When you put your hand in a flowing stream, you touch the last that has gone before and the first of what is still to come. – Leonardo DaVinci
I have always preferred a river to the ocean. Although the ocean has the glories of moonlight on a vast surface and of the sound of waves at night, rivers are just more...soothing to me. And more interesting. There is always something happening on a river that you can watch. There is always something happening IN an ocean that you can never see. And rivers are more safe where I live. No river ever spawned a hurricane.
But the thing I like most about rivers is how therapeutic they are. When you release your troubled thoughts to the ocean the tide brings them right back a few hours later. When you release your troubles to a river, they are gone forever. I could sit and watch a river endlessly.
All rivers, great and small, hidden or historic, know each other and share a common heritage. They are all of the same tribe, so to speak. I've pulled a big canoe over shallows in the Wisconsin river as a boy, fished Hem's "Big Two Hearted River" and caught a trout, scattered my father's ashes in the Baptism River, had drinks on decks overlooking Bayou Teche in Lafayette and the New River in Ft. Lauderdale, had a love affair with the Seine from the Pont des Arts. During each experience I felt my life clock winding back a few ticks. Sometimes a lot more than a few ticks.
Like yesterday when I spent an hour or two with a new friend, the St. Marks River. Tucked away in the heart of North Florida, it was the first time I had been to her shores. It is just the sort of adventure for your Epic these days when time has been brutally compressed and herds of significant problems and issues roam the landscape unabated. But an Epic adventure does not require immense effort or expense. An Epic adventure requires merely the desire to grab a shiny pebble out of the stream of the day.
The St. Marks is not hard to find. If you look out your car window and see the Florida capitol building in Tallahassee, just keep driving south. About thirty minutes. Until the road ends at the front door of a great bar and grill. The river is right there.
You can sit on free benches without beer but this IS an Epic journey after all. Order some of the outstanding seafood on the menu. Let that herd of issues run right past you into the river. Trust me, the river will take it from there.
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