“The face of the river, in time, became a wonderful book,
A book that was a dead language to the uneducated passenger,
But which told its mind to me without reserve,
Delivering its most cherished secrets,
As clearly as if it uttered them with a voice.
“And it was not a book to be read once and thrown aside,
For it had a new story to tell each and every day.”
Mark Twain,
Life on the Mississippi
Music: Once Upon A Time
We wandered this sandy river road
For many a glorious, uncivilized mile
And the tale it told to us as we rambled
Soon brought all three of us many smiles
I was thrilled with its unadulterated ancient beauty
This river bed was marvelously unchanged by men
And my two very invigorated canine companions
Kept sniffing the tracks in the sand again and again
This was an ancient road, which had been carved by nature
And not yet blacktopped over by our modern-day civilization
The raw beauty and uniqueness of the many tracks we saw
Very quickly filled all three of our hearts and souls with elation
We marveled at the footprints of many creatures
Whose ancestors had traveled this road for eons
And, there wasn’t one junky fast food restaurant
Or one gaudy modern man-made sign flashing neon
But there were many wondrous fresh tracks left in the wet sand
By mammals, birds, amphibians, and assorted nocturnal creatures
The scents and the signs of these marvelous ‘footprints through time’
To all three of us was one of this old river road’s most glorious features
The track on the left above is that of a white heron. These magnificent white birds have a delightful habit of standing on riverbanks and in shallow water on one foot, eagerly peering all about their watery world in search of their next meal. I love watching them slowly strutting about in lake, creek, and river shallows.
The tracks on the right truly fascinated my two dogs. They were left by a long-tail weasel – a relative of the skunk. This creature is rarely seen since it is strictly a solitary nocturnal hunter; it roams the plush riverbank in the dark of night in search of prey. And like its cousin the skunk, the long-tail weasel has extremely aromatic scent glands, which truly fascinated my two inquisitive canine companions.
We wandered this sandy river road,
For many a glorious, uncivilized mile;
And the tale it told to us as we rambled,
Soon brought all three of us many smiles.
©January 2013, Mr. Ed
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Anna
Many smiles on this one..
Lady Vivian
has to offer as you do, Ed, is not a gift all have
or bother to cultivate - your experiences are not only
of 'being there' but of real observation and an understanding
the true heart has
john
Ron
Rebecca
We have many ice age trials here, untouched by man and off the
trials you see such beauty, as you also do, in remote areas of
the lakeshore on Lake Michigan... I have walked several of them
Treasure the history and the beauty you find...
Love and Light
Lily
Cheers,
Dan