Post Number Thirty-Two

 SILENCE ALWAYS RECLAIMS ITS SPACE

Lessons brought back from vacation:  There are a couple of new boats on our beloved Lake Louise.  They are fast and powerful boats designed to pull water skiers, and designed to draw as much attention to the event as possible.  I do not begrudge the owners of these boats the thrill of speed and power.  I can still remember a time in my own life when speed and power seemed like the only worthy summer aspirations.  Just because I am now determined to embrace my geezerdom and puts around the lake on a humble pontoon boat I do not expect everyone else to follow my lead.

These boats are equipped with powerful audio speakers mounted on an arched rack and pointed back at the skier in tow.  I never thought about it before, but I can image how difficult it is to hear your favorite rock band over the roar of a muffler-less engine and the slam of skies against the water at thirty-five miles per hour.  I thought about this as I walked more than a half mile south of the lake and I could feel the bass beat from the speakers as I walked along Thumb Lake Road.  I thought about it again a week later as I tried to conduct an evening vesper service at the camp just as one of these boats roared by during a moment of silent prayer.  It is remarkable how spiritually charged junior high boys get at the sight of one of these boats.

If your goal is to declare your dominance over nature and announce to the entire community that you are now out on the lake and everyone should take notice, you cannot do better than one of these boats. They are designed to make an audacious display of presence.  One cannot be ignored when you are riding in or skiing behind one of these boats.  For the time it takes to run through a tank of gas one can imagine that the lake belongs to you and your particular idea of fun.  Those in kayaks and canoes might just as well pack it in. 

I have noticed something.  This audacity cannot be sustained.  The gas always runs out.  The light always fades.  The wake always subsides. The boat always goes back on the hoist.  What fools we are to think that creation takes note of our presence.  We are but a noisy flash.  When we are finished or just plain exhausted silence always reclaims its space.

Dave Gladstone

Comments

[Carl]

Pretty insightful version of "Hey you kids! Get off my lawn!"

But we should remember to tell everyone the story of the guy who decided he wanted that same boat-based stereo system for kayaking - it took six kayaks lashed together, but he was able to float up and down the lake listening to "Anchors Aweigh" - until the extension cord he was using to power the thing ran out, disconnected from the side of his cottage, and toppled the whole contraption into the water and down to the bottom of one of the deepest spots in the lake!