Farewell, Ray Harvey, thanks for everything.

Years pass and great trees fall but the lake lives on. Children of the fallen reach greedy limbs toward the newly open sky, shedding no tears as they race one another to the sun. Incurious rocks can be split by winter but never notice our pounding feet upon them. We think we leave footprints, and we do, but not for long; not as the trees would see it.

This is a tribute to Ray Harvey, another large tree we lost last Spring. I missed his memorial but I have his memory. We all have his memory, we who knew him, who were baffled by his sometimes odd approach to maintaining our cottages (I was), but also marveled at his ingenuity (I did), and relied utterly on his reliability (I did, utterly). Ray was always there, a really good guy and we miss him. Just to show how much I’m going to re-publish the Ray stories this summer. You may have read some, others will be stories I’ve kept to myself until now.

Until then, here’s to you Ray Harvey, and as I said to Jim McTaggart who came and went before you, have fun in heaven. Don’t forget to write.