Glassing the Lake

While stopping to rest at a small beach on our drive along the shore of Lake Erie, I found myself sitting under a shady maple tree with binoculars in hand.  The straw-colored beach in front of me teemed with people milling or sunning along the water’s edge.  Beyond them, the lake spread below the cloudless day with all the sensibilities of an ocean.

I scanned the perfect pencil-line horizon with the binoculars and found big ships and smaller craft melting into the length of the distant water horizon.

Erie is the fourth-largest of the Great Lakes.  At the point where I sat, the shore on the Canadian (Ontario) side lay fifty-some miles across the water’s surface.  The Iroquoian tribe called the lake “Erige” (“cat”) due to the unpredictable nature of the lake’s waters, but as I scanned the surface for boats the lake lay becalmed.

I sat watching ships and boats until my three traveling companions were ready to climb back in our vehicle and drive on.  Only when we were driving off through some shoreside mansions did the thought occur that I had neglected to scan the beach for scantily clad women.  Now a decision must be rendered.  Did I not glass the beach for women because I have matured?  Or am I exercising the first signs of senility?

--Mitchell Hegman