This morning I started painting when I got up. Things were going well and I was feeling kind of lazy- this will not be a bike/ swim day.  I looked at the two pieces in progress and determined they were both too wet to go forward, looked at the house in need of cleaning, tossed laundry in the machine, stepped out of pajamas and into my swimsuit. It is already a week into august – summer won’t last forever.

When I got to the beach there was not a soul in sight. The water was calm, the weeds were easily spotted in large and small rafts pretty much stretching the expanse of the swim area.

I have trouble with weeds.

The fear comes from a place without rational grounding and therein will not respond to reasoning. I considered a duck into the water to cool off and then perhaps a leisurely expanded bike ride home.

Looking up I could see something large and dark on the surface of the water, not a goose, bigger than a grebe…. I have an obsessive fondness for loons, their eerie call, their patterned throat, everything about them I find a delight. Any place we have spotted one on a road trip demands a pause next time through, just in case.

Last year on a friends pontoon. a make shift viewing station for greibe babes, we also encountered loons which for me, steal the show. (these photos are from that day)

I pushed through the dreaded weeds and swam with limited splash to the first buoy on the swim line. A loon indeed.

She swam never more than half a tie line buoy length away. She watched me with a curious eye, dismissing me as no more or less troublesome than a goose. For about twenty minutes we shared space. There is something quite different than the boat or shore view with a water bird to being head above the water and face to face. The sun glinted across the lazy waves of a wakeless lake, a ghost moon grew in transparency and I felt as though I had been given a reward for listening to the voice that says, take this moment, it is full and offered and will not be repeated. With deep gratitude, to the voice that calls or whispers, and year of living quietly that is designed to let me answer.