There are no clocks aboard the Little Dipper, no calendars whose page-flips count the days. But time is everywhere in the Apostle Islands if you look closely. It is not just the 660 million year-old brownstone cliffs, the centuries-old white pines on Outer Island, or the constant tick-tock of the shoreline waves. This time of year you can measure the passage of time in the growth of the fluffy-headed strings of meganser chicks trailing their mother in the bays, in the slight tint of brown just now beginning to become noticeable in the shore grass.
And then there is the fireweed.
Growing in sunny places, often within the splash of storm waves, or in areas disturbed by flames, fireweed (Chamaenerion angustifolium) is a kind of measuring stick of time, summer’s ticking clock. It blooms first at the bottom of its stalk, its burst of color climbing higher and higher as the summer progresses in a kind of slow-motion fireworks display. By late July here in the Islands, it is, like the days themselves, in its full “ohhh” and “ahhh” summer glory.
And then slowly it begins to fade. There is a saying that when the “fireweed goes to cotton, summer is soon forgotten.”
In Quiet Cove one recent morning, I watched summer’s ever-so-slight fade written in a stalk of fireweed. No need for a clock or a calendar. It was all there in the silent fireworks of fireweed. Do what you will, it seemed to say, summer in the islands is beginning to fade.
— Jeff Rennicke (all photography by the author unless otherwise noted).
And then there is the clock of older people like me that runs too quickly while the young want to speed it up to get - where? At 15 you want to be 21 at 80 I also want to be 21. How our perspective changes while nature maintains her pace despite the actions of humans.