Something there is that loves a pond.  Henry David Thoreau found his transcendental inspiration at Walden Pond, contemplating its beauty and the meaning of life for two years, two months and two days.  Irish poet William Allingham, also moved by a pond, wrote: “Four ducks on a pond, / A grass-bank beyond, / A blue sky of spring, / White clouds on the wing: / What a little thing / To remember for years - / To remember with tears!”

There are hundreds of ponds in North Carolina, and one of them, a three-acre marvel, is in my backyard. I’m a city girl and have never lived on a pond before or even contemplated that one might be in my life someday.  Now that I live on one, it has become a living, breathing being to me, something that I consider every day, almost as if it were one of my children. 

The pond is a thing of rare beauty.  It is a deep emerald green, ringed with lush trees of every sort, and full of largemouth bass and the occasional turtle.  If there are snakes, they keep themselves scarce, something I’m very glad of.  Water lilies, wild iris, azaleas, beauty berries, rhododendrons, wild roses and other flowers I have yet to identify grow in happy profusion.  Dragonflies glide along the water’s edge while birds swoop and dart overhead.

Geese and ducks fly in and out of the pond, chasing one another in a noisy game of presumptive ownership.  The daily winners are, in turn, chased by our three Labs and one yapping Bichon, so that no one has yet to claim the pond as it’s own.  I am hoping for duck or geese babies someday, so I do hope that a brave pair will decide to stay, ignore the dogs and get down to business. 

My husband, daughter and I stroll with our dogs around the pond at least twice a day.  While the dogs sniff and hunt and burrow, we assess the pond.  Is the water level going down too precipitously considering our current drought?  Are our fish healthy and happy? (Yes, I know I said “happy.”  It’s a clear indication of my pond obsession.)   Are there too many aquatic plants and if so, how do we handle that little problem?   Should we plant wild rice around the shore to attract more waterfowl?  And, so on and so on.  I often scurry back to my computer to search for answers to these and dozens of other pond questions, grateful for the North Carolina State University Pond Management website. (Who knew there was a website devoted to this topic! But then again, I guess there is a website devoted to just about everything these days.)

As often as I can, I sit at then end of our dock and watch as wind moves over the pond like wind over a Kansas wheat field. The water ripples and sways, catches the light and then lets it go in an ever-moving dance.  Fish jump and frogs splash while bees and wasps drone through the wildflowers.  As dusk falls each evening, a small band of white tail dear steps out of the surrounding trees to drink and then flee at the smallest sound, tails up like white flags in the gathering dark. In the still of the night, the pond is pricked with the light of overhead stars.  We listen while frogs croak and call, and whippoorwills sing us to sleep.

The pond is so busy, so brimming with life, so endlessly fascinating that I cannot imagine ever living anywhere else.   When I do travel, I long to be home again, sitting on the dock with legs swinging and nothing much else on my mind save for the pond and its abundant life.  Believe me when I tell you that everyone should have a pond. It is the heart and soul of our little piece of North Carolina.

(To see images of our pond, just click on "The Pond" in the drop-down menu under Thoughts Along the Way.  Play the slideshow - it has some great music!)