DO YOU BELIEVE IN DRAGONS part 4

Do You Believe In Dragons   Part 4

I have spent hours upon hours reading articles and documentation of various sightings of these creatures.  I scoffed at some, actually most of them at first, taking these stories in stride and considering them Folk Lore, or just imaginary tales, all fiction, hoaxes, sometimes making a comment about what those folks might have been drinking or smoking at the time.  I didn’t really believe their stories, but I didn’t quite disbelieve them either.  There was that nagging thought, that slim possibility that there might be some truth to it. (After all I was already acquainted with Cosmos and Quinnie if I didn’t just imagine the whole thing.)

It was in 1975 that I saw something that struck me as unusual, strange and it has stuck with me ever since, I can’t shake it, forget it but I am not absolutely certain what it was I actually saw.  I’ve thought about and pondered this experience often.  I sketched it.  I wrote a poem about it. I made detailed journal notes.  By 1975,  I am all grown up and have children of my own.  I’m well educated.  I don’t indulge in alcohol or drugs.  I am a respected member of my community.  All this aside, I saw something out there I cannot explain nor has anyone ever been able to explain it to me. 

What I do know and have confirmed is that there were no barges, freighters, large boats on the lake that night that might have had booms on them that I would have mistaken for something else through the fog.  There is no record of any such thing being there at that location on the lake on the night in question.  Whatever it was, it was moving against the current not with it so it was not a log or some other large, inanimate object.  Whatever it was, it was alive and it was very large and it wasn’t a barge, a ferry, the Coast Guard, or a cruise boat showing tourist the lake by night, of that I am quite certain. 

MAYBE IT WAS CHAMP

It was the wee hours of the morning.

For some reason I couldn’t sleep.

We were camping and I slipped out

To walk along the beach.

Fog rolled across the water.

It was difficult to see

That creature that was out there

In the lake, there in the deep

Moving against the current,

Its secret the fog would keep…

But I saw it, yes, I saw it,

Something in the fog and damp

And I wondered, still I wonder,

Could that something have been Champ?

Stories about a great lake monster in Lake Champlain between Vermont and New York have been circulating for hundreds, maybe even thousands of years.  Indigenous Native Americans have been passing down tales of this great lake monster, a huge lizard like creature for probably since they began inhabiting the region.  There have been hundreds of sightings including one that I may have seen but I cannot say with any certainty that what I saw one night in 1975 was indeed the famous lake monster of Lake Champlain but with all certainty, I did see something out there in the water through the fog and mist.  I would like to believe that Champ is real and really does exist and that he is harmless and a wonder to behold.  If so, why can’t we find him with all our modern-day technology?  Is he really able to be that elusive?  Someday I hope we will actually find proof one way or the other.  Champ, real or no more than legend and lore, is by law, in both Vermont and New York, a protected species.  Apparently, there are enough people who believe Champ to be real and there have been enough probable sightings so our legislatures decided it was wise to make a law to protect Champ from harm whether or not he is real or just a wonderful legend.  I’ve seen pictures that I am reasonably sure were photo-shopped but on the other hand, I’ve heard the stories and seen other evidence that seem to prove that there really is something out there in the depths of Lake Champlain.  We may never know but one thing is certain, someone or maybe several people perhaps a thousand years ago saw something and told the story or the story wouldn’t be.  Like all folk lore, it probably has been embellished to make it more interesting, more exciting.  Who knows?  What I do know, is I saw something that closely resembled the descriptions I had heard of a great lake monster out there, that night in 1975 through the fog and mist but what I saw, I don’t know with any certainty.