December 26th - by Andrew Gary Baker

December 26 was yet another joyous celebration of life (oh, and Nicole Palazzolo's birthday!) at Devil's Pool. Nicole, Becca, Roddy and myself frolicked gleefully upon the rocks and (quite obviously) in the pool below. Nicole and Becca both made their second trek to Devil's Pool this December, which should encourage those of you who question just how awesome the Devils Pool experience is in December.

While I have the opportunity, I want to accept Rodman's offer to answer Terry Thompson's question concerning whether God knows about Devil's Pool.

I'm not going to give a theistic nor an atheistic traditional answer. Beliefs can have a tendency to be somewhat limiting and I'm choosing to suspend belief and disbelief for the sake of maintaining an open mind. What is important to realize is that Devil's Pool is a wonderland for us mortals. The beauty of Devil's Pool reaches a crescendo with the understanding that we are creatures destined to die in a creation which is itself fleeting. As much as we may like to stress our self-importance with thoughts of our past and of our future, these self-aggrandizing misconceptions are largely fiction. Yesterday is a memory, tomorrow never comes. We have the present moment alone, all else only theoretically. In the words of Achilles, "Every moment is precious because we are doomed. You will never be more beautiful than you are now." So, I'm sorry to skirt around the question like Sarah Palin but the answer is inconsequential because the sanctuary of Devils Pool Terry, is for us mortals.

Some photos from the day:













Thanks so much to Christine Hennessey for taking such great footage for us. You are awesome!!!!

December 24th -- A little chilly

Just Andrew and I today...sans camera. (And although we do enjoy the group days, sometimes it is nice to get back to just being "two buds")

After a few days of temperatures that dropped to around 18 degrees in the evening here in Philadelphia, the weather warmed up a bit (Unfortunately we had not been able to get to the pool during those really cold days due to outside commitments). We were expecting the pool to be frozen over. To our surprise it was not...just a small frozen layer in the shallow end.

So, with the water extra cold we both jumped in and really enjoyed ourselves. The feeling you get after jumping into ice cold water can only be described by experiencing it. It transcends blogging...it transcends prose...it may even transcend the finest poetry ever written (ie: "The scent of these armpits is aroma finer than prayer" [Walt Whitman, Song of Myself]).

Hence, we will move on and answer another Devil's Pool question:

QUESTION

Terry Thompson from Philadelphia: "Does God know about Devil's Pool, and if so, what are his/her thoughts on it?"

ANSWER

Well Terry, considering that I do not believe in God, I will have to let Andrew get back to you on this question...however, in the event that I am wrong (which I quite often am) I will surmise what God, if such a divine being existed, might think about Devil's Pool considering that theoretically God knows and created everything and thus is well aware of Devil's Pool and is also aware of the blog "Devil's Pool is Really Cool."

God thinks that Devil's Pool is totally awesome!!! God went through a brief phase of almost exclusively ice swimming about 10,000 years ago. During what we call "The Ice Age." Since then he sometimes goes North for a dip during the Winter in places like Greenland, and South during the Summer to his outpost home on Antarctica. He has been plunging into cold water and creating beautiful places to do it for approximately 4.6 billions years!

Between 450 and 350 million years ago God said, "Hey, I want a really sweet place to cliff jump near the Wissahickon River (of course it was not called the Wissahickon back then, maybe He called it "The Semi Muddy Slowmoving River") that isn't as dirty as the Wissahickon."

He then worked his magic on the rock in the area and POOF!!! Devil's Pool was ready to be filled. I am sure it took a few days for the water to rise, but when it did, God was might pleased with his handiwork. I am sure that he/she/it still feels the same today. Sometimes I even think he smiles down on us with a beam of sunlight just at the right moment as we glide through the air...as in the photo below:



So, the moral of my surmise is that God loves Devil's Pool and if you want God to smile on you, then you should come jump in with us. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah, and a Killer Kwanza.