One evening I went for a walk on the Trailway which is the name given to the former railroad bed, one stretch runs along the shore of Conception Bay near my home. I stopped for a moment to rest on a bench a few kilometers from my starting point. My eyes were drawn to a plaque on the bench’s wooden back. This particular seat was dedicated to Dick Aylward, a man who many years before, often sat in this very spot and gazed at the ocean.
Being curious, I
wondered what did Dick Aylward see. So, I sat myself down on the bench to find
out. I had just walked about two kilometers and hadn’t really “seen” anything.
I waited for a few seconds, focused, and then took in my surroundings.
The sun, at my 10
o’clock view, was covered by a white hazy gauze which reminded me of the fleshy
cod fish fillets on the lit boards of the trimming line. The distortion was
perfect enough to keep the shine at bay allowing me to be mesmerized by the
yellow orb.
Next, I noticed a
golden Christmas tree on the water. I was sitting at the star while the
branches spread out in even form to the base somewhere on the other side of
Conception Bay. I watched the bright blue waves flutter within my shiny
Christmas tree giving it an appearance of being alive. This Christmas tree was
my own and I’m sure everyone on the trail had one but, like me before I sat,
may have failed to see it.
In the distance at
my 1 o’clock a small white object stood out against the darkening backdrop. For
me it was a speck of ice but I’m sure from somewhere over around Bacon Cove or
Brigus it was a sizeable iceberg. A tiny white shark fin caught my eye as a
sailboat bobbed around mid-Bay. When I took my eye off it, it was hard to find
again until it swung full sail into my view and grabbed the sun. Otherwise, it
was no more than a pencil mark on a rippley blue canvas. A streak across the
water drew my attention and I followed a speed boat in and out of my golden
tree. As it departed the left side of the branches, I saw a lonesome gull
flying low on the water in my near vision and just off shore. I would have
missed it if it wasn’t for the speed boat dissecting my tree. Two more gulls
slowly rose from the landwash, glided, and hung on the breeze not ten feet in
front of me.
The sea gently
caressed and polished the large beach rocks to a spit-shine as the gulls
pitched and silently waited for something palatable to come by.
I followed the
horizon of the north side of the bay but after four or five attempts to find
the tip of Baie de Verde I was unable to determine if Ireland would be visible
between the cup cake that sits at the end of Bell Island and the headland of
Conception Bay. The land folded into the Bay until it was hard to tell what
must be shifting water and what must be solid ground.
Closer to land on
my side of the Bay two large chunks of ice took up station close to Bell
Island. I had seen them off Topsail a few days prior. They were big then and
didn’t seem to have lost any of their size. Roofs of houses gleamed in the sun
from the top of Bell Island and I thought it must have been a good day on
clothes over there. A red flag waved over by Kelly’s Island seizing my
attention as another sailboat with bolder taste revealed itself to me.
It was a feast for the famished on Dick Aylward’s bench. To think I would have missed it all if I hadn’t taken a moment to sit down. I didn’t have a camera and I don’t have the skill to capture the vista, but I could see why Dick Aylward chose this place or maybe it chose him. I got up to head back and I thanked Dick Aylward for being fortuitous enough to find this spot and mark it for people like me who hadn’t taken the time to enjoy what Mother Nature has going on. So much going on, it’s no wonder she gets confused. For the last few years since my first revelation there, I have sat with Dick Aylward and contemplated what was going on around me. The ever-changing experience has always been worth my time.
I hope you find your own Dick Aylward's bench and pause long enough for it to make a difference.
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