Diverting

 

I diverted on my way there and ended up here.  It was a good call, such as I thought about it.  It is a cloudy and pleasant with a light breeze that falls, on the scale of wind,  right into the pleasant range.  The cove, which is actually a flooded section of Pond Brook, is quiet and there is a delightful, tangy scent in the air from the amount of new green plant growth.

I head down the cove following my usual line in big water rivers.  I keep the canoe under the edge of the forest canopy, usually one or two canoe lengths from shore.  Looking up, half of the view is sky and half is forest.  It's a place I like to be in life - the border where things meet, one foot in and one foot out.  On this line, my canoe is not just a water vessel, but also a traveler of the forest.  14 years ago, I returned to canoeing having not been in one since I was a teenager.  It felt, in an instant, to be the place I should be.  As I reflected on many trips about that feeling, I realized how much the canoe and I have in common.  Neither me nor the canoe are excellent at any particular thing.  The canoe is a jack-of-all-trades boat, not perfect for much of anything, but pretty good, or at least adaptable, in almost any situation.  It's not the usual way that our society frames success.  Everyday, it seems there is another news article about a mega billionaire and his fathead ideas - supposedly, it seems, some model for success.  But anymore, those billionaires seem to be on some odd end of a personality spectrum, clearly good at making money, obviously ruthless in business, but alarming disconnected from ordinary people, which is, after all, 99.5% of humanity.  That is a high cost for supposed success.
Three cheers to penis shaped rockets and autopilot electric cars! 
But, I think I'll go with having friends... and a canoe.

I follow the shore down to the small marsh just above the dam.  I spot a couple Great Blue Herons, an immature Bald Eagle, and a few Cormorants.  Big water isn't great for bird life, and the forest hides them well.  I cross the river following the barrier floats for the dam and return on the far shore.  By that time, both fishing boats have retreated upriver and I have the entire stretch of river to myself.  It takes no time at all to drift off into the "zone."  It is a very good canoe trip.