From LONG ISLAND – by Ann Parry (ann-parry.com)
December 31, 2018
Cammanns Pond
Tonight, ten days after the shortest day of the year, and hours before the stormy last hurrah of 2018 would become the dawn of 2019, I stopped at Cammanns Pond on my way home.
Struggling through the downpour, the light from the street lamp behind me surrendered before reaching water’s edge.
Merrick, NY, USA. Dec. 31, 2018. A raft of ducks sleeps hidden at Cammanns Pond during rainy New Year’s Eve. (© 2018 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)
Rain coated the windshield seconds after each sweep of wipers, and dashboard lights bounced on the glass and water, so my bullseye view was light from distant buildings slashing an abyss.
But, after countless visits, I knew waterfowl must be near. Once my eyes adjusted to the darkness and I covered the instrument lights with an infinity scarf, I saw hints of a silent, nearly still raft of ducks midway between shores.
Aiming my iPhone from the space between steering wheel and windshield, I captured rain smeared photos of two bare trees standing sentinel in front of the pond.
Going outside, I stood behind one tree trunk then the other, to avoid throwing a shadow, and leaned out to take photos of the ducks, pond, shores and beyond.
No home is an island
Then I sat silent and still in my car as ducks slept at the Merrick pond, on the deluged south shore of Long Island…
on the northeast coast of the United States on Earth as it orbited the Sun, in a spiral arm of the Milky Way, in the Virgo Supercluster…
as we made our way in the universe this New Year’s Eve –
forty years after the world understood global warming and still had time to avoid crisis.
• NASA: Global Climate Change Resources
• Bloomberg: Climate Changed
• NYTimes: Losing Earth: The Decade We Almost Stopped Climate Change
• United Nations: Climate Change
fyi fLI
What’s the correct spelling of the name of the Nassau County park on the south side of Merrick Road between Lindenmere Drive and Babylon Road? Several versions appear, including on government sites.
The park’s named after the Cammann family. In 1890 Hermann Cammann bought the Carmen farm house property on the north side of Merrick Road, across from where the park is now located, and he rebuilt a larger version of the house.
So – despite its glaring absence of a possessive apostrophe next to the “s” – I’ll go with the name on the park sign: “Cammanns Pond“
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- Nassau County gov’t site: Camman’s Pond
- New York State gov’t site: Camaans Pond, Camaan’s Pond
- Google maps: Cammanns Pond County Park
- MerrickHistory.pbworks.com: Cammann House
Cammanns Pond: MY GALLERY
