May 3, 2016 Grief is the Price for Love, the Columbia Canal and Riverwalk

The walk between the canal and the Congaree River reopened two weeks ago after the devastating floods of the fall.

At the entrance I find a new bronze statue of a young woman holding the scales of justice. Below her is a garden for victims of crime. There is a circular walk surrounded by stella d'oro (stars of gold) lilies in full golden bloom and knockout rose bushes of blushing pink popsickle color.  In the brick walk are the names of victims of crime and here and there a brick with messages of love and bible verses.  One brick states "Grief is the Price of Love."

I walk again where I have come so many times before, under the crape myrtles dedicated to  loved ones.  I cross the bridge of the canal and breathe in the cool damp air. The sky is overcast and after I have gone a mile along the water, the clouds open with  a deluge. I stand under an oak tree with a woman and her dog but soon she leaves to go back.  I run for the railroad trestle and highway overpass, soaked and laughing where I meet a Saudi couple and their baby Tameen. The woman wears a long  wet abeyya of pale lavender. Her eye makeup makes one long gray rivulet down her lovely face.  The ranger comes in his truck and offers us all a ride, but no one is interested.  We like the rain which has brought strangers together on this planet. I bid my new friends goodbye and continue on down the trail discovering that the second overpass has shiny new bowed girders reflecting themselves in the water below.
The old bridge abutments that for years stood useless in the water and looked like statues of Darth Vader are now gone.  The rain is over. There are aquamarine breaks in the clouds. The geese are back paddling the river. Birds fly into the bushes and trees which are lush now with the nutrients washed over them by the flooding water.

After a long and beautiful walk, I stop in the rest room and try to dry my clothes in the forced air from the hand dryer.

I visit the Crime Victim Garden one more time and leave with tears and wet with rain.