I had a very good summer, but more of that tomorrow. In the meantime, a synecdochal story. The other day I had the opportunity to perform at The Clearing. It was a short environmental play presented as a dramatic reading. We gathered a few hours early to rehearse and concluded the rehearsal with an hour or so to spare. Fortunately, I have my summer truck.
The summer truck is so named as it is a vehicle of possibility. Some time in early summer I throw kayak racks, a bike carrier, and an oversized, covered storage bin on the truck. Our kayaks and my mountain bike get added and the bin holds an assortment of clothes, sports gear, cameras, towels, soap, etc... At any given moment, it is possible, within a few minute's time, to be engaged in anything from sleeping on the beach to entering a triathlon. In any case, there is rarely a justification for not being actively involved with life if you have even a few minutes to spare. At the end of each day anything that needs cleaning comes out and is replaced. It is a carrier of possibility. It is a summer truck.
So, realizing the surrounding loveliness, I went back to the truck, stripped down, grabbed my running shoes, shorts, and Zen, and headed off down the curving gravel drives that wander the property, Gaither Vocal Band singing loud in my headphones to drown out my gasps. I ran 'til the exit drive T'd into Garrett Bay Road and headed into Ellison Bay. I eventually made my way back to the primary entrance and cut back onto Clearing property, again following the single-lane, gravel path.
Back at the truck I dumped my shoes and music, grabbed a towel and my flips, and went in search of the stairs that dropped off the short cliff to the rock beach below. I stopped once for directions, and, after a quizzical stare, which I assume suggested a complete abhorrence for swimming in that cold water (or so I heard someone mumble as I trotted away), I found the path behind the Lodge and made my way down to the water.
Off shore by 150 feet were two fishermen on a small bass-boat casting for smallmouth. While that was enough to prevent me from jumping in au naturel, it was not enough to prevent me from the experience of swimming along that bluff in the mid-afternoon sun. Actually, "jumping" is a bit of a misnomer. Typically, at the bottom of these bluffs, the water is clear and lovely and gets deep quite quickly. The beaches, however, are rock and the rock continues well into the water. There really are no sandy entrances and the rock, once at the water line or beyond, can get very slippery.
So I didn't jump. I kicked off my flips and threw my towel and sunglasses on a large rock. I then minced my way into the water until about a foot or so deep. At that point, despite the high uncool quotient, the best strategy was to awkwardly flop into my stomach and drag out into deeper water.
I found a larger rock out a ways which allowed me to stand completely submerged except my canted mouth, nose, and eyes. The water was crystal clear and cool. I just hung there, gripping the rock with my toes to counter the slight waves and let the sun beat on my face.
After I had cooled enough, I swam along the shore a little and then pulled, alligator style, eyes and nose just above the water line, into the shallow. I heard a buzzing and glanced to my right. All along the beach, now exposed some 6 or more years, nature was reclaiming dry ground with an assortment of flowers, milkweed, and occasional poplar or cedar sprig, roots crevassing down to the water table. The buzz was a humming bird methodically working from town toward the bay, appearing to visit every stop en route. I watched, nose deep, until far enough away to not be disturbed by my exit, equally ungainly as my entrance.
I toweled off and headed back to the truck and people and dramatic readings and things of apparent greater import. Yet my strongest memory is of the hummingbird, barely 10 feet away, filling its gullet.
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