Ancient Shores

I led a very wet hike this evening at Averill, once the largest banking ground in the world, where white pine logs were piled thousand upon thousand as they awaited their trip to the sawmill. A lot has changed since the 1880s, and the property along the Tittabawassee River is now owned by the Little Forks Conservancy, who has worked to restore the natural ecosystems there.

As I walked the property yesterday, I listened to the wind blow through the trees and watched autumn leaves spiral to the earth. Each spring, 130 years ago, this land was nothing but logs piled 30 feet high and more, stretching for a mile along the high riverbank. Now, white pines and a host of other trees grow there once again and birdsong fills their branches.

The little stream flows into the river

As I contemplated this history of men and trees, I was drawn off the trail by a fragment of an old stone foundation in the woods. A small piece of wall is all that's left of some old structure, long rotted and gone. Looking further in, I noticed a piece of an old railroad tie that was once part of the grade that ran near here. Now, it's a paved bike path that stretches for 30 miles through the restored countryside of forests and farmland.

Looking even further into the trees, I noticed the winding bed of a small stream, cutting its way through the woods as it heads for the nearby river. I found evidence of mink, raccoon and deer in the sand and clay along the shore. Beds of stones and pebbles lie exposed in the low water. Walking along the bed, I paused to examine these rocks, deposited here who-knows how many eons ago. Crouching low, I was amazed at the variety of sizes, shapes and colors and found several small pieces of pure white quartz amidst their gray-clad cousins.

Then, in the water, I noticed a pattern of lines and pulled up a rock that was nothing less than a completely fossilized shell. Just over an inch long, its top and bottom halves are clearly visible, almost like something new which had instantly turned to stone. This whole region, however, was once covered by glaciers a mile thick and ages earlier than that, a warm saltwater sea. The name of our local Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans group is "Ancient Shores CUUPS" in recognition of those times long past and forgotten by most.

Though it seems like the main tale of this place, it turns out those frenetic years of lumbering destruction were just a mere moment of time in a long, long, story of this land. Here I am, crouching in a streambed with wetted fingers, clutching a fossilized shell from an ancient sea. Maybe the very water molecules that gave it life thousands and thousands of years ago are literally flowing through my veins.

Skybranch /|\