Just plain ducky

GLEN LAKE, Mich. – I share weather news up here because I think the folks who know the place enjoy an update. They’ve seen the lake area's moods shift in one day … the skies turn from angry gray to robin blue to crimson at dusk.  Or the opposite – from welcoming arms to thunderous fist.

When I’m back home, I get the same kind of reports from my siblings and imagine being there.

This morning, Nature did a 180 … actually, more a 120: Flat breezes from the humid southwest gave way to cool northwest winds.  The haze has lifted; white clouds now sail by like ducks or swans on parade. The birch trees salt the deck and my coffee with their fleur-de-lis seed buds – a summertime pain, but hey, the birches live here.  It’s their right.

And the waves … at last, there are waves against the shore, drumming a rhythm for the day. 

This summer is the cottage’s last.  I won’t dwell on that.  I have previously, and anyway there are still weeks ahead to reminisce. 

I did, though, do something when we arrived Sunday night that I hadn't done in years. The sun had set. The moon had climbed from the opposite horizon. And I stepped down the dock’s ladder into the dark, wet coldness, walked out to waist-deep, and dove in.

It’s been nearly two years since I started this blog. Today, for grins, I looked back at my first post. It’s too long, the sentences are too fat, and it’s damn too serious.  Professor Donald Trump, my freshman colloquium teacher at Wooster College, would have chopped it to pieces like a Benihana chef.  Then chided me for leaving out the wasabi.

It’s also clear I’ve fallen short on much of its mission.  When I first considered doing this, I remarked to a close friend and colleague that personal blogs seemed to me to be too … personal.  “They (the writers) tend to focus on just themselves, not on what’s going on around them,” I complained. “A lot of ‘me’ and ‘I’ and ‘my.’”

I vowed as the journalist to make this one different.  To write about others, especially those with an edge, and to take risks while doing so.

Hasn’t happened. At least not much. Instead, I've talked a lot about “me” and “I” and “my.”

Why?  Laziness.  It takes work, assertiveness, the ability to win over others, to bring their stories into this kind of forum.  It’s one thing to say you’re a writer with The Kansas City Star.  It’s another to say, uh, well, that I write this blog that a few kind folks read and that’s about it. It hardly impresses. Blogs are the zucchinis of the written word – a gardener's gift at first but less welcome as the bulbous things arrive in ever-larger numbers. 

Not that there haven’t been positives.  I’ve written some things here that have surprised me in a good way.  I don’t talk much, so when ideas and feelings bubble up, it’s both a relief and affirmation.  Like a burp after a good meal.

What has remained consistent, though, is this blog’s name and theme.  I still view water as a defining plane – adventure above, solitude and solace below.

So Sunday night I jumped in to our lake. (Hmmm … “our” lake.)  Sure, I could heap symbolism on the moment.  Write about sacred waters and a blog that’s gone full circle.  But that’d be tiresome.

Best to just describe the experience.

After stepping off the ladder, I found my footing.  The water at dock’s end is just above the knees and crystal clear.  But, it being dark, the clarity didn’t help.  Four steps in, I banged my left toe on a rock.  Then my right toe on another.

“Well, crap, this is going well,” I muttered.

I waited for my eyes to adjust; I could start to see a few, dark hazards below, which I now avoided.

The sandy bed of Glen Lake, on the south side, gradually deepens to shoulder-high – about 100 yards out – before falling to 130 feet below.  So for the average pedestrian, there’s plenty of room to wander before descending to the deep.

I walked about halfway out to the cliff, and then I slid below the water line.

It was like diving into pillows of warm and cold.  The water, relatively still, was warm toward the top because of the day’s sun.  The cold layers waited below.

And then I surfaced.  Not like a whale, spouting spray and noise.  But stealthily … slowly breaking the water with, first, the top of my head, then bringing my eyes just inches above the surface.

And then, like a submarine’s periscope, I turned 360 degrees and took in the sights … a smattering of pinpoint-yellow dots all along the shoreline, lake cabins and houses aglow; looking up, there were stars at a depth and number never seen in Kansas City.

And straight ahead, atop the water … the ripple of reflected light from our cottage.  It was warm, aflame and beckoning  – broad like landing lights on a runway, but far more inviting and fluid.

The cottage this night was in shadows and silhouettes.  But inside, brightly lit, was a legacy of life and living well-done.

It was a precious moment at a precious time.  

A duck’s eye view, I suppose.

Then again, no … it was my view.

My view, my moment, my time, full of “I” and “me” but ever thinking of "we" …

… that happened to be, with apologies, just plain ducky.