It’s been much longer than I intended to be away from this blog… but, intensions are are strange things. They are like promises nagging to be kept and I’ve decided to keep this promise to myself and resume this blog tonight with a simple evening tale.

Old and future new bridges span the Merrimack River

There’s an old metal bridge across the Merrimack River in Massachusetts… downriver from the towns of Haverhill and Lawrence and Lowell and a dozen other old mill towns whose power source was the river itself. The old Bates Bridge is being replaced by a new concrete structure and an arched design of the kind that says ‘modern’ and ‘up-to-date’ in the same way that the old flat metal design says ‘out-dated’… it’s faded green paint and growing rust a temptation for macro-grunge lovers like me. I was hoping to get to the bridge sooner but it was after 4 in the afternoon and the dark shadows of a winter’s afternoon are not the best time for that kind of photography.

The ice breaker on the river.

So, as I drove away along the south side of the river, I noticed that the river was clogged with ice from the recent cold temperatures and covered with the heavy snowfall of the weekend ‘Nemo’ storm. I stopped to capture an image or two of the ice and the construction site under the two side by side bridges. I began to wonder if the amount of ice and the forces it could bear on the barges holding 3 enormous cranes for the construction companies could be a potential problem… when a strange craft came from under the bridges and proceded to push the ice around. As it did, the floes drifted away from the big ice pack and floated harmlessly down the river past the barges. An Ice-breaker! Round and round it went clearing the ice from the river while comuters traveled across the old Bates Bridge north and south… home from work to Haverhill or Groveland on either side… oblivious to the work going on below on the river.

The ice yields to this quiet but forceful pressure.

The open river but for ice near the shores.

It was so quiet from where I stood. Only the sound of the boat to break the stillness of a quiet New England scene. In the opposite direction… a promise of a sunset to come… but, I couldn’t wait. Another time, another sunset on the Merrimack.

Looking upriver, the scene is shadowed by the anticipated sunset.