Hudson Mills Metropark, Dexter, Michigan.
May 26, 2010.
The dawn broke bright and warm, sunlight streaming through the open bedroom windows, a special day, Susan's birthday, her 70th, exactly three months after her transcendence. The night had been restless. This was to have been a memorable day. Susan and I had discussed it at length. "I'd like a big party but it's a lot of work and many of my friends and some family probably won't be able to make it," she worried out loud. "We could take a trip ourselves or we could do something very special at home," she conjectured. I didn't have a clue, although I was relieved that she seemed to be nixing the big party idea. "Time enough to explore alternatives," I had thought to myself. But the day had arrived wrapped in a cloak of transcendental circumstance, its significance begging acceptance and recognition.
I had planned to release some of Susan's ashes into the Huron river today. The event would mark not only her birthday but would celebrate the completion of our California cross-country healing odyssey. But there would be no whales as witnesses, no energy vortexes to swirl the ashes heavenward, no giant redwoods penetrating the divine light. Just me, Orion and Rosie and the very familiar Huron river rolling through Hudson Mills park, a scant two miles from our home. "How do we make this day special?" was the question that hung in the soft humid morning air.
Sitting at the kitchen table, coffee in hand, my thoughts carried me over the park's trails, footpaths and bridges. This past year Hudson Mills has become a sanctuary, a place of worship and replenishment amidst the turbulence. For years Susan and I had walked these trails together with Gaia and Zeus. But this past year I walked without them, Gaia and Zeus having crossed the rainbow bridge, and Susan's foot wound preventing her from walking any distance without severe discomfort. My thoughts now turned to an event, a mysterious synchronicity that had transpired on the day following my return from the road trip, and in my crystalized recollection I could sense the glimmer of an idea.
I had never seen a white-water kayaker on the river here before. Lot's of canoeists do float along this stretch from upstream. When they get to the rapids in the park, they stiffen, grab their paddles extra tight, and allow themselves to be carried along by the churning current, surrendering themselves to the will of the water. But directly before me is a kayaker joyously playing in the waves, the white foam spilling over him, he rolls his kayak over and over, he reaches behind him with his paddle and the kayak rears up like a stallion and falls over backwards on top of him. He laughs and laughs as he frolics, as much under the water as above it, never drifting with the current. His play reminds me of the whales. When he emerges from the river he spots Orion. "How old is your Curly?" he asks. "You know about Curly Coated Retrievers?" I reply with surprise. "Yep, owned one myself." Astounding! I have never met another Curly owner outside of a dog show. Curlies are rare. Just a handful of people in the park have ever correctly identified the Curly breed. I sip my coffee. The adventure of the day percolates through my gray matter. Susan will have her special birthday. Today, her ashes will ride the waves in a miniature kayak that I will now build.
Two hours later I enter the park, the six inch cardboard kayak containing the ashes resting on the seat besides me next to my camera, Orion and Rosie restlessly await our arrival at the parking lot next to the rapids. Not a hundred yards past the park's entrance gate a deer crosses the road directly ahead of me. I've never seen a deer cross the road in the park before. An animal crossing your path is not a good omen. I ignore it and proceed on. I concentrate on separating myself from ordinary reality, allowing the divine mysteries to dictate events from here on. "I am not subject to the laws of man," I chant to myself. "I separate myself from consensual existence and enter the realm of unexplored experience.
When I reach the parking lot and uncrate the dogs the sun beats down on my balding head and I am surprised to realize that I have forgotten my baseball cap. I never, ever forget my baseball cap. Bad omen number two. A sign posted on a pole warns me to keep my dogs on leash. Enjoying my separatist fixation I drop Rosie's leash to the ground. As I glance up, a golf cart appears at the top of a hill that I affectionately call "The Pyramid of the Sun." The cart heads straight for me, driven by a young man wearing a shirt bearing the park logo. "Pick up the leash," he commands. As I dutifully comply I count omen number three.
I lay down my camera as I prepare to launch. I'm going to throw the kayak as far out into the river as I can, upstream of the bridge. In the deep flow of the river's core there will be less chance of the kayak getting hung up along the river bank. Susan cries out "Stan, are you sure this is going to work?" I reply "I've worked out all the details, everything will be fine," as I convince myself they will be. As soon as the kayak is water-borne, I will run downstream with my camera and record Susan's miraculous birthday adventure. "Everything will be all right," I reassure myself, nervously.
The kayak strikes the water far from the riverbank. It is floating vertically, its bow pointing straight up, its stern under the water's surface. Susan cries out "HELP," but there is nothing I can do to help. I watch helplessly as the tiny craft slips below the water's surface and disappears. It has traveled at most ten yards before sinking. And as I walk slowly back to my vehicle, my mind clouded by failure and disappointment, a trickle of ash finds its way out of the water-soaked cardboard kayak and into the smoothly flowing current. The trickle becomes a stream, and the stream merges itself into the river, flowing like a river, smoothly navigating the rapids, raising its head up in the snowy white-water caps of the rapids, diving deep to the solitude of the rocks below, embracing the freedom and joy of being one with the river's passion. I reach my vehicle and load in the dogs. It will be some hours before I can let go of my failure. Susan's spiritual name is Sarita, it means "flow like a river." Flow, flow my dear Sarita. I'm so sorry.
Wishing you many successful adventures,
Stan
