My Relationship With The River



I don’t know if I have told you about the River. Well, really it is a creek. It is a calm, steady, serene presence in my life. It speaks peace.

During the summer Dave and I would sit on the bridge over the creek and watch the water sparkle by. The water flowing away from us is like our life. It is the events of our life flowing along. The river flowing toward us is the future; the river flowing away is the past. We can not recapture the water which has flowed by, nor can we recapture the events which have transpired in our lives. They have happened and they have gone.

When we first arrived in June I would collect some of the hundreds of pinecones which fell from the Ponderosa Pines and throw them into the river. These pinecones came to represent various stresses and anxieties. Sometimes I would throw a whole laundry basketful in at one time; sometimes I would throw them in individually. It was a calming, healing experience every time.

As the summer wore on and we relaxed and the stress drained out of us; I visited the river less and less. Yesterday, Dad and I were raking 8 inch long Ponderosa Pine needles into huge piles on the lawn. We would then use a pitch fork and lift each pile into the wheelbarrow and wheel it out behind the shed to the burn pile. It was a briskly cool day. We were wearing toques and work gloves and big baggy flannel shirts. The sun was shining on us as we worked. When Dad strode off with yet another wheelbarrow load I turned and gazed at my beloved river. She is quite low at this time of year and I was surprised to see lacey ice collars around all the exposed rocks.

The water still babbles merrily by and creates scalloped edges on the ice collars. The trees are all bare now, but the scene is still beautiful in a wintry sort of way. The river still speaks, but it seems there is more joy in her voice now.