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Thursday

Red Light - Green Light

When I was a young woman I visited my parent's house one summer, my two little girls with me. It was a cottage home, small, but cute. It rested within a beach front community in Youngstown, New York, located at the mouth of the Niagara River where it joins Lake Ontario. The beach sat down below a cliff, which we had access by stairs.

In the daytime, we could look across a great expanse of shimmering water. It felt so peaceful. Sometimes there were sailboats afloat. Occasionally, if we looked out far enough, we could see an occasional freighter ship running through the middle of the lake on it's way out to the St. Lawrence River to the Atlantic Ocean.

On a clear night my girls and I could sit at the edge of the cliff on the top step of the stairs, and view the black velvet water, thousands of stars sprinkled across it like sparkles glued upon a Halloween costume.

Without binoculars, straight across from us, about 40 miles away, we could see the lights of the city of Toronto, Canada. We often sat there lulled by the quietness of the starlight, the lapping of the water upon the shore, and the light breeze rustling the leaves on the huge oak tree in the back yard.

We could have lined a string directly across the lake to the brightly lit traffic signal that reliably changed every few minutes from green to red to yellow to green. It was hypnotic.



Photo of Toronto at Night by Richard Almasi

10 comments:

  1. We may be making a return trip to the shores of Lake Ontario. We visited Olcott Beach, NY, earlier this month. We're thinking of making a return visit, to spend a couple nights rather than a couple hours.

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  2. Linda, Funny... our old paths keep crossing. I used to live in Olcott near the skating rink. I wonder if it is still there?

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  3. If you describe where in Olcott you lived (street names, etc), I'll see if I can find it.

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  4. Second house from corner of Main street near the creek, and Lockport Rd on the lake side. I think the bowling alley and skating rink are gone, though. I'll have to ask my brother who lives in Lockport. Haven't thought about Olcott in decades.

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  5. I'd be more interested in seeing how the lake front and park look these days. I wonder if they still have carnival rides there?

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  6. Yes, Olcott still has carnival rides. When we were there the first time earlier this month, the amusement park wasn't opened. It opens at noon. We arrived at 9:00AM. We had other things to see and places to go, so we didn't get to go inside the amusement park. I have pictures from that visit earlier this month but just haven't had time to get them uploaded. It looks like I'll have two visits of pictures to edit and upload :-)

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  7. What a beautiful plc to have lived. I visited Toronto in 1992 and thought it wonderful ~ from there on the Niagra to see the falls.

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  8. Thanks, Jan, I was raised in Niagara Falls, lived on an island in the river. Haven't been back there twenty five years.

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  9. Janna, It was lovely, and I miss those times with my girls, though I'm sure they don't remember.

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