The first modern print report of a sighting of the Loch Ness monster was published on this day in 1933 in the Inverness Courier. The creature had long been a local legend, dating back as far as the Sixth Century. The publication of a photograph, a year later fueled the legend and boosted local tourism, though it was later deemed a fraud – the photo but not necessarily the legend.
I’ve driven down the coast of Loch Ness, and though I never saw any monster, plenty of tour boats were in evidence in the otherwise placid scene, prompting me to wonder if perhaps we were the true monster. Eventually, the thought led to this prose poem:
A Reflection
“The important thing is that I believe in myself.”
Unknown
First of all, I’m not a monster. It’s just you haven’t see the likes of me for longer than you measure time and to tell the truth it’s even been long for me. And while that makes me a bit lonely, I’ve grown used to it after a few of your millennia. I’ll have you know, I swam to these waters long ago and liked it enough to stay, which is a good thing since there seems no way out for now. I may well be the last of my kind, but I’ll have to wait for the waters here to rise again to learn.
I know that may seem long to you, who live and breed like fruit flies. But to me time matters little, having seen the land rise from the seas that were my home and even some stars come and go, as I expect in time will you. When that comes and you go, it should be peaceful again without your boats and tour guides that tell their tales of sightings as if I can’t hear them or simply don’t care.
The truth is though I once found your company comforting in a way, scurrying along this lake’s long shoreline and fishing above me. Only now I hear the constant heartbeat of your motors running up and down my home in search of me, all the while believing I’m a myth; only I’m not.
I sense now in the warmth of the air and this water that perhaps it is you who may soon be the stuff of myth, and one thing I can do well is to wait. If that makes of me a monster to you, perhaps you should stop your useless searching for me and look into your own reflection in the waters above me.
When all is said, I suppose Nessie may have the last word.
