My Other Eden: Where Imagination Blends With Reality

[Note: This is a piece of descriptive/narrative writing fed purely by my imagination. It is semi-autobiographical and the rest fictitious, the locale and the topography of the land having been changed as per my fancy and convenience. If my description is reminiscent of my favorite writers, it only bolsters the fact of how deeply I have been influenced by them!]

Want a glimpse of my other Eden? Relax now, breathe deeply, loosen your limbs, sit back in your seat and come with me on an interesting journey to a place so rugged, so serene, so pristine, so primordial and elemental in its beauty that I truly believe is the abode of the gods. The flux of life has taken me across the vast expanses of continents, be it for work or pleasure, but my mind is still awash with fresh memories of this other Eden from my childhood and like Wordsworth’s daffodils “ they flash upon that inward eye/ Which is the bliss of solitude.”

Not far from my parents’ vacation home was this oasis of beauty, a quiet haven of nature’s bliss to which we retreated time and again. It was a lucid lake that was nestled among the mountains, flashing like an aquamarine jewel in the brilliance of the sun and reflecting the deep blue skies on a warm, clear day. On occasion, when a few clouds drifted lazily past, they reflected on the water and changed its color, from indigo to blue to turquoise, shades of blue and green playing out continuously on the surface. Sun, rain, wind – it looked amazing in all. The lake was fed by tiny pebble-strewn streams and waterfalls that poured off the canyons surrounding it, and had an abundance of fish in it. The mountains foundered in a wreckage of rocks and boulders that stood like a crumbling fort around the lake, with the towering stands of pines and other conifers for sentinels, guarding a heavenly secret suspended in time and space. It was a relatively unspoiled location, literally in the back of nowhere, and only a few of our neighbors who lived far and apart were privy to it. The ambiance was sheer magic, the mood it evoked so divine and ethereal. Child though I was, it felt like paradise on earth to me, inspiring dreams as grand as its lonely, silent, stupendous splendor.

The lake was quite an enchanting walk from home, across a heavily – wooded area of mixed conifers and various other trees that roofed over like a great cathedral, with an impenetrable mass of ferns and bushes growing under them. The mighty canopy of the trees towering above was colossal in proportion and size, evoking an almost religious awe in me. The ground underfoot was like wet sponge as we walked on a mass of sodden leaves. Nurse logs were there aplenty, signaling death, decay, and rebirth. The woods were always loud with birds, a bird watcher’s paradise indeed. As we walked through the woods, my siblings and I would listen to the bird calls, be it the chatter of a thrasher or a thrush, or the ear-piercing calls of others which sounded like a dozen hammers beating on anvils. Buoyed by enthusiasm, we would compete with the sound of the bird song, as we skipped merrily along, dancing to the varied tunes of our winged friends. It was always cool under the trees, the greenness of the foliage adding to that feeling. Late spring and midsummer were my favorites, when the trees were a dark green. It was then that the brilliantly hued flowers in the clearing were a riot of colors, from the muted pinks and whites to the vibrant golds and yellows – a shangri-la of leaf and bloom and bird song.

There were a number of streams that emptied into the lake and as we crossed through the woods, we could hear the gurgle of the water as it flowed atop the pebbles. On a warm, lazy afternoon, my siblings and I would go off the beaten path and gravitate towards the streams. I would watch the boyish antics of my two older brothers as they climbed a tree or two on the way. My sister and I would pick the native berries on the banks of the streams, or collect nicely-rounded pebbles for our brothers to skim along the surface of the water. I remember being fascinated by the sight and sound of the pebbles as they plopped into the water. I would recite Tennyson’s “Song of the Brook” – “I come from haunts of coot and hern / I make a sudden sally/ And sparkle out among the fern/ To bicker down a valley.” My sister, the oldest, would go, “I chatter, chatter, as I flow / To join the brimming river, “and we would all cry in unison , “For men may come and men may go/ But I go on forever.” Oh, for those days of childish delight and pure unadulterated bliss!

Pouring off the shaggy rocks in the area and not easily accessible were a couple of waterfalls. We children were not allowed to go there without our parents, precisely because we had to thrust our way through the trees on a steep rocky canyon where the waterfalls came cascading down in a torrent and eddied into the silver pools below. Our parents were concerned that a misstep might send us hurtling down the jagged walls. The place evoked an awe in me as I sat and gazed at the silvery curtain of the water plunging down below. I would often recite Robert Southeys’ “ The Cataract of Lodore” with its plethora of ‘–ing’ verbs. “How does the water come down at Lodore ? “ the poem would ask, and after an endless list of verbs in the present progressive - “Rising and leaping,/Sinking and creeping,/ Swelling and sweeping, /Showering and springing, / Flying and flinging, / Writhing and ringing, / Eddying and whisking, / Spouting and frisking,/ Turning and twisting around and around,/ With endless rebound,/ Smiting and fighting,/ A sight to delight in,/ Confounding, astounding, / Dizzying and deafening the ear with its sound…,” - it would end, “ And this way the water comes down at Lodore.” Up above, I would watch the birds zooming past in the sky and wonder if they enjoyed the aerial view or took it for granted. In my childish fancy, I would be a bird as well, soaring above the rocks and water. It was a surreal feeling, as if I had transcended the barriers of time and space into another dimension.

As we came down to the lake, it was picture– perfect indeed. There was an other- worldliness to it, as if we had stepped into eternity. It had the typical smell of all water bodies, that of leaf, and mud, and fish, blended together. Under the glassy blue green sheen of its surface, what secrets did it hold, I would wonder. I would imagine an iridescent creature with amber eyes rising sleekly out of the water like Nessie, or I would fantasize about a mermaid with her merman and merchildren living in the depths of the lake. Wasn’t the water in the lake perhaps the very same water that the dinosaurs of yore drank? In retrospect, the lake and its surrounding environment in all their beauty and ruggedness bring about a calming, healing effect on my soul to this day. I feel akin to Thoreau in Walden, one with nature and in tune with the music of the spheres when I think of my other Eden now.

My parents are no longer alive, my siblings and I now live in different parts of the globe, and the vacation home is long gone. My other Eden still exists, in reality as well as in my memory. Will the lake of my childhood memories be there for my son and his children and countless other children to enjoy for posterity? Only time will tell. In the meantime, dear readers, relax, breathe deeply, loosen your limbs, sit back and enjoy whatever it is you are doing, for there is hope yet for our planet and our own personal Edens.