When I was in my early twenties, I was staying with friends of mine who lived out in the country. Before going to sleep one night, I saw a light flashing by the window. Instantly I was scared. I froze in stillness with my eyes wide open, trying to see where the light was coming from. Was it somebody walking around with a flashlight? My friends were sleeping in the next room. I was convinced I was in danger, that there was a bad person prowling around outside, but I was frozen with fear. I don’t know how long I lay there in fear, finally falling asleep against my will.
We headed east from Ely. Superior National Forest surrounded Highway 1 in Autumn glory. Our late September trip up north wasn’t quite over, even as we were heading home. We drove to the shore of Great Lake Superior. It is such an amazing sight! We stopped at Tettegouche State Park—just one of around 17 state parks that line the eastern border of Minnesota along Lake Superior, the St. Croix River, and the Mississippi River. Tettegouche is a French Canadian phrase meaning “meeting place.” The land was home to a logging camp in the late 1890’s, then a fishing camp and retreat, and conserved by a couple owners and The Nature Conservancy before becoming a state park in 1979. With the afternoon waning, we opted to hike to High Falls along the Baptism River, the highest of four falls that drop the Baptism River 700 feet to Lake Superior.
Getting up to the falls took a substantial amount of breath, but once there, we walked across the swinging bridge to peer upstream and downstream to the edge of the falls.
Trails on both sides of the River, along with the bridge, allowed us to see the spectacular rock face and sixty feet of cascading water.
We hiked back down to the car, crossing the Superior Hiking Trail that runs though the park.
We wanted to see where Baptism River meets Lake Superior. The rock cliffs guided the River to the Great Lake who had tossed up a sand bar of polished rocks, seemingly blocking the flow of the river.
The ‘rockbar’ stretched across most of the mouth, but the River rushed around the corner of it, spilling into Superior.
We rock-hounded for a while, gathering some, leaving other ‘heart’ treasures the spirited Lake protects with her cold waters.
The spectacular Shovel Point, where rock meets water, glowed in the evening sunshine.
The clouds and dancing light of the sunset reflected down on our Minnesota sea where sky meets water.
It was many years after my frightening experience when that memory came rushing back to me. It was when I saw a light flashing by a window, just like that time so many years ago. This time I didn’t freeze. I was able to walk to the window and look out…. I saw fireflies. I had had a life-threatening encounter with fireflies. This time I marveled at how bright the tiny insects were when they flew close to the window. It’s such an embarrassing story, but it was very real to me. When we are exposed to what we perceive to be a life-threatening experience in our childhood and there is no resolution, our bodies become programmed for fear—for fight, flight, or freeze. Without thinking, my body froze when I was a young adult. Adrenaline coursed through my body, my heart raced, my pupils dilated. Fear took over my brain and body.
We are a nation divided by a great chasm of belief systems that are seemingly miles and years apart. Each side fears the other. I’m here to remind us that fear first works on our bodies and in the process, shuts down the logical, reasoning pre-frontal cortex of our brains. When we are in fight or flight mode, there is no reasoning with us. I truly believed that I was in danger that night, that I was going to be harmed. But in reality, I was safe. Fireflies pose no threat. I was wrong in my fear, my very real fear. This is when and where we need to extend grace to ourselves and others. Grace is the meeting place between us humans and the divine. It allows us to have a meeting place between our hearts and minds in order to dispel the fear that is taking over our bodies. That is work only we can do for ourselves, albeit with help from others. Blessings to us all in this endeavor.
We may differ widely in environments, education, learning, knowledge, or lack of it, and in our personalities, our likes and dislikes. But if we set ourselves the task, we’ll find a meeting place somehow and somewhere. Faith Baldwin, 1893-1978
Thank you. Our family shares a poignant love of the Baptism River and Baptism Falls. This is where my sister’s ashes were scattered, flying down through the air from the bridge above the falls, into the falls, and then out to Lake Superior. It is a place we visit for its beauty and for the sacred space it holds for us… where we released our beloved family member’s remains into the vast lake
How beautiful, Nanci! What an extraordinary place to remember your sister. It is a place that holds a lot of power and spirit. Thank you for sharing that with me. Blessings to you and your family.
The divine is the meeting place between our head and heart… what a wonderful image. We so need divine guidance as a nation right now, if only we could meet in that Presence and allow our heads and hearts to be led by a greater good.
You are so right, AnnElise.