American Ganga

I’ve been thinking about water in the way of rivers, lakes and ocean beaches. My post from two days ago about going to the lake every summer reminded me that not everyone went to their lakes for the summer. Some people did just fine visiting their local lakes, ponds or pools. While growing up our family was a member of a local Country Club.

No we weren’t rich or snooty. The Country Club membership was part of the benefits package where my father worked. All employees received this benefit no matter if you were the CEO or the lowest paid part-time employee inn the guard shack. Imagine employment with benefits. This was an age where companies treated their employees like family and usually got the same feelings in return.

Eventually this Country Club was sold to the County and became a County Park. It was and probably still is a wonderful park. It had two large sand bottom lakes for swimming and a large lake between for fishing and boating. There where tennis, handball and basketball courts and probably a hundred picnic spaces in different parts of the woods.

Having gone there since a child I still went there after it became a County Park without much thought other than the fact I now had to pay a fee to get in. One hot summer day I found myself in a traffic jam back on the old country road that serviced this park. I figured there must have been a wreck because this road never saw that much traffic.

As I inched ahead I saw what the problem was; the park had been discovered. There were thousands of people visible at the lake and all the cars were in line to go into the park. It looked like the Ganga. I could no longer imagine swimming in lakes where there were potentially so many that could be pissing in the water at once.

When I was near the entrance to the park I continued down the road to one of my favorite little known spots on the Ramapo River where I knew no one would be. There I could swim in peace.