Differing Senses of Place

¶ … standing at the lighthouse in a park in Mackinac City, shivering and cold in the dim August light. The lighthouse's grey walls tower above me like an immovable stone monument to the bleakness of the day. I peer out into the misty air, struggling to see through the fog that presses up to the thick, bruise-blue clouds, and across the choppy water. Mackinac Bridge juts out in front of me, just as imposing and cold as the massive lighthouse above.

I feel tiny, insignificant, about to be swallowed up by the greatness of concrete and stone that surround me. Mackinac is impossibly long, five miles of concrete stretching out along the massive water where lakes Michigan and Huron meet in a quiet rush of grey water. Miles of grey cables stretch out above the bridge, like long spider arms desperately holding the mass of concrete above the dull water below.

The cables strain and groan in the wind, a tireless cry of strength moaning disquietingly into the cool wind that rushes past. The Mighty Mac spans from Mackinaw city to St. Ignace; tall and solid against the endless forces of wind, gravity; strong against the grinding pressure of rushing ice and water that press against its massive girders. Cars crawl across the bridge, tiny and busy bright blobs of color moving slowly along the grey concrete.

They seem to cling precariously to the strength of the bridge, 55 stories above the Straits of Mackinac, struggling not to fall into the choppy water below. I can imagine the tired faces of grey people, one apiece in their freshly-washed Toyota Camry's and Ford Taurus', rushing by blindly on their way to work, late for morning meetings with faceless managers named Bob in the empty office cafeteria.

I've been one of them, passive and immobile in my little cubicle, typing memos and meeting requests to people I didn't like very much, guiltily writing e-mails to my Mom to pass the time, and hearing the drone of office gossip sweep past my ears and into the empty corridors. Anxious travellers bob among the office workers, in minivans and SUVs, in their hurried rush to relax somewhere else. Next to me a family stops to snap quick photos in the park, against the lighthouse's massive walls.

I step aside, and take their picture for them, an image of pasty white faces and bright rain slickers on their trip to somewhere. They stare out to the Mighty Mac for a minute, and I can hear the man calculating how long it will take to get to their destination, and the children wonder when they can stop for supper.

They don't see what I see through the August haze - men sweating under the hot August sun, stringing thousands of miles of cable, building a monument to their toil, a monument to their time. I see an endless flow of travellers and workers, pulsing across the great bridge, day-by-day, year-by-year. They drive off to crawl along the bridge in their two-tone blue Acura, disappearing into the tiny and busy bright blobs of color that move slowly along the grey concrete.

I'm simply content to watch them go by, solid and immovable as the Mighty Mac, watching the human current rush and ebb with the pulse of hurry and time.