Wordless Wednesday - After the Rain

Sequestered, 361 (CCCLXI)

On the River Tay

Not the Scottish Tay, but a lovely winding  river that flows through the Lanark highlands of eastern Ontario, Canada. The views here are of (and from) a bridge over the river in the beautiful town of Perth. 

The lands of the Tay watershed are the ancestral home of the Algonquin First Nation who hunted on them for many centuries, traveled its waterways in canoes and harvested wild rice on its lakes. When European settlers arrived, the area was controlled by the Mississauga First Nation (Ojibwe), but the name by which the river was known to either indigenous group is unknown. In the early nineteenth century, homesick Scottish settlers renamed it for their beloved River Tay in Scotland.

Like the St. Lawrence river, Lake Champlain, the Lake of Two Mountains on the lower Ottawa River and the lower Saguenay river, our Tay was once part of the ancient Champlain Sea created by melting ice sheets during the last glacial cycle. The river came into being when the Champlain retreated at the end of the Ice Age. In the now, the Tay makes its way to the Ottawa river via the Rideau, and its waters merge with the mighty Saint Lawrence at the end of their journey.

The bridge was a perfect place to hang out on hot summer afternoons with a waffle cone from a local ice cream factory. I have no idea how many hours were spent there over the years or how many cones Irv and I consumed while leaning over the railing and just watching the world go by. The tart cranberry ice cream was a particular favourite, and we always got a scoop of something frozen for our dogs. 

I have a thing about rivers. When I am near the Tay, I think of poet/priest Father John O'Donohue's wish that he might live his life as a river flows, carried by the surprise of its own unfolding. What a wonderful way to go along.

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