To sit in a hotel room chair overlooking Niagara Falls feels surreal. A wide river flows into a cavernous crevasse. There is fallout. Mist. Lots of mist. And sound, like a roaring wind. The mist is ethereal...veiling the view at times, refracting color and light, other times. Always in movement. When you walk close to the falls and perch at the rail, you feel the blessing of the river. The mist alights on you, the witness......witness to the immensity of this geologic situation.
The mist is an ever changing dynamic connecting river to sky. I imagine what it must have been like to happen upon the Falls hundreds of years ago, on foot or horseback. You first see the plume at a distance, rising above the trees. There is tension and anticipation when drawing near...at least I have always felt this. As a child, there was trepidation, and dreams of being engulfed by its immensity.
Today, towering casinos, high rise hotels, and an abundance of pulsing light vie for attention while the ever powerful, dynamically stoic, Niagara River flows on by. And its delicate mists sing of change and transformation.
Cataract
Cataract (Dictionary.com):
noun
1.
a descent of water over a steep surface; a waterfall, especially one of considerable size.
2.
any furious rush or downpour of water; deluge.
3.
Ophthalmology.
- an abnormality of the eye, characterized by opacity of the lens.
- the opaque area.
I have always been fascinated with the term cataract, describing the Falls. While the word waterfall conjures an idyllic image, cataract, has a darker, more mysterious feel to it. And how strangely curious that the alternative meaning speaks of obfuscation, veiling.
The river is wide and divided creating two spectacular and separated water falls, and a boundary between two countries. (I wonder how the river feels about its honorary role of separation? Do you think it likes the Canadians better?) From wide, level riverbed to plunging cavernous escarpment, this cataract is dangerous and majestic.
Originally from the Greek kataraktes, meaning rushing or swooping down, it became a simile around the 16th century for something that stopped the light from entering...a web in the eye. (For more on the origin and evolution of the word cataract check out World Wide Words.)
As a hotel patron with a sublime view of the falls, what webs my eyes are the glaring lights and distractions humanity has thought to include in the cataract experience. I would love to sleep with the curtains open and the river at my side, but the night-time circus that has become Niagara Falls, pesters. How does a "wonder of the world" cope with such circumstances?
Mesmerized, I sit with this spectacle and watch the swirling mist...at times thick enough to cloak the view across the river. The mist.........yes, this cataract has cataracts.Eclipse
Early this morning (October 8) there was a total lunar eclipse, at the opposite horizon from my view of the Falls. The moon takes on a red hue (blood moon) as the earth passes between sun and moon..... and is darkened but enhanced at the same time. It is said that during a total eclipse, there is a planetary pause, like the space between in breaths and exhales. It is an opening within which we can access the cosmos and harness powers for change. Certainly there is a big push for change in the global collective and I would guess, similarly in our individual lives.
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| photo by Denise Stottman |
Oh My
The little synchronicities of this day have put me in a reflective mist. I think proximity to a cataract during a total lunar eclipse unleashes the beasts of the psyche. I will/can make no solid conclusions, but maybe some fluid ones. When one's vision is impaired other senses are heightened. Mist and cataract combined to heighten mine. Something was loosed in me. The eclipse saw to that.
I will leave you with the last little synchronicity....an excerpt from a poem that came to me today (Oct. 8), by Philip Schultz, called Afterwards.
I will leave you with the last little synchronicity....an excerpt from a poem that came to me today (Oct. 8), by Philip Schultz, called Afterwards.
Suddenly,
regardless of what the Gods say,
regardless of what the Gods say,
the present remains uninhabitable,
the past unforgiving of the harm it's seen,
while
the future remains translucent
the future remains translucent
and unambiguous
in its desire to elude us.
in its desire to elude us.
