A few weeks ago, I visited the new Laconia Plaza, a stone amphitheater tucked into the eastern shoreline of the Saco River on the Biddeford side. I’d seen the social media posts and the video footage, all of which were impressive. But it wasn’t until I actually stood on the lowest level of the plaza and experienced the full brunt of the river’s power that I was able to appreciate the amazing element that is water.

From any angle facing the dam, the energy being produced as the Saco crashes down over those stones and concrete diverters is awesome. But facing it dead-on, with old mill buildings providing a very relevant framework around the image of all those millions of gallons of water roiling toward the sea defies description. In short, you have to go there and stand in front of it to know what I’m talking about. For there are no words even capable of capturing all that is happening there, especially at the height of the spring runoff.

The first time I viewed the falls  was a few months ago, from the still relatively new and very impressive Riverwalk foot bridge that connects the twin cities just feet above the rushing river. From there, I was able to get a three-quarter view of the water which was tumbling at top speed that day. I was able to get closer to the falls by walking up the paved roadway that winds around behind the Saco Island Condo building, but the view up there was spoiled by the obligatory chain link fence to keep curious onlookers such as myself safe in the face of such terrible power. A sign on the fence there warns of “Certain Death” should anyone dare to defy the odds, and with perfectly good reason.

Any form that water takes, be it ocean, lake, or river, illustrates one of nature’s most powerful mediums. More than any other element in nature, water is eternal in that nothing that exists could without it. Even if we wanted to or were able to subsist without it, there is no getting away from H-2-O, for it plays a crucial role in all forms of life as we know them. Plant, animal, human…none of it would be possible without water, the one thing that runs through us all and that connects us all as the things that live on this planet. The earth itself spins through the cosmos enclosed in an outer layer of moisture that we perceive as clouds most days and as rain or snow at other times, and the relative humidity that meteorologists go on about reflects how much water is present in the very air we breathe.

As a symbolic motif, water figures in the belief systems of many religions, from the actual worship of sacred rivers to the widespread belief that it can purify not only our bodies but our souls as well. The very thing that gushes from our faucets, that we buy in plastic jugs at the supermarket, that emerges from springs high in the mountains, that floods streets in the spring and propels surfers toward the shore in summer is what made my view of those rapids possible.

I stood there that day on the plaza, feeling the river’s spray as it crashed and boiled and raced, each molecule trying to outdo the other, toward the calmer area downriver just past the foot bridge. I’ve lost count of how often I’ve driven across the bridge in my lifetime and marveled at how the river’s mood shifts rapidly from enraged to calm in not that many feet, from thrashing and frothing on one end to calm and mirror-like on the other. It’s almost like the water knows that it has yet to meet an even greater force and humbles itself along that part of its journey before it is subsumed by the sea itself.

Whether it is coursing through the earth’s trillions of capillaries, bursting from the tips of maple leaves, crashing against the rocks at Biddeford Pool, sloshing against the walls of swimming pools, getting our clothes clean, or moistening our parches throats after a hike, there really is no facet of our lives in which water does not play a role. I am reminded of when, not that many years ago, I was left without power for an entire week, which meant no lights, no refrigeration, and no water. I subsisted that whole week on the water I was able to lug home from the store in plastic jugs. That brought home to me in a very real way the irony of such a ubiquitous element being at times in such short supply and just how precious a commodity it is.

That said, I’m watching dark gray rain clouds move in from the west as I write. I think I’ll ensconce myself near a window and watch the show. Which reminds me of yet another thing I love about water…the sound it makes when it’s hitting the roof during a storm…