We arrive at Jack London Aquatic Center. It’s 5:15 in the morning. The darkness on the estuary envelops everything. Any light that happens to shine on the estuary is absorbed into the darkness, mangled until all that remains is a faint twinkle. The cold is piercing. It penetrates everything. Only its temperature makes itself known. It has no scent, no feel, no taste other than cold. It burns the nostrils but leaves but no smell is detectable. The cold in combination with the darkness makes the estuary sterile. The senses can only perceive two things, cold and darkness, there is no other stimuli to taint one’s perception. The estuary is cold and dark; nothing could be cleaner.
The water is perfect. It sits still as if it were glass. Any attempt to disturb it would be futile. Flesh, metal, stone, all break on the surface of the flat water. They are absorbed never causing a ripple. The darkness of the sky is reflected in the flat water. The estuary is a dark impenetrable abyss. It swallows all light and movement, leaving only a void in which nearly everything is lost.
Once on the water, little to nothing can be seen or sensed. Only what is in or on the estuary exists. Only water and boats can escape the destructive force of the void. Light, sound smell- everything but water and boats is sucked into it, reduced to nothing observable.
There are all types of boats on the water. Paddleboats to supper tankers, all are represented. Most of the boats stand in their slips, docile and sleeping. A couple prowl the channel, groggy and constrained.
To start out on our morning adventure, we row across the estuary to the Alameda side. We head southeast along an endless line of marinas. In the marinas innumerable personal yachts and pleasure crafts sit. These boats are in a deep sleep unable to be wakened from. They boats are like children; well loved by their owners and unthreatening to others. The paint is well maintained, the sails are neatly folded and are not in the least bit intimidating. These boats show pieces for there owners, they serve no point other than exhibition.
We spin the boats around. Immediately it is clear we have entered into a more dangerous territory. The ships on the Oakland side are big, working vessels. We have entered into a den of sleeping lions. The ships, unmoving and unmanned, remain at rest for the time being, but could
spring to life at any minute. As we row by three big Coast Guard Cutters, we are careful not to wake them. A tugboat appears out of the darkness. All that can really be seen of the tug is 
its three lights stacked vertically, one on top of another. We make special care not to disturb it, for it is sleepwalking. It moves in silence, and hardly produces a wake. I fear if we were to disturb it, life would pump through its motor and the destruction it would deliver to our boats would be devastating.
We reach the cranes at the northwest end of the estuary. These are giant bird like structures. They stand firmly on the shore but allow their heads to peak out over the water. A couple of these cranes are feeding some sleeping tankers. Lowering their heads they regurgitate big metal boxes directly into the belly of the sleeping tankers.
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Again we spin the boats. This time we set a course for home through the middle of the channel. The sun is beginning to make an appearance. The cold and dark disappear. The light destroys the illusion of a sanitary environment instantaneously. Now there is no way to hide the ugliness from the senses.
The sun illuminates the water’s true nature. It is a putrid green, filled with haze and debris. There are patches of dark brown sludge, and an infinite amount of sticks and twigs floating on the surface. A wind has also started to blow. It has managed to break the impenetrable surface of the water. Now the water’s surface resembles that of a heavily used public swimming pool. Every now and again the unorganized slosh of the waves will align and a murky green growth will scale the gunnels and flood in.
Once back on land, any remaining semblance of cleanliness is destroyed. The darkness and cold that were able to cleanse and hide the ugliness of the estuary are gone. The sun baths the estuary in filth. Trash litters the shore. Fast food wrappers, unwanted furniture, and anything else tha
t belongs in a dump or trashcan, makes an appearance on the shore. Mounds of filthy cloth appear on the ground. They are nests belonging to the homeless and crazy. What is not covered in trash or the grunge of the homeless is coated by a combination of dirt and animal feces. The whole place is in need of a street sweeper and a good rain.
With the heat comes a smell. Rancid and offensive. The estuary is the only place capable of possessing this scent. It is a growing scent; it builds up in the head until it becomes unbearable. There is no habituation to this odor either. Every movement subjects the nostrils to a new foulness. The only escape possible is into the stench of ones own sweaty cloths.
With the light the ships come to life. The bugler for the Coast Guard notifies all that the peaceful quiet is gone. The sound of ship motors and heavily trafficked freeways fill the air. This noise is an overwhelming contaminating one. Even shouts from the megaphone are made inaudible by the noise of the daily hustle.
With the sun, that which was pristine, unscented and quiet in the dark becomes an overpowering filth. The dirt of the estuary wakes up with the sun. Dirty, smelly, noisy and generally unpleasant, is the only way it can be seen. The estuary drives people away when there is light, not even boaters can stand it in the day, they stay around long enough to board and launch and don’t come back till the sun has set. It is a nocturnal place, only showing itself in the dark. During the day it does its best to drive people away.
The author's narrative on the Oakland Estuary provides a evanescent feel of the the field location. The mood of the scene shifts throughout the passage, lending the text a temporal axis that the author explores with his vivid imagery. The author's tone however is not panicked, but emotional and reverent. The constant repetition of cold and darkness in the first paragraph invokes the feel of a social fallout. The whole scene is blurred by darkness, and viewed from the coldness of the estuary. As the readers, we cannot make out any details but the general description of the feel of the view from a boat.
ReplyDeleteThe author uses personification constantly throughout the passage to give life to the boats. When juxtaposed against the rest of the deadened landscape of the the waterfront, the boats are crafted to be malignant and alive. The author's choice in visuals for the narrative supports the vision of monstrosity. His pictures are not scanned in or taken with a camera, but rather photos of hand-sketched images. The shaky blurry images lends an nightmarish presence to the dock and the ships, creating shadows that wander in the cold nights of the docks.
When the green tinted day arrives, the feeling of the narrative explodes into a putrid recollection of what the sun has revealed. The feeling shifts from a silent blue/black into a edged yellow/green. The growing sensory noise of the the estuary creates a violent shift in the feel of the place. The author ends his report on the awakening of the place, perhaps reenforcing even more the fact that no one would ever want to be near the estuary during the day.
The narrative very much relates to De Certeau's “Walking in the City.” The excursion out into the estuary in the night is akin to an overlooking view, unencumbered by details, only seeing a macroscopic view of the area. However, when the sunrises and he returns to the closeness of society, all the unpleasantness of the area assaults him again. There is a clear dichotomy here that author and De Certeau's asserts. Looking from afar and looking at details can bring up two very different images of the same place.