A Superior Rest

I’m a night writer.

Make that late night writer. As in the wee small hours of the morning, when the house is blissfully quiet and I can think without distraction.

I lay in bed in a dark house with thoughts that float through my mind, wanting to drop anchor. If I wait for tomorrow, they might be gone.

My fingers itch for the laptop, but I tell myself I need rest. After a half hour of tossing and turning, I succumb. I’ll be tired tomorrow, but I get up to give these circling thoughts a place to land.

I have not been this relaxed in ages.

We go to the beach because the girls love it and it’s a great outlet for their endless childish energy. We go because the sun in shining and it feels sinful to stay inside. We go because it’s relaxing and that's good to do every now and then.

There’s relaxing, and then there’s relaxing.

It wasn’t the beach. I’ve been to beaches before. It wasn’t Lake Superior. I see it every day. It wasn’t being with the family. I’m with them all the time.

It was the conjunction of a warm sun shining after a week of cool temps, warm sand, fresh air, secluded beach, incredible sky, still water, happy dogs, contented daughters, and a mellow husband.

And the gift of mighty Lake Superior at ease.

Lake Superior on a quiet day is a sight to behold. Calm, glassy water reflecting and borrowing the color of the sky. The only difference between lake and sky is a thin line on the distant horizon.

Almost imperceptible swells gently kissed the shore and receded with a soft sigh.

Utterly charmed, I wondered how I could have lived almost 50 years and not known such places exist. All my life I never knew or cared.

I drank in the blue-on-blue horizon, listened to the mesmerizing water, a nearby loon, and my children laughing, and felt tension drain out of my body.

And peace took its place. And filled my emotional tank.

God, thank you for peaceful moments. Times of rest from constant, mind-numbing activity, respite from conflict and chaos, no endless tape running through my head of go here, do this, fix these, solve that. No questioning, wondering, or second guessing.

Just an absorbing. A filling. A resting.

An unexpected sweet pocket of peace on a secluded beach in Northern Wisconsin on the ever changing shore of the finite immensity of Lake Superior.