Waters of our childhoods

I remember the months leading up to our first BLT (Baby Lake Trip). My dad was describing what he thought it would be like, and I would lay Awake at night and imagine our cabin. I had no reference to imagine the place, but my anticipation grew with every day. My children only know the magic of this place. They’ll never need to imagine what it will be like.

There have been the best of memories, people, family, friends that have become family, and fishing. This place is where I am at peace. I don’t go for the traditions and comedic mishaps that inevitably unfold, although they make the place that much more precious. I go back to the waters of my childhood, over and over, because it is where I find peace.

It is in the quiet of nature that I feel most connected to the spirit that is in me. In the moments where no one is speaking and you’re lying on the dock. The darkness falls around you, and the tall northern pines encompass the flowing glass beneath the damp boards. I rewind the versions of moments here, and I’m seventeen again in a sweatshirt and jeans, snuggled under an old comforter. A boat in the distance dawns its light, coming in from a night of catching walleyes and crappies. After the sound of the motor folds into the silence, there is a gentle lap of waves on the shore. The cool of early June is brisk on my face, as I gaze upwards. The stars glow warm, piercing through the black above, the haunting melodic call of the loon swells, and suddenly a gasp; as the flicker of light darts swiftly near the moon. Willa Cather wrote, “Some memories are realities, and are better than anything that can ever happen to one again.” I assume she wrote that about an evening in Red Cloud, before all of the lights and buildings and bustle, where she too was arrested by the stillness and wonder of shooting stars.