In search of a swimming hole, we went for a bike ride on the path from the parking lot near the Eustis covered bridge. We headed toward North Hatley, then left the path at some nice looking narrow trails, where we parked our bikes in a convenient patch of poison ivy. At the bottom of the path, there was a widening in the river, deep enough to swim in.

A man came down from the other side to let us know that if we touched his side of the river, we were trespassing, and that we’d probably get some infection swimming in the water, perhaps some parasites or an itchy rash. He didn’t seem to appreciate the fact that people swim in water— at least not if it’s within shouting distance of his house. I couldn’t actually see his house, and I don’t believe we were shouting, but he was especially vigilant.

Of course the river isn’t perfectly clean. Maybe there’s a sewage processing plant in North Hatley that’s located too close to the river. Maybe farmers’ fields run off into the river. The problem is, I don’t know how to live life and NOT play outside in water.

If I was a child living in Nigeria and my mother forbid me to swim in the river because of the risk of perpetual illness from schistosomiasis, as mothers there do, I would swim in the river. There is no better place to play, and no better place to cool off. It is a sad state of Earth.

Here in the Eastern Townships of Quebec,

where the water is relatively clean and we have chlorinated swimming pools and air conditioning,

I like to play in the river.

We did not get a rash. We did not get parasites. We did not get sick.

The river is still a lovely place to be at the moment.