Water has always run through my life, the Hackensack River, an unnamed stream in Bogota, NJ, the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, the Long Island Sound, Flat Rock Brook,
the South China Sea,
Lake Michigan , so it's not surprising that Atwater's park, bluff, and beach often pop into my blogs. If I take a walk or bike ride, the lake usually is a magnet.
Someone recently asked me if I'd ever seen the tram at Atwater Beach. In fact I often overhear it mentioned as a presence in the distant past, not so distant to me. When my kids were young, we'd even occasionally use it. The tram carried non-walkers between bluff-top and beach. Once it no longer functioned, it remained in a limbo of disrepair before the construction of the scenic overlook and wooden stairs, and the deconstruction of the bath house and concession stand.
During one period of my life I'd load my bike with
paints and pieces of plywood (the grain reminded me of water), and trek down to the beach to paint. Blistering Augusts and ozone alerts never stopped me, though they probably should have. I've done hundreds of drawings looking down from bluff-top; and the startling view triggers many of my poems. It seems natural that my blogs hover over the lake with me. In fact I wrote one last July that I never got a chance to post, so I thought I'd do it now.
THE COAST GUARD TO THE RESCUE:
7/24/06 A couple of years ago a cardiologist told me to wear a pedometer, make sure it was accurate, and do the equivalent of 8000 steps a day. Perhaps that was counterproductive, since I was already aiming for 10,000. Since lifting weights and doing tai chi barely register, and biking is under-reported in the foot count, I do more than 8000 most days. But sometimes at the end of the day I'll glance at the pedometer and realize I haven't exercised enough. That's why I'm at Atwater Beach, looking down from the top, and the low tide is amazingly low, clouds reflected in the wet sand. I was exhausted till I got here and saw the lake; now I'm inspired to do the steps. One round trip.
Later. "Ciao, Suzanne, come vai?" called Ricardo, as I was about to descend. We always start our conversations in Italian, thanks to a shared love of opera. Then, after an aria or two, we retreat to English.
"Are you willing to take the steps with me?" I asked, and we walked down, watched waders wallow in the low low tide. A white yacht was bobbing unusually close to shore. Several people in orange life jackets stood on board. What in the world were they doing, not fishing, not moving, as the sky darkened? The deteriorating piers that jut into the lake were crowded with people who had climbed around the fences and ignored the keep off signs.
The tide was so low, we decided the boat must be grounded. Just then a boy and a girl climbed out of the boat and waded towards shore. "Are you stuck," I called.
"Yes, we've been here since 4 o'clock. It's some friends' boat. They're German. They don't know the boating rules." They'd come in too close, hit a rock, damaged the boat, and were waiting for the Coast Guard. And so did we, waited, and waited, for the Coast Guard rescue as the sun set. Finally a boat with flashing lights came from the north, then another from the south, then a third. When we left at 9 PM, it seemed the rescue was underway.
7/26/06 Wow, that's all I can think, as I watch sunset reflected, pink-tinged clouds and water, gulls appearing dark as they glide past brightness, horizon a hazy deep blue, lake a streaked mirror, red-winged black birds noisy yet invisible to me, sounds muted as night falls. Parents try to move their kids upwards. "These steps aren't so bad if you take your time," says the father. "Oh, my legs are already burning," says the mother, while a wired man dashes up and down steps, monitoring his heart rate and blood pressure. A screaming 3-year-old is carried up by his father. Now the mother takes over. Someone's using two folding chairs as walking sticks; he bumps his way upward.
The silhouetted figures in the water are framed by mauves and blues, voices from the crowded pier carry upwards, lake grows pinker and pinker, streakier, someone snaps a photo with his phone. Time, time, time to go, but how can I when the change is so constant, the colors more and more intense? May I never get used to having this a half mile from my front door.
