Here's a Line

Cottage life on our small lake been for us a place to peacefully isolate and enjoy nature. We arrived here four days ago after our 2,056 kilometre trek across four provinces. Misty mornings, nighttime loon calls, hot sunny days, lake breezes, brilliant sunsets and clear fresh water to swim in or kayak on are reason enough for coming here.

And there has already been an abundance of wildlife to enjoy and amuse us, as indeed there also is at home in Nova Scotia. Two inquisitive and playful otters  visited us off our dock soon after we arrived. A beaver was sighted swimming at a distance. Several deer sightings delighted us as we drifted close in our kayaks in the early morning. Fuzzy tiny ducklings huddled together in their own family bubble on a cedar log floating by shore. They appeared to us to have been abandoned until a terrified mother came flying out of the bush. She mimicked injury and attempted to lure us away as she paddled and flapped across the water in the direction we were anyway heading. At least she will feel like she had done her motherly duty after her neglect.

Nine painted turtles of various sizes sunned on a fallen tree that had lodged itself off shore. Then there was the graceful heron that glides in the air close to the surface of the still lake, reflected therein so that it appears to be a multi-winged monster. And of course there are the large snappers that swim in the deep and sometimes are discovered lounging on our diving rock. Creatures large and small amaze us. The dragon flies, the humming birds and the wonderful song birds all delight. Even the mischievous and sometimes annoying red squirrel is our daily entertainment.

Now we have witnessed many wonderful land, lake and air creatures over the thirty-four years we have been coming here; but perhaps the strangest of all occurred just a day ago. We were sitting on our upper deck looking out at the lake and the forest beyond. The sun was hot and we were appreciating the dappled shade on the oak which sits beside the majestic giant white pine. Suddenly some object appeared to drop from the tree overhead and into the water below. It surfaced with a leap and quickly swam away cresting the water’s surface as it made a variable slashing sound.

I was sure it must have been a young bird fallen from its nest that was trying its best with its tiny wings to stay afloat. John thought otherwise. But then he had not witnessed the decent from above. He had merely heard the splash and seen the resurfacing. He was sure it had been a fish of some description that had jumped and strangely not dived again to the depths but had kept instead to the surface. We sat pondering the possibilities.

Moments later we both saw and heard the effects of another splash. Surely not another bird. Even I was skeptical. The fish, which I came to accept that it must be, had surfaced, and like the first, scurried away in the same manner as the first across the water’s surface. It made the same odd flapping sound and disappeared in the same general direction as the previous one.

We continued to sit and watch the view as we discussed this bizarre set of events. Then there was another splash as a similar creature emerged from the depths of the water and quickly disappeared from our sight in the same direction. Was this some sort of aquatic birthing ritual that we had, strangely, never before been witness to. We were befuddled. And there were several more of these creatures that emerged and fled in the same manner.

John became curious as to why they were all heading off in the same direction. Was there some current, some lunar force, some source of nutrition that attracted these newly born creatures. He went to peer over into the bay that lay behind us and hidden by the trees. There, quietly standing on two separate docks were two keen fishermen repeatedly casting their lours into the water in front of us.

My disappointment was great as I had already fashioned a story of alien creatures arising from the depths of our lake as a result of this pandemic virus that now imprisons our society. But we merely discovered that the mystery was only something ordinary that two people who do not fish would not contemplate.