magic for me, two days after the Susquehanna River engulfed
our village and I was paddling down Front Street in a kayak past my water
soaked house. It reached in and placed a calming hand on my psyche.
Water is magical. Is it because millions, maybe billions, of
years ago, the life form we’ve evolved from crawled out of the “soup” and some
of those genetic materials lie deep within our DNA? Maybe. I guess it doesn’t
really matter; we’re drawn to water. How else do you explain the premium price
we willingly pay to be near it, to visit or to reside?
Anyhow, here I sit, yet again, gazing at a body of water,
receiving a dose of curative, calming medicine; an old man, still trying to
figure out what life is all about, and getting nowhere.
Comments. Complaints. – mlessler7@gmail.com
No comments:
Post a Comment