To Fly Above the Black Swamp

Experience, which destroys innocence, also leads one back to it. –James Arthur Baldwin

I called bogus on myself when I re-read last week’s post before publishing—the last line was bothering me. Not because it wasn’t true, but because it wasn’t complete. Time and maturity do contribute to our becoming sparklers of light, but when I asked a question in a Facebook meme of what makes you happy during a rough time, one particular answer struck me. My friend Sharon answered with a picture of her young grandchildren—three sparklers of light with little age and no maturity. What they did have was innocence, the perfection of newness, pure emotions, and a drive to experience their world.

Our day of the dragonfly at Mille Lacs Kathio increased exponentially when we drove the short distance from Kathio to Father Hennepin State Park, situated on a large peninsula on the southeastern side of Mille Lacs Lake. I am in awe of this lake. Its size alone—207 square miles—is enough for one to appreciate, but it also contains clear and beautiful water along with a brag-worthy population of walleye and other fish.

The park was named after Father Louis Hennepin, a French priest who explored the area in 1680. He wrote about the landscape around the Lake and the Mdewakanton Dakota people who lived there. Chris and I hiked the lake-hugging Pope’s Point Trail through a hardwood forest of Maples and Basswood that must be spectacular in Autumn.

We soon came to a black water swamp/lagoon that stretched along the inward side of the trail. It was a sharp contrast from the clear, blue water of the Lake. It made me think of the Bobby Bare song Marie Laveau—‘Down in Louisiana where the black trees grow, lives a voodoo lady named Marie Laveau…’

‘She lives in a swamp, in a hollow log…’ When I researched the history of the Park, I found that Father Hennepin called this area of Minnesota ‘Louisiana’ in honor of France’s King Louis XIV (and conveniently his own name), and later published a book Description of Louisiana from his extensive writings about the area.

The black swamp was intriguing and messy compared to the simple, open water of the Lake. And while the swamp water itself and the muck surrounding it were so yucky looking, I marveled at the crisp green grasses growing up through it…

…and the many exquisite dragonflies flying and landing on grasses and branches.

As the open swamp water ended, we came to a forest of ferns, five feet tall and glistening in the sunlight.

We reached Pope’s Point Overlook with water stretching before us on three sides. A mother Mallard duck with her ten babies all in a row swam close to shore.

At ease, ducklings.

While we watched the ducklings, hundreds, if not thousands of dragonflies filled the air—dark, darting dots against the blue sky and water. Wow!

What I thought were two white boats far out on the lake were actually one white boat and one white rock island. Hennepin Island, one of two tiny islands that make up the smallest National Wildlife Refuge (less than one acre total), is home and nesting grounds for the Common Tern. Though its name implies otherwise, the Common Tern is listed as a Threatened Species due to loss of habitat. These tiny protected islands are one of the last remaining nesting areas in Minnesota for the terns.

We walked back the forest trail to the sandy beach where dogs fetched sticks from the water, children played, and adults lounged.

It is a beautiful, peaceful place, worthy of exploration, admiration, and reflection.

Many of my friends have experienced the newness and perfection embodied in the tiny being of a grandchild. They can experience again the innocence of childhood, the energy of pure emotions that aren’t labeled good or bad, and the innate drive we all have to learn and truly experience the world around us. Those tiny beings are sparklers of light. Somewhere in Life, we encounter the messy, yet intriguing muck of the black swamp. Where does it come from? Why is it there? How do we get from the perfect innocence of a new being to the messy muck? We can have all of our ducks in a row and try to stay clear of the black water, yet sometimes we find our feet stuck in the muck. That’s when we learn from the dragonfly, and if it takes thousands of them to lift us up, so be it. Any moment in time, any glimpse of someone’s life we see, any given situation we find ourselves in, is not the complete picture. It is true as the sky is blue at that moment, but we don’t see to the depths or know the influences. We no longer know or use the pure emotions to guide our behavior—we take refuge from them on the rocky islands of denial and ‘grown-up-ness.’ So in reality, I shouldn’t call bogus on anything. It’s just a snapshot picture of a bigger, more complete mural of the situation. Maybe our dragonfly message and moment is to use our time and maturity, our experiences in the muck, and the innate drive to learn and develop in order to be at ease, to return to our newness, and to fly above the black swamp.