The fog this morning isn’t as thick as it has been over the
last few days, and though it usually causes havoc with my lungs, I’ll miss it.
When I can’t see the New York Skyline from the window of my Hoboken
office, you know the fog is thick.
I spent part of Friday strolling along the shore of the Hudson
River , thinking that Avalon would appear out from the remote
waters – a King Arthur Legend I am particularly fond of.
I could see the water but not New York ,
and could see the ferries as they popped out from the white walls as if my
magic, ferries that should have been fairies carrying passengers instead of
mystical swords.
Some of the ruins of piers on the Hoboken
side gave this an even more amazing feel, and I strolled along trying to
glimpse thing in the over grown and twisted piers that the passing,
uninterested masses would certainly miss.
Having a river within eye sight of where I sit each day
renews me, in the same way the old Passaic
did when I had to cross it twice or more a day, or could jog along it.
This intimacy, this tenderness of contact, is what I miss
most about being close to water.
John Lennon used to boast about being the son of a sailor. I
am, too, and the grandson of a boat builder on the other side of my family.
And though I tend towards seasickness in turbulence, I still
tend to go to water to heal or to find inspiration, or to find myself in the
mists of life’s fog – a condition that seems more prevalent as the years go on.
In the fog the sound of lapping water against the shore
seems louder and competes with the daily grind that has brought civilization to
the very brink, where industry and now real estate stares eye to eye with
Mother Nature, and in this stand off, it is impossible to tell which one will
prevail.
Our civilized ways have altered the environment in something
sometimes called global warming, proof – despite the wishes of some deaf, dumb
and blind religious leaders – that mankind has the wherewithal to undermine the
creative wishes of God, and to turn this Garden of Eden god or accident has creative
for us, into a wasteland.
We constantly thrust ourselves from Eden
by taking too big a bite from the apple, this propelling ourselves forward with
the illusion of progress. So these days, Mother Nature turns her fury towards
us and lashes back, raising her waters over these streets.
Even the Native Americans knew better than to settle too
close to water, but we don’t. We live with the arrogance of power we really
lack. So our latest plan is to build walls to keep the rising water out so that
the wealthy who must have views of water can live at the edge of doom – while
wiser and poorer people elsewhere foot the bill with taxes rising nearly as
high as the water.
So it is on foggy days like this I wonder as I walk if these
foolhardy souls that cling to these shores still appreciate the view, the way I
do, as the fairies come and go to the sound of water, and I wonder, who will
win this staring contest – although in truth, I already know.
