The lake at Big Bear is perhaps 20 miles long. On the East end there is another small natural area that, this year, has become a small lake, thanks to the copious amount of rain and snow during this year’s winter.
Yesterday Nancy and I walked through this preserve. For a large part of of the walk we were on a boardwalk about 20 feet above the lake. The cool breezes left windswept patterns on the surface. The schools of fish, now plentiful because of the annual stocking of the lakes, broke the surface as they fought for food . . of perhaps as they celebrated their new-found freedom . . the price they would pay for this freedom would soon bring happiness to the fishermen on the banks.
This was all a dry field not long ago. But now, newly transformed into a small lake with an island in the middle, it seemed pristine, idyllic! I could only imagine that in my youth I would have been plotting a route to the island with a small boat with paddles.
In reality, the lake is only about a foot deep. The reason the fish are on the surface is that it is too shallow to descend into the depths. It will soon be a dry field again, baked by the hot California sun. The fish will be meals for fishermen, and the island will only be a promontory in the middle of a yellow field of grass.
Time moves on. I am going to enjoy it as it was in my imagination . . a deep lake, full of fish and wildlife with an island populated by pirates who are going to feel the brunt of my search for truth and justice!