Take Me To The WATER....

Ever since I was a wee, little one...I have loved the water. It was just part of my life. The earliest pictures of me almost always have me swimming, playing in the lake, sitting on a boat...It was a natural part of my life. Water, it seems to me now, has always had a significant part to play in my life.

And so it continues....

Long ago...when I was still a boy but desperately trying to act older then I was and already feeding a raging addition to alcohol...I was in a situation no 12 year old should ever find themselves in...frankly nobody, no matter the age should have been in that place, on that night. I was violently attacked by three grown men. I was blindsided, I was out numbered and I never had a chance. One of the obvious results of the events that followed that night is that I was severely beaten.

The events themselves are a blur of images, snippets of light, sound...smell, I can still smell my fear, really...I still can. More has been revealed to me in the 36 years since it happened but one of the things I've always remembered about that incident was after it was over and I had dragged myself out of there to another, safer place, I looked up into a mirror in a bathroom as I splashed cool, healing WATER on that battered face with those swollen eyes and for the first time ever saw the "Thousand Yard Stare""...I was so damaged.

WATER...there it is again...water. Healing water.

Over the years, as my my back and left hip have deteriorated and the pain has increased...I've often found relief in water. A Hot shower, the running water bringing temporary relief to that miserable pain that never seemed to quit. A whirlpool or just soaking in a tub, floating in the lake or the surf in Florida or a hotel pool. Water is still my safe place...a sacred place for me.
As a teenager, I spent the Summer here on the Island staying with my Grandma at the old cottage...my routine was often to get up before dawn, fish, clean fish then bath in the lake...every day. I jumped into the water to essentially start my day, everyday of the Summer...that routine followed me into my "real life" of school then work as I got used to an early morning shower to start my day.

When I was young, my family traveled a great deal. And we always stayed at hotels/motels that had a pool...it's just what we did. My father liked to take a sauna or steam then a swim at the end of his day. So When my kids came along and we traveled...yep, we stayed at motels with a pool.

I realize everybody uses water in their lives...I know, we as human being absolutely require it to survive. But it just seems to me to have an extra significance to me and it always has...

Tomorrow afternoon, water once again plays a critically important role in my life. Once again, I go to the water...this time willingly as a man, a human being with all my flaws, pain, hurts and sorrow...I'll go into the water to die and be re-born and demonstrate how my life has been changed forever.

Take me to the water....