Encountering River ep.4/6
River you River me River bird
This series of river encounters was the first in a run of what has become an ongoing inquiry into relating with the living world through paying attention to and being with our local rivers. The first series was conducted by myself and retired academic Dr Peter Reason in May/June 2020, in preparation for a class we were booked to co-teach at the California Institute of Integral Studies in autumn of the same year. To read more about our work conducting co-operative inquiries into Rivers I recommend Peter’s Substack “Learning How Land Speaks”. Today’s account documents week 4.
By the fourth week of our co-operative inquiry into being with River, it is clear there is a felt sense of being in relationship. This visit occurs during a descent of heavy mist. Inner and outer boundaries become blurred and indistinct and the deep intimacy being experienced also blurs the question of what feels safe to share.
Cycle 4: Saturday 13th June 2020
I am looking out of the kitchen window onto thick white mist. The hills opposite the house have completely disappeared. Visibility must be less than ten feet.
“The river has come to me,” I think, marvelling at the inundation of water. I’ve had no chance to go out all week. Rain or shine, the time is now. I throw a few things into a bag, put waterproofs on and drive down to the layby where I leave the car when I visit my lover the River, as the term to refer to these excursions has come to be.
I do not leave the car immediately on arrival, but sit with the windows down, listening to the trees and River, letting the wet air in. Inside outside. Today feels all about listening; it’s too wet to write, paint or draw anyway, and the mist feels intimate and as if the place is drawing everything into itself somehow. The songs of numerous birds tumble around on the airwaves and beneath them the constant murmur of the river. I close my eyes and feel how the sound is slightly removed by the hollow shell of the car. A sudden longing to be immersed in the world grips me and I coat up and walk to where the path begins to slope down to the water.
I stop here and look at the plants. A great variety jostle for space and yet also seem to somehow fit together. The air holds the finest mist, making everything heavy with water. A slight wind wobbles the odd tree top or branch, and the trees make other sounds, as water drips from leaves with loud, intermittent splashes. I feel a squeeze of excitement at this mysterious wetland and the magic it seems to hold. I wait by the entrance to the path, until the nodding of a nearby grass makes me somehow feel included, and pausing to bow, I begin the gentle descent to River, admiring the plants and flowers I pass with a touch or a stroke, or sometimes a photo. I am excited, like a teenager who has snuck out for a secret date. My lover the River.
The water is higher today and more urgent than when I was here last and the sun shone. “River is the plural of rain,” I remember my poet friend Becky in Devon once writing, and I stop to watch for a few moments as the water swirls around a group of rocks topped by a clump of vibrant reeds. Listening again, I wonder at the way River sustains its song, and also at how the song seems different every time I visit. As when I had gazed at the plants, I feel awe at the unity in this display of multiplicity and diversity.
I decide to walk a little along River and find a rock to sit on. I do, but it is uncomfortable and so I slide over to a small clump of grass that sits beside Rock and which is encircled by tall reeds. I am close to the water and the song is loud here. I close my eyes. The water drowns out all other sounds and, closeted by the reeds, I feel immersed in River’s body, the intimacy more pronounced by the misty obscuration of the bank opposite.
I try to meditate but my mind is an onslaught of thoughts. These seem to pass across my mental screen from right to left, the same direction as the water, and flash from the personal to the social. Soon thoughts of my father arise, and tears fall. They continue to fall as the thoughts move from my father to all our ancestors. It is as if River is exposing me to the layers of suffering and trauma they hold, the centuries of bloodshed that has spilled across the land. I am overcome with a tidal wave of love for my surroundings as I cry, and this makes the tears fall harder. I touch the reeds and look at River, and let the thoughts and the tears rise, flow, and fall…
Time passes.
Suddenly my attention is grabbed by a small bird on the bank opposite. It looks very dark blue, or even black, with a brilliant white chest or bib; a white-throated dipper. These birds live and breed on and around fast-flowing rivers and streams. I have been thinking about River being with and all around me all week – in the mist, the rain, coming out of my body, in the water I drink. I watch the bird bob his distinctive dance and understand I am seeing River-in-bird-form. River me river you river bird. He dances for a while, hopping from rock to rock, before a sudden dart into the air lifts him up and away, leaving me with the inexplicable sensation of having been blessed.
A ping from my phone brings the far-outer world into this inside-outside wetland I’ve been subsumed in. My mother. And I can see I have been here an hour. I stand up, my bottom wet from the wet rock, and I thank River for allowing me in. Inside outside. All is wet. I walk slowly back, pausing to fill a small glass bottle I’ve brought after asking if I may, to keep my lover the River close to me while we are apart. I smile as I walk back up the path to the road, remembering how last year I was playing around outside with my lover the wind and my lover the sun. “I wonder if I should tell Peter about that?” I think, pausing to turn and say one last goodbye to the retreating river. As I do so, a duck flies low from left to right, honking as it passes. And the honks sound like laughter, and so I laugh and carry on making my way back to the car.
References
Gethin, R. (2009). River is the Plural of Rain. Oversteps Books.
Peter Reason just followed me on the dying bird site, which led me to your stack as well as his. Welcome, and happy to find company!