We visited Niagara
Falls on Saturday. Saturdays in August are (apparently) when everyone who
isn't already married heads for Niagara Falls to tie the knot and link their
eternal commitment to a stunning, flowing, misty waterscape, much like those special
someones in times past who tied their destinies to a wooden barrel to ride the
plunging tons of icy water over a cliff to the unforgiving rocky pools
below. Ok, maybe not so much like
that. Anyway, it was very
evocative. If it weren't too late, I
would have proposed to Eric.
Liam and Kai watched
the water for a long time. The Falls are
stunning, but visiting them stirred a vague dissatisfaction that they finally
clarified for me. We first saw the Falls
from Prospect Point, where they asked whether we could go up and look from the
Observation tower above us. At Horseshoe
Falls, Kai looked down and saw the boardwalk for the Cave of the Clouds below,
and asked if we could go down there. Standing
at the bottom looking up, I’m sure, they would ask if there was any way to
climb up. The waterfall is so elemental,
with unimaginable volumes of water hurling over and through an unreal height and
shattering itself into mist and roar, that there really is no way to hold the
fullness of its sound and fury all at once in your mind. All the kids – and I - can do is try to knit
together the snippets we collect of rush and drop and sound and vapor. I feel like I am peeking through the keyhole
of a vast room, with no way to reach up and open the door.
Kai was a bit overwhelmed by it all.
-Juliet
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