The River: It should be called the Styx

The day that I took these photographs was a particularly happy, leasurely day, when we'd taken a trip to town.  Since then, The Husband tells me, he's thought of this fondly as "our" bridge.

Not any more.  Since last week, I have been thinking of these photographs and how the images they show, belie how life and peace can be shattered in an instant.

Bare banks  downstream whence the ever-so thirsty gums have been removed.

There is a deep, unfriendly algal world below.

Debris from past spates, hanging from the undercarriage and pillars of the bridge.

Valleys, plateaux and the odd, lazy fish and memories childhood weekends next to a friendly river are now marred because we now know that there is malevolance in those depths.

Last Thursday afternoon, someone we had just begun to get to know, started across the river, never to reach the other side.  A freak accident, coupled with the fact that the railing had not been repaired after a previous accident, resulted in her life ending in that river.

Crossing that bridge and looking at that deceivingly beautiful river, will for many who live in our village and beyond, never be the same again.

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