Falls

It was hard leaving my woodland life behind but berry season is over, the wildflowers are no longer blooming and autumn is imminent.

On Friday I set out on a quest for Silver Falls which had been touted as a "must see" attraction. "The water is perfectly clear there, you can see right to the bottom" I was told. I consulted my maps. I consulted our landlord who pointed out their coordinates on the map and then suggested I visit Drewry Falls instead. "They're closer." 

But I am not about "closer". I am about adventure and the promise of a tropical paradise only a short paddle away. Because, despite all geographical evidence to the contrary, tropical is how my imagination envisioned it. It was going to be a large, cascading waterfall with brightly coloured fish for me to chase while swimming in the crystal clear pools below. It would be just like the one I once hiked to in Costa Rica.

So I set out with one bottle of water, one piece of farmer sausage, ten cherries and a basically empty Blistex container. I paddled the shoreline of the lake for hours searching for the Grassy Narrows that would lead to the connecting lake but every excursion into every bay turned up nothing. "It must be just around the next corner," I would tell myself with every disappointment, then paddle confidently around to the other side of the trees only to discover another bay with more trees. I had been told the trip should take about two hours but three hours later I still had nothing to show for my efforts.  

I ate my lunch. With the sun beating directly down on me I realized I only had a quarter of my water left. I had no more blistex. Refueled and reinvigorated I forged on convinced at every turn that it would be just around the next bend, and then the next until, finally, off on the horizon at last I saw reeds. That must be it. I paddled for twenty minutes towards the reeds, ignoring two more bays along the way. Five minutes before I reached the grassy shore I passed a cottage with a family leaving their dock in canoes and kayaks.

I searched the shoreline for an opening but couldn't find one. I was about to give up when I spotted the family from the cottage paddling and disappearing into the reeds on the far side of the marsh so I followed them in. Paddling down the beautiful creek I felt happily content and when the falls came into view after turning round the final bend, I was relieved to have finally found them.

They weren't exactly how I'd envisioned them, more like rapids than actual waterfalls, and I most definitely couldn't get out and swim, but still they were pretty and definitely worth the paddle. My spirits buoyed I thought I might check out these Drewry Falls on my way back. I pulled out my map. I checked it three times certain I must be reading it wrong. But no, it turns out I had been reading it wrong all morning and I was already at Drewry Falls. I was still miles away from Silver Falls.

Suicide Cells

I ran into one of my neighbours the other day. He's an interesting character; a recovering alcoholic with some mental health issues, he loves esoteric religions and conspiracy theories. Some mornings on my way to work, he'd walk me as far as the soup kitchen and we'd talk politics and doomsday scenarios. If I ran into him at the grocery store I'd buy his groceries for him but he'd always offer to share his food. Sometimes food allergies and issues are a blessing.

On his good days I'd sit on the stoop with him and he'd try to teach me french. On bad days I'd usually just listen him rant or bemoan. On one bad day, after a good friend of his had died he said, "I just don't get it, I just don't see what all of this is for. What are we even doing here?" So I told him my theory.

"To love and to be loved."

He looked at me like I was nuts.

"Well," I continued, "We're not very good at it, obviously, judging from the mess we're in," I made a sweep of my arm to acknowledge the wider world, "but we have to keep at it, don't we?"

When I ran into him over the weekend and told him I was moving he said that was sad. "You are one of the kindest people I've ever known." This is, of course, complete nonsense. I am, among innumerable other failings, impatient and judgemental.

But, there are biological cells whose sole purpose for existing is to tell other cells to keep on living and I want to be the human equivalent of those cells. I will consider myself a successful human being if I can make the people I meet see how important it is that they exist. Even the schizophrenics. Even the panhandlers. Even the suicide bombers.

Particularly the suicide bombers. Nature abhors asymmetry and we are creatures of nature acting and reacting in accordance with those laws. It's quite possible that without the few committing evil every day there would be no room for the million acts of good.