Canoe in the Mist

The photograph. A cropped version appears in the header of this blog.

That photograph is about something far deeper and more than simply a canoeist alone in a canoe on a still lake in early morning mist. Or then again, perhaps it is not about more than that. It all depends on how one sees, I suppose....

That photograph says more about me than any words of description could.... It speaks of, and to, the very depths of my soul. It speaks of my deepest connections and my deepest desires. It speaks of my deepest hopes of my life. It speaks of my deepest truth. It speaks of silence, simplicity, and solitude. And yes, to me it even speaks of a certain uncertainty (what an ironic phrase that), and of traveling through life lightly and with a hand that holds lightly, not grasping.... To me it even speaks of the impermanence of all things, arising, "blooming," and fading away on their own....

No more commentary from me. Just these words from some who "got it":

"The movement of a canoe is like a reed in the wind. Silence is part of it and the sounds of lapping water, bird songs, and wind in the trees. It is part of the medium through which it floats, the sky, the water, the shores. . . . There is magic in the feel of a paddle and the movement of a canoe, a magic compounded of distance, adventure, solitude, and peace. The way of a canoe is the way of the wilderness , and of a freedom almost forgotten. It is an antidote to insecurity, the open door to waterways of ages past and a way of life with profound and abiding satisfactions. When a man is part of his canoe, he is part of all that canoes have ever known." ~Sigurd Olson from The Singing Wilderness

What sets a canoeing expedition apart is that it purifies you more rapidly and inescapably than any other travel. Travel a thousand miles by train and you are a brute; pedal five hundred on a bicycle and you remain basically a bourgeois; paddle a hundred in a canoe and you are already a child of nature. ~Pierre Elliott Trudeau, former Prime Minister of Canada