Island of Pine and Clay, Clarks Hill Dam, June 3, 2007, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Have you ever made love under a rustic waterfall or on the sand at Cannon Beach, Oregon (it doesn’t feel as romantic as it looks in the movies). Have you soaked in a natural hot springs in New Mexico or dipped in a sulphur pool on a canoe trip along the Nahanni River in southern Canada? Have you ever flown in a seaplane?
Tell me everything you know about water. Here are 20 useful water facts to get you started. Did you know your brain is made up of 70% water, the lungs weigh in at 90%, the body can be all the way up to 60%. How many times a day do you shower? What’s the longest you’ve gone without brushing your teeth? Have you ever heard of the human squeegee?
Would you rather live in the desert or along a lake, river, or stream? Did you honeymoon at Niagara Falls? When’s the last time you walked slowly in the rain? When did you learn to swim, who taught you, were you wearing water wings? How long can you hold your breath underwater? What are your first memories of water.
Do a writing practice on everything you know about water. Then choose a memory and write it down adding as many details as you can.
Wednesday, June 6th, 2007
As soon as I saw the title of this post, “Water Wings,” I flashed back to a memory of swimming on a very crowded July 4th with my older sister at Pymatuning State Park in Ohio. I had a modest two-piece suit at the time, but concerned that I had no breasts, my mother had stuffed two white plastic pads in the top. I dove in toward my sister, and when I came up out of the water near her, she was pointing behind me, laughing, “Look at those two white lily pads!” I whirled around and spotted the pads, as large as islands, all the whiter in the sun. Two boys swam toward them and then began to toss them around like small frisbees.
There they were, my water wings, flying high.
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“Would you rather live in the desert or along a lake, river, or stream?”
Absolutely no contest. I could never live in a desert. I lived on the outskirts of Palm Springs from February through May of 1981. It was interesting, I liked the little roadrunners, glad I did it, but the way all the humidity is sucked out of the air felt like death to me. Even the Desert Museum used skulls and other bones.
I miss the water of Minnesota, and like being close tothe water of SF Bay. Having had skin cancer, the fog and overcast of the Bay Area is very welcome to me.
My wife likes deserts, and does not care much for cold. Here we are both in the climactic zone that overlaps the comfortable range of the other — but she does not care for snow and I could not do the heat of summer in California’s central valley or a desert.
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I’m going to do a writing practice, but first I have to say, like Ombudsben, it’s no contest for me. Definitely a river. Preferably in the desert mountains. (Good thing we’re not married, O.)
If I lived near an ocean, for example, then I’d have to delve into my fear of sharks, which as you know is a favorite topic to <em>talk about</em> but not actually ignite.
Jim prefers streams. I like them, too, but they’re not usually located near coffee shops or musuems or art supply stores. Visiting streams, even staying near them for weeks and months at a time – all good. Living by them, not ready yet.
Lakes. Don’t have experience with that either way, unless you count dammed rivers. Which aren’t really lakes at all.
Great topic. It’s going to be fun.
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OmbudsBen, I feel that way sometimes, too, about the humidity being sucked out of the air. I do love and appreciate the desert – but I have to be near water.
You bring up a good point about how we have to sometimes compromise with the climates we live in when we have partners. Minnesota is a good place for water but also has the cold. I’m lucky that Liz and I both love winter and water!
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ybonesy, funny you mention dammed rivers because that’s what Clarks Hill Dam is (the one in the photo above). If I remember correctly, it’s at a confluence of three bodies of water. It was created to help regulate the flooding problem of the Savannah River in Augusta. And also for power.
In some places, dammed rivers that create big water recreation spaces are the closest thing to a lake that people in dry areas can get to. I know a lot of people don’t think we should dam rivers. It changes the landscape. But there sure is a lot of that going on down in the dryer climates of this country.
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I lived in Olmsted County in Minnesota from 1962 until 1974 — it is the only county in Minnesota (I’m told) without a “natural” lake.
“Natural” because Silver Lake, in Rochester, is manmade: a dammed river.
Btw, a friend recently turned me on to an interesting web site about old “penny postcards”, which occurs to me because it has an old postcard photo of Silver Lake, in the Minnesota / Olmsted section:
http://www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/special/ppcs/ppcs.html
Neat site if you want to see old views of your town.
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ombudsben, thanks for this link. It’s a cool site. I saw your Lake Olmsted postcard from Minnesota. I didn’t know it was manmade.
I also checked out the site for Richmond County in Georgia, where I just spent a lot of time on family history. I saw many of the landmarks my mother took me to. There were quite a few postcards like these in my great Aunt Cassie’s old things we were going through at my uncle’s house.
Liz was looking at North Dakota and Wyoming. And I also checked out New Mexico where there was a postcard for Chimayo and quite a few in Taos County. Really fun site.
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I just checked out the Penny Postcards site, and what a great site it is! I loved looking at all the historic buildings in Albuquerque, plus the other counties. Mt. Capulin, that was gorgeous.
Thanks for the tip!
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[…] New Year’s 2005/2006 – Cumana to Lechería, Venezuela: A coastal kayak expedition with Douglas and Matt, a gay couple from San Francisco. They came to Venezuela to paddle, but had several bad experiences with police harassment. When they reached Cumana, they called me and I met them there. It was a good 5-day paddle of about 60 miles total. Very fun and interesting times. Matt was a diva, and Douglas did what he could to keep Matt from going into his “fits” (as Douglas called them). Douglas taught me how to surf my kayak on the big, following waves. About this writing practice, mimbresman says: I wanted to write on this topic but got bogged down each time I started. Finally I decided to make a chronology of memorable experiences I’ve had with water. I guess that’s what this is all about: experimentation and writing. -from Topic post, Water Wings […]
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Memories of the Savannah (link)
But I sit on a gray deck near the banks of the wide and rambling Mississippi whose mouth bubbles out not far from the Canadian border in a lake called Itasca.
Sunday, June 17th, 2007
-from Topic post, Water Wings
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[…] Jun 23rd, 2007 by ybonesy -Reflection of La Llorona, ink and watercolor © 2007 by ybonesy. All rights reserved. -From Topic post, Water Wings. […]
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[…] travel back to the quicksand, red clay, and gangly pines of the Southern hometown where I spent my childhood (same years as Flannery, birth to 13) in hopes of learning what I am made of. I always drive by the […]
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