Power

         The last line in the better-than-average book/movie A River Runs Through It is:

                   “I am haunted by waters.”

         In both the book and the movie, the sentence resonates in my soul, for waters also captivate me. I am pleasantly but powerfully drawn to moving water, especially to the river and the ocean, each moving under its own sweet power. Yes, moving water fascinates me.

         Admittedly, the water from a faucet moves also, but this water is no longer free. It is captive, held by humankind for our own purposes, be they good, bad or indifferent. This captive water moves through our needs until one day, it is – one way or another – set free once again to join with its brethren in the openness of nature.

         I stand beside a river – the Snake, the Payette, the Columbia – and my every sense feels the power of the river, the strength of the water as it tumbles through the mountains, over the rocks in a timeless journey to the Pacific. The noise of the water is an energetic chattering, a demand loud and vigorous, a request for space in the universe as the drops are crashed and crushed into droplets flung into the air. They may land on a leaf or on soil where they are absorbed and consumed. Or, they may plunge once again into the roiling body of the river itself where they seek the faraway sea, swimming like miniature salmon toward their distant goal.

         And the water talks. Have you heard its voice? If you listen, you can hear the voices of the droplets combined into the overwhelming din that is the sound of the river. It is a voice that begins with the trickle of gathering raindrops which flow together to form a rill and then a creek and then a stream and, finally, a mighty river that winds toward the sea of life. Any sea – it does not matter.

         And the voices are raised throughout the journey. At the edge of the ocean, whatever ocean, the voices are again merged into one great voice that whispers around the planet.

         I have stood on a beach by the ocean water on a quiet warm day and listened to the chuckling childish sound of the waves. And I have stood near the water during a raging hurricane when the sea grows angry and vivid and ever so loud.

         It is written that the chemical content of our blood is a close match to the chemistry of the sea so many years ago when life first crept out of the ocean and onto the lonely beach of that ancient body of water.

         Is it any wonder that the sea calls to us, to our very blood, enticing us to move closer, to join, to become once again part of the vast creature that holds itself dominant over each and every part of our planet. The power of the sea is indisputable and each individual drop of water is filled with individual power.

         Yes, I am haunted by waters and the waters sing a song to my soul.