Member-only story
Three Great Lakes
1. Lake Michigan
1973. Hofmaster (or maybe Grand Haven). My hair tangles and swirls around my head, covering my face as my shoulder, then knees, then back are raked across the lake floor. I claw the long strands from my vision and swim hard toward the bright light, thinking it must be the way to oxygen, but instead slam into the sandy bottom with my cheek. Tumbled by the waves and so disoriented, the sunlight piercing through the clear water reflects off of everything, impossible to know which way is up. The panic leaves me in a split second. I am unafraid. I am suspended, tousled and dragged by the crashing waves and undertow, but completely at peace in the chaos, time standing still. In the moment, it does not occur to me that I am drowning. Then just as suddenly, a hand is yanking me upward and I am gulping air. I see my mother on her beach blanket, reading her book, completely unaware of what just occurred. The person who saved me gone, I struggle to stay standing in the strong surf, and wonder when my mother will see me, will notice that I’m right there, that something is or was or is about to be terribly wrong.
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1998. Bridgman/Warren Dunes. I brought my Senegalese friend Mafal and his comrades to the Big Lake. These dudes from Africa who grew up on the Ivory Coast, reportedly the most beautiful coastline of the entire African continent, cried…
