It was that color - bone white - that first caught my eye, but I am getting ahead of myself.
Last Sunday, on just the second run of the season aboard the Little Dipper, I was still working out the kinks of a winter on the hard, trying to regain the easy grace of summer boating skills, so I only went as far as what we call Quiet Cove on the north side of Oak Island.
And there I drifted, engine off, eyes closed, coffee steaming. Even though it was early May, I could feel the warm fingers of the sun on my skin, the first brush of summer’s touch. There were mergansers on the water, the swell of leaf buds on the trees. Thoughts of winter, snow, and ice only a distant memory.
Or so I thought.
Rounding the eastern tip of Oak Island on the way home, I caught that glimmer of white out of the corner of my eye and throttled back for a look. A winter killed deer skull perhaps? A pile of white feathers that would miraculously materialize into a snowy owl and flap off like a white dream? No, as I got closer I could see it for what it was: ghost ice, a last piece of winter so white against the already blooming thoughts of summer that it hardly seemed real.
I crept closer, camera in hand, as if stalking a ghost, brought my eye to the viewfinder, finger on the shutter release and then …
Nah. I turned away. I don’t believe in ghosts. No more winter. No more ice and cold. I spun the bow back down the West Channel, pointed for Bayfield and throttled up. All the way home I could feel the sun patting me on the back, putting the winter behind me and pushing me towards the sweetness of the summer that lies ahead.
— Jeff Rennicke (all photography by the author unless otherwise noted).
These Sunday postcards are a free offshoot of the Little Dipper blog. Subscribers also get a full-length illustrated essay every Wednesday. Subscribe and join the journey.