My last article/poem (Predilection) was a little mysterious. I gave a hint that those who knew my predilection would be able to figure it out, but I haven't made very clear what it is. I have been sprinkling in references to water in my poetry for some months, but I've come to the point in my life where I'm ready to try again to openly translate my passion for water in words.
I begin with this idea: no matter how fascinating you find life or how much you already love water, you probably would be far more enchanted with it if you knew just a little more about it. If you had the chance to understand a little more of its nature, or to train your eyes to recognize how it works, you would be as fascinated as the kids I've taken on vortex hikes.
It was this past summer that I returned for a visit to Nature Camp, near Lexington in Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains. Since 1944, this unique summer camp has trained kids in natural sciences and impelled many of them to go on to scientific careers. I was a camper there in the 1970s, and a limnology instructor, head counselor of boys and finally the camp cook. But I didn't know that much about water then. It was so much fun to go back to the stream I used to teach on and help kids see the mysterious, flowing side of water. It only took a few moments before they were off searching for tiny chains of vortices or that rare phenomenon, a continuous, standing vortex.
Water is attracted to itself by a phenomenon known as hydrogen bonding. It's what keeps this substance (composed of two gases) from flying off into space. It creates surface tension so that some insects can glide over the top and the same feature creates layers within any sort of flowing water. Those layers allow water to take circular shapes like waves, drops and vortexes, and water always seeks to flow in circular shapes. It always seeks to spin.
Those shaped layers conceal something which is beyond the reach of our eyes, an internal liquid crystal structure, and that structure matters. But I may already have given you more information about water than you can drink in for now. And so I will turn this over to water.
If you will follow this link, you will see a short video which illustrates the complex and precise movement of layers of water. Stick with it and you will see tiny chains of vortices traveling across the frame like water bugs. And you may begin to sense that you've been missing out on liquid knowledge.
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Comments: 28
You articulate this lesson very well.
I hope you get into waves next?! I love the circular movement of waves, and to think, the water is actually circling in the opposite direction we initially would guess.
Thank you, Gerry.
(And did you see Jonathon Coleman's wetlands restoration article?)
Dannielle--I have so much more to say about water that you might not believe it. If I communicate even a bit about how tantalizing it is to me, then I've succeeded. The problem could become getting me off the topic before I bore my readers. Thank you for reading this and watching the video. I did see Jonathon's article--good work being done. Which reminds me of the bad things happening to water where those mountaintops are being destroyed that you wrote about, not to mention the land it flows through.
Charlotte--even though I don't have the scientific depth I'd like to have in studying water, I've learned that an observant person can learn a great deal without the college courses, which don't really get into water's nature enough anyhow. I appreciate your interest!
Sam--thank you for stopping by. I hope you continue to follow the flow here because it is going to cross paths with your interests soon.
John--you are so right--I've been saving this behind an obstruction for a long time.
Amy--With your poetic powers, I'm going to be anxious to see how you structure writing around the structure hidden in water.
Beryl--If you can brave the cold sometime this fall to nab some pictures of that phenomenon, I would love to see them. It's on my list of water I'd like to see!
I'm off to see the video now.
There are some Scandinavian water purification and energization devices that work with whirling/vertexing tap water through loops of pipe......
You make your passion for water a scientific poetry for us. Interesting things to learn and realize that what I have seen so often has an answer. This is something I will share with my children.
Thank you for this new discovery--WHY water doesn't fly off into space!
I am afraid of flowing water. When I was quite young, someone tested out the theory of sink or swim using me!!! And I sunk!!!! And had to be retrieved and revived. If I ever venture very close I will certainly look for this phenomenon.
I´ve read about hydrogen bonding before years ago in an article on natural world phenomena but it really takes someone such as yourself who is absolutely geared on a subject to make it come to life for a person who is just shown a lot of arrows and a flow chart.