Having left behind the world in the form of traffic and driving, I’ve arrived at a beloved place far from my everyday existence. Owl Pond, in Brewster on Cape Cod.
Centering down, I stretch, take a few breaths, and start looking around. The surface is that deep green-black color I know so well, but I am surprised how high the water is this year. A small boulder, a glacial erratic I’ve often walked past or sat on, is almost submerged. As usual I see few houses, nestled as they are in foliage back from the shore. Closer in, tree branches bend low like friendly arms, their leaves like open palms, and beneath them the water ripples slightly.
Stripping down to a bathing suit, I leave my shoes and towel on a bench and gingerly descend the pebbly, pine-needly banking. The soles of my feet rejoice to reach soft water and flat sandy bottom! I walk forward to where trees have deposited a dark clothy layer of leaves and twigs. Wet to the waist now, I’ve emerged from under the leafy canopy and a bowl of clear sky floats overhead. Soon coolness covers my breasts and as I swim out, the pond receives me: I am folded into a watery envelope.
Scooping gently with my palms about forty feet from shore, I begin to move in place like a slow propeller making no splash. Looking, turning, I find myself in a leafy circular diorama. Shading and shading, further and further green, the treescape ‘verdiates’ and evolves, foliage without end, Amen. Though hardly at the pond’s actual center, I feel at the mid-point of a universe – or is this water-tree-sky world a kind of temple?
Usually flotillas of water-striders skim the surface but today pairs of dragonflies hover close in, large silvery-blue lace wings or lean yellow-rod bodies. Miniature white blossoms from a low bush release a fragrance of great sweetness. Scanning the shore, I spot occasional bursts of bright red brush dabs. It’s sumac, a familiar detail like so many others, including the water itself. Owl Pond tastes thick and mellow, like Minister’s Pond in Eastham where I swam as a teenager. Though earthy like Minister’s, the water here leaves no reddish traces of iron on my forearms, the way I remember. In those years I lived with everyday reference to water, whether I swam, rowed, skated, or walked around the pond.
I continue turning. Why Owl Pond? Never have I seen or heard owls here, but all those trees furnish them perfect concealment — and I always come in daylight. I wonder, does the roundness of Owl Pond suggests an owl’s head? Or the huge orbs of its eyes? There are usually good reasons for Cape Cod pond names (Minister’s is located below a church), so I accept whatever significance this one possesses, happier with its connotations than those of Snake Pond in neighboring Orleans or Horseleech Pond in Truro.
Pondering, I keep treading water by bicycling with my feet and scooping with my hands while watching and listening. Owl Pond fills my vision, fills my thoughts. There is somehow enough time, a feeling I seldom have. I inhale the fragrance of those white blossoms and the incense they mingle with, an herb-like aroma composed of dry leaves and pine needles. I listen. . . a few bird calls . . . the distant roar of a plane. Staying afloat is as easy as breathing; my arm and leg strokes are responses in a kind of physical litany. Embraced by this gracious water, I worship. Over and over, stroke by stroke, I give thanks. For this moment Owl Pond is my place in Psalm 24: “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof.”