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Nov. 15th, 2007 01:15 am[ The warmer current of the river collides with the cold snap of air: sends the billows of fog stretching from bank to bank. I stand on the small sandy beach formed by the continuously receding water and watch the world, bathed all in white. ]
Upon seeing such a beautiful and fleeting act of nature, a human being usually starts to think of themselves - as part of nature, as beauty, and the virtue of their own existence and identity. Or, perhaps, that is just me? Awe-inspiring sights make one contemplate and imagine, our own advantage of human creativity coming alive.
My family had gone up to Quebec this past summer to kayak on the Rivier Desert. (Fitting to its name, the river was low on water and quite proliferate with rocks.) Ten hours in a car with a sullen family, although intermittently driving, was such a monotonous and 'silent' ordeal that I retreated into my own mind. And, later on, when my tired muscles burned and I kept on paddling - a Sisyphean task - my mind kept wandering, still a tiny bit lost in the fog of the early cold morning.
Who are we, and who am I, and how are we who we are, and why am I here, paddling on the water that might possibly be a unique claim to a solitary existence in a vast universe? Perhaps these are questions better left to seasoned philosophers than brooding teenagers. But all can appreciate beauty - and all history has shown that we continue to live, to persevere, by asking questions and trying to find answers.
The fog in the river seemed to be a natural representation of ourselves. The view is at first cloudy, but it clears up with time and we cannot waste the day dwelling in the fog of the past, no matter how beautiful it may be. Taking from it what we need and using it is neither thievery nor plunder, but us.
It is every person's privilege and duty to keep paddling, to keep driving, to keep thinking - to continue down that small rocky river, where the fog is soon enough replaced by the sunshine.
Upon seeing such a beautiful and fleeting act of nature, a human being usually starts to think of themselves - as part of nature, as beauty, and the virtue of their own existence and identity. Or, perhaps, that is just me? Awe-inspiring sights make one contemplate and imagine, our own advantage of human creativity coming alive.
My family had gone up to Quebec this past summer to kayak on the Rivier Desert. (Fitting to its name, the river was low on water and quite proliferate with rocks.) Ten hours in a car with a sullen family, although intermittently driving, was such a monotonous and 'silent' ordeal that I retreated into my own mind. And, later on, when my tired muscles burned and I kept on paddling - a Sisyphean task - my mind kept wandering, still a tiny bit lost in the fog of the early cold morning.
Who are we, and who am I, and how are we who we are, and why am I here, paddling on the water that might possibly be a unique claim to a solitary existence in a vast universe? Perhaps these are questions better left to seasoned philosophers than brooding teenagers. But all can appreciate beauty - and all history has shown that we continue to live, to persevere, by asking questions and trying to find answers.
The fog in the river seemed to be a natural representation of ourselves. The view is at first cloudy, but it clears up with time and we cannot waste the day dwelling in the fog of the past, no matter how beautiful it may be. Taking from it what we need and using it is neither thievery nor plunder, but us.
It is every person's privilege and duty to keep paddling, to keep driving, to keep thinking - to continue down that small rocky river, where the fog is soon enough replaced by the sunshine.