I didn't take the dogs for their walk until after lunch today, and I walked fast to outpace the mosquitos, and so, no photos from the woods today. But then, my favorite part of the day was my swim in Farm Pond from my friend's dock in the early afternoon. I swam out beyond the island, and the sound of the swimmers from the far off beach wafted over me as I found my rhythm and glide and the quiet peace that swimming brings, like no other activity, such silence, an absence of distraction. Breath, breath, breath. I felt, as I swam in this pond, the place where I learned to swim and have been a swimmer for almost six decades, I felt today, I don't swim as fast as I used to, and I never was a fast swimmer, but I could swim far, and I felt today the strength of my heart and lungs, that sense of the power in my body that immersion, that crawling at a steady stroke through a fine, fresh body of water outdoors under a big summer sky brings, surrounded by the green of the tall trees, in the vicinity of the island, in the deep water, alone, with cries of the kids coming across the pond from the docks, it was me, I was there, playing on an August afternoon, wishing school would not be starting soon, and loving the long, free afternoon of wet play and a desire to be in the pond, unlimited, swimming and playing my heart out in the water while it was warm and while there was time, and it was the place my whole body wanted to be for as long as possible. 

About Farm Pond

Farm Pond is a “kettle” lake, meaning it was formed by the melting remnant of one of the glaciers that departed from New England more than 12,000 years ago. Because it was formed between the late oligotrophic and early mesotrophic periods, Farm Pond is a “young” pond. As shown by the map on the back cover of this booklet, the pond is about 58 feet at its deepest. The pond covers about 124 acres. (From the Farm Pond Handbook, produced by The Farm Pond Advisory Committee in 1997, under the leadership of Douglas Cassell. The handbook was revised and updated in the winter of 2001 by the Farm Pond Advisory Committee under the leadership of Dusty Burke, Jr. The current version was updated in June, 2011.)

All photos and text ©Kelly DuMar 2018 unless otherwise attributed