Spring on the North Fork Touchet River

by Steve Henderson

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Price

$1,150

Dimensions

12.000 x 12.000 inches

Title

Spring on the North Fork Touchet River

Artist

Steve Henderson

Medium

Painting - Oil On Panel

Description

It’s just a little river, and one that people mis-pronounce all the time:

Around here, we say TOO-shee, as opposed to Too-SHAY, because the people who named it, whoever they were, must not have been conversant in French.

But it is a determined little river, flowing through the meadows and fields, past farmlands and ranch houses of an eastern Washington valley until it meets up with the South Touchet (still TOO-shee) river and then through the little town of Dayton and onto Walla Walla (yes, there really is a town of that name) where it flows into the Walla Walla River.

Most of the year it is a peaceful little stream, its sparkling blue water flowing gently through its landscape. Standing along its banks one enjoys the happy burble; if you’re quiet enough when you approach it you may even surprise wildlife: deer, otters, a magnificent bull elk.

And then, every many years or so, there comes a spring thaw after an especially grand snow season, and the little Touchet transforms – overnight – into a raging, roaring, churning, brown deluge of angry water, rising up against its banks in a determined effort to flood the land about it, to change its course from what it has been, to assert that, though it may seem to be a tiny little river, it has the potential to be very impacting indeed.

But not today. Not on this quiet spring day when the new growth of grass and leaves is verdant, when the sun shining on the water’s surface brings out that sparkling blue. And the artwork, Spring on the North Fork Touchet River, invites you to put the cell phone someplace safe, step through the trees and foliage, and spend a little time at the edge of this little, frequently mis-prounounced, but very determined little river.

Uploaded

December 6th, 2024

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