Ann you sure have enjoyed lakes over the years - wonderful - no matter where you lived there was a nearby lake to enjoy - sounds like winter on a northern lake is cause for a neighborhood get together just for the fun of it - I wonder if they still ice skate at night with warming shakes surrounding the lake -
Jean yes, I think that is the million dollar question - why? I know for me when I am on a large lake as when I lived near other large bodies of water I feel a weight lifting - I am free to just be with no thoughts and no concern for responsibilities almost like being in a cocoon with the breeze blowing any loose hair around my face. All this interest in yoga and exercise as a way towards emptying the mind and all I have to do is stand or even sit by a large body of water and in no time flat I am out of body.
Darby Nelson speaks to our desire to just sit and observe the lakes more than be active in or around them suggesting this as he observes so many who own property with lakeside homes and who are seldom ever seen outdoors, much less on the lake. Second, he seems to notice those who do play on the water.
I wonder though if that is our modern viewpoint taking over. I remember when hiking in the mountains of Mexico any small village, most not even on the map, were built near a stream or creek - in fact the hiking bible said if you are lost just listen for chickens which will be located near the river and then you can follow the river to find larger communities. The stream was their only source of water - they drank it, bathed in it, washed their laundry in it, cooked with it, the animals drank and swam in it, ducks lived near or in it and were often the family meal.
Which goes to how while working over a 5 year span of time, various jobs at the Girl Scout Camp those of us who were not responsible for a unit of girls would in the evening take our folding chairs within about 100 yards or so of the river to watch the deer come down to drink and so for early man it seems to me the river was an easy source of not just water but where taking down an animal was possible as long as you were not taken down by the animal.
And then long before engines moved us across the landscape our highways were the rivers and even creeks for a canoe or other boat with a shallow draft. So the river was a place of commerce and the public activity that spawned all sorts of jobs and investments - where you went to keep in contact with people in the community. I can see how those living near the ocean saw it as a place of travel, fishing and community however, it was not where animals or people came to drink or wash themselves. Hmm I guess a lake or stream is a more intimate place since our history includes our using the waters for our person more so than for commerce.
All to say I think we may have lost our original reason for living near water - Except here, in Austin we had lots of cheaters living near the lake/river siphoning water to keep their lawns green - they couldn't drink it without it going through a filtration which is costly but for the last 2 years, until the rains came this past Spring, we were only allowed to water or wash our vehicles once a week and some communities ran out of water so that it was trucked in. And then folks were sneaking water out of the lake - of course this a common practice when the lakes are nearly full but some think of 'me' and 'mine' before the community.
The other issue as to value - water front property will always be more expensive - there is a lot of land but a limited amount of shoreline in comparison - where ever there is a limit there is a premium - the reason California, Oregon and the State of Washington have more expensive Real Estate - there is the ocean on one side and the mountains on the other limiting the easy building and farming land to what is between those two barriers. And if you look at a map nearly any large city is built next to a body of water - they may be large and lost to their city centers but they all started as trading spots and a good place to beach or anchor a boat so that even then prime locations on the water enjoy a premium.
To my thinking, the draw to live near a lake is like eating cheese - We ate cheese as a mainstay food source for over 4,000 years however, now we are drawn to many sources for cheese unavailable as recently as 50 years ago because of the opening of worldwide markets and more travel. Now we enjoy cheese for more than topping a pasta dish, as a sandwich or cooked in supper and lunch dishes. Some of the grocery stores have cheese departments larger than the meat markets of a few years ago - and so where our attachments change I think as we love eating cheese so we love living near, walking near, playing near, traveling and drinking in the source of life, Water...
my contemplation on water...
