I've used this picture before, and have chosen to use it again. The reason is simple. This is one of my favorite spots on earth! (so far) This is home turf for me, not where I grew up but where I'm from. This is a lighthouse on the great inland sea, and you are looking toward Duluth Minnesota some four hundred miles west toward the setting sun. Behind you some fifteen miles is Whitefish point with all of its tourists and museum. Notice that there is no one in the pic. We, my wife and I and daughter had the beach to ourselves as far as the eye could see on this August day.
What you don't see is just beyond the lighthouse is a few driftwood logs washed up from some long ago storm or the winter ice cap. Upon one of the logs is a leather chair with the back legs broken off creating a slight reclining pose facing west to the setting sun. I have no idea who put the chair there but I know a bit of what they're thinking. To spend any day on Lake Superior is to commune with the raw power of god. To do so in isolation as can be done here is to recharge the soul. I like to look out at the water here knowing that I'm looking at a graveyard.
This is the shipwreck coast. I've always had an affinity with old graveyards, has something to do with respect for the past and its inhabitants. The person that put that chair on that log was watching the sun set on another perfect day and trying to drag every minute out of it. In the summer there it gets dark very late, about ten or later so there is lots of day to have. One might wonder why I've brought all of this up but there is a point. I have decided not to look west at the setting sun no matter how beautiful, and not to look out upon the past wrecks of many lives but to turn the chair! I have been blessed with a string of beautiful sunsets so long that I've forgotten how bright the dawn. Lets take a look.