What had begun as a crystal clear early morning with stars twinkling in the still dark sky, and as red and white bow lights flashed on the other rowing shells as they moved silently nearby on the dark surface of the water, so very quickly and with what seemed like little warning, the morning dissolved into a thick and impenetrable fog.
Not only had all our landmarks disappeared, so too had all the other shells.
Just like that nobody knew where anybody else was on the water.
In our double rowing craft, we were now alone and on our own.
Ever present was the fear of collision.
Stroke by tentative, slow, gentle stroke we made our way along. Row half-slide, let it run, pause and listen. Peer long over our shoulder into the grey gloom as if by our gaze to penetrate the curtain, to see anything familiar from having passed this way before.
But there was nothing to see. Just grey and greyer. And not a sound. Even the gently placed blade in the water, the creak of the seat, our whispered voices all seemed muffled, blanketed, smothered.
Finally, the tree-lined shore loomed ahead, then a dock, not our dock from which we had started but maybe the dock after that would be recognizable. We thought we knew this lake so well having rowed hundreds and hundreds of miles out there. But nothing at all seemed familiar.
I tried to remember. But in the attempt to remember, to recognize, to recall it was then that I realized in much of my rowing to date I had been for the most part otherwise occupied, busy with stroke rate, technique, breathing, speed.
The beauty of where I had been, the joy of interacting with the water, the landmarks all of which I’d taken for granted, such memories failed me now in this enveloping, suffocating fog.
Dock after cautiously approached dock we rowed, and then, blessedly, we were home, the place where we’d begun.
By the time we stowed the oars and placed our shell on the rack, the fog had lifted and gave way to a grey dawn.
It was only then that the invisible became visible.
Like countless jewels on a necklace strand, fog created droplets of moisture lay pearled on a spider’s web.
While we had labored, stroke by stroke through the fog to find our way home, an artist had been at work adding to the strand, pearl by pearl.
Love can be like that.
Oft times in the journey we take for granted the beauty, fail to appreciate every day the opportunity, too busy to delight in the company, of our dearest treasure, having a love for her, but perhaps having forgotten what it means to be in love with her.
Pearl by pearl, day by day, like a painter’s weaving of a dew-drop web, falling in love, over and over again.
That’s an art.
And it’s beautiful.
Beautiful David.
I like what you write and I think this is the best of your writings I have read.
Imagine if all of us had this at the front of our minds and tried to do this with everyone every day?
Thank You.
I love your rowing analogy, and will remember it in my own relationships from now on.. I learned to row at age 64, though now I only row on my erg and not a beautiful lake. Thank you for the wonderful thoughts.