Oh. Canada.
Sudbury, Ontario; mile 2823
I broke a self-imposed dirving rule today, going twice my 300-mile-a-day limit; in general, the smalle roads have given me space to make the emotional, spiritual and physical transition from one coast to the next. Interstate driving makes such sudden leaps. This drive has been more like a dawn -- the color changing, but slowly enough that from moment to moment you are carred along rather than jerking in fits from shade to shade. But today 600 miles because the day was so beautiful, and the driving so fine, and my stubborness to stick to schedule so great... Bunyon needs in his Pilgrim's Progress a Mr. Headstrong who marches on forward even when the straight and narrow way pauses or bends. Or having in Exodus a 13th tribe of Israel which bypassed the 40-year journey through the desert by going straight up, northeast, into the Promised Land and then sat around for a generation wondering where everyone else has gone...
Last night was another camping night (hence the lack of a 'blog entry), on the banks of Lake Superior just south the of the Apostle Islands. After setting up camp and having some hot soup, I took the inflatable kayak (still unnamed -- it's blue, bobs like a rubber duck, and travels well. Any suggestions?) out onto the Lake.
If you have only seen ordinary lakes, it might help to think of the Great Lakes as inland seas. They are vast, ocean vast, but without the salt and with an almost tropical clarity to the water (at least, that is, away from the cities). They swallow the horizon, produce great waves, and have been known to sink large ships. So it was with both joy and fear that I paddled out in the kayak. The fear part (and yes, before i continue, I did have my lifevest on) is pretty apparent -- it was dark, the waters unknown, and I kept wondering why that particular model was marked down 50%, and how quickly it would sink if it began loosing air. Would I slowly dip in the water, or would I zip around like a deflating baloon in a Warner Bro's cartoon?
The joy was three-fold. First of all, it was refreshingly cool and wonderfully quiet, two qualities sorely lacking while driving. Second, I had the anticipation of the gathering darkness and its attendant stars. The third joy was a whole suprirse. I had been looking back at shore (to the northwest), checking that I could swim the distance. I then looked behind me to the Eastern horizon, where a perfect, molten, full, solitice moon was rising golden and awesome. I floated above the deep, watching the moon transfrom herself like an alchemist soon to be poor, changing gold to silver.
Yesterday ended beautifully and began wonderfully exploring Stillwater, MN, with Elis. -- and in particular, Loome Books, a bookstore of used theological books houses in an old church and set up according to a Platonic ideal of used bookstores: not only the perfect mix of beautiful old leatherbound books, inexpensive but well-cared-for paperbacks, but well-organized but not oppressive shelving winding (without teetering piles) up stairs and in choir lofts and balconies, all illuminated by stained glass windows:
From Stillwater I head north, checking out one of the world's largest potholes -- not in the road but in an ancient riverbed, carved out of hard basalt by swirling water
and then past the National Freshwater Fishing Hall of Fame and other great sights, but particularly the warm Midwestern summer light and the fields of wildflowers
Today was largly the UP, upper penninsula Michigan, a land inhabited by Finns, pine trees, and bad puns on their regional moniker, including a bar named UP Chuck's. I wish I was kidding, but I'm afraid I'm not. It was great country to drive through -- just diverting enough, but with straight, fast roads. I did stop for a number of visits, to waterfalls and parks and Finnish stores, and in Harvey, Michigan, the Episcopal parish of Saint James the Less, known in that diocese as Little Jimmy's. Little Jimmy's has a building to match its name, and a localy ordained priest, Bruce, so in love with the church and simultaneously humbled and thrilled about the work of being a priest. We had a good long talk inside the church, about the sacraments, about community, about wearing a collar... lots of stories, and a blessing for me to have walked into Little Jimmy's.
Tomorrow might not be as early a morning as originally planned; even with the long haul today, though, I'm still a day behind schedule. Thanks be to God that I have a little buffer time. And still more stories that haven't fit in -- towns with names like Luck and Siren and Lively; river names, including Teaspoon Creek, and the realization that though I crossed into Canada, I've traversed nearly a dozen other sovereign nations, some large and some only a few hundred acres. Extra points if you can name some of those nations I might have passed through on this trip :)
I broke a self-imposed dirving rule today, going twice my 300-mile-a-day limit; in general, the smalle roads have given me space to make the emotional, spiritual and physical transition from one coast to the next. Interstate driving makes such sudden leaps. This drive has been more like a dawn -- the color changing, but slowly enough that from moment to moment you are carred along rather than jerking in fits from shade to shade. But today 600 miles because the day was so beautiful, and the driving so fine, and my stubborness to stick to schedule so great... Bunyon needs in his Pilgrim's Progress a Mr. Headstrong who marches on forward even when the straight and narrow way pauses or bends. Or having in Exodus a 13th tribe of Israel which bypassed the 40-year journey through the desert by going straight up, northeast, into the Promised Land and then sat around for a generation wondering where everyone else has gone...
Last night was another camping night (hence the lack of a 'blog entry), on the banks of Lake Superior just south the of the Apostle Islands. After setting up camp and having some hot soup, I took the inflatable kayak (still unnamed -- it's blue, bobs like a rubber duck, and travels well. Any suggestions?) out onto the Lake.
If you have only seen ordinary lakes, it might help to think of the Great Lakes as inland seas. They are vast, ocean vast, but without the salt and with an almost tropical clarity to the water (at least, that is, away from the cities). They swallow the horizon, produce great waves, and have been known to sink large ships. So it was with both joy and fear that I paddled out in the kayak. The fear part (and yes, before i continue, I did have my lifevest on) is pretty apparent -- it was dark, the waters unknown, and I kept wondering why that particular model was marked down 50%, and how quickly it would sink if it began loosing air. Would I slowly dip in the water, or would I zip around like a deflating baloon in a Warner Bro's cartoon?
The joy was three-fold. First of all, it was refreshingly cool and wonderfully quiet, two qualities sorely lacking while driving. Second, I had the anticipation of the gathering darkness and its attendant stars. The third joy was a whole suprirse. I had been looking back at shore (to the northwest), checking that I could swim the distance. I then looked behind me to the Eastern horizon, where a perfect, molten, full, solitice moon was rising golden and awesome. I floated above the deep, watching the moon transfrom herself like an alchemist soon to be poor, changing gold to silver.
Yesterday ended beautifully and began wonderfully exploring Stillwater, MN, with Elis. -- and in particular, Loome Books, a bookstore of used theological books houses in an old church and set up according to a Platonic ideal of used bookstores: not only the perfect mix of beautiful old leatherbound books, inexpensive but well-cared-for paperbacks, but well-organized but not oppressive shelving winding (without teetering piles) up stairs and in choir lofts and balconies, all illuminated by stained glass windows:
From Stillwater I head north, checking out one of the world's largest potholes -- not in the road but in an ancient riverbed, carved out of hard basalt by swirling water
and then past the National Freshwater Fishing Hall of Fame and other great sights, but particularly the warm Midwestern summer light and the fields of wildflowers
Today was largly the UP, upper penninsula Michigan, a land inhabited by Finns, pine trees, and bad puns on their regional moniker, including a bar named UP Chuck's. I wish I was kidding, but I'm afraid I'm not. It was great country to drive through -- just diverting enough, but with straight, fast roads. I did stop for a number of visits, to waterfalls and parks and Finnish stores, and in Harvey, Michigan, the Episcopal parish of Saint James the Less, known in that diocese as Little Jimmy's. Little Jimmy's has a building to match its name, and a localy ordained priest, Bruce, so in love with the church and simultaneously humbled and thrilled about the work of being a priest. We had a good long talk inside the church, about the sacraments, about community, about wearing a collar... lots of stories, and a blessing for me to have walked into Little Jimmy's.
Tomorrow might not be as early a morning as originally planned; even with the long haul today, though, I'm still a day behind schedule. Thanks be to God that I have a little buffer time. And still more stories that haven't fit in -- towns with names like Luck and Siren and Lively; river names, including Teaspoon Creek, and the realization that though I crossed into Canada, I've traversed nearly a dozen other sovereign nations, some large and some only a few hundred acres. Extra points if you can name some of those nations I might have passed through on this trip :)
posted by tetracontadigon at 6/23/2005
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