Bali Ha’i will whisper / In the wind of the sea:

“Here am I, your special island! / Come to me, come to me!”

Your own special hopes / Your own special dreams,

Bloom on the hillside / And shine in the streams.

If you try, you’ll find me / Where the sky meets the sea.

“Here am I your special island / Come to me, Come to me.”

-- South Pacific, Bali Ha‘i

There is a small island on a Minnesota lake, scattered with pine needles and shaded by gnarled old trees. The sun dapples it with gilded patches and highlights its beauty. Brilliant sapphire water laps up the edges of its sloping sides and whispers secrets to the earth of the island. Some give it no name at all. Others call it Eagle Island, for that name was given it when my family purchased it some years ago. But I call it Bali Ha’i because it is my special island.

Many of my fondest memories hover in the mist above the island. On warm summer evenings my sister, my parents and I would pile into one of our several canoes and paddle around Bali Ha’i. Sometimes we would beach the canoe and romp across the grassy knoll within Bali Ha’i’s tree cover. Other times we would leave earlier and eat supper cooked over a campfire and swim in the shallow, gold-flecked waters around the island.

When ice and snow covered Grand Lake and even the least adventurous of ice fishermen deemed it safe to erect their ice shanties, we would load our bright orange sled and trek out to Bali Ha’i. The steepest of the island’s slopes made a perfect sledding hill. Besides, a warm campfire with roasted hot dogs and marshmallows was an enticing treat after the one-fourth mile walk to Bali Ha’i. (Though, when the island is in the throes of a northern Minnesota winter, even I wonder at my sanity in naming it Bali Ha’i.)

Bali Ha’i is an outdoor refuge for me, and always has been. It is encircled by a ring of giant trees, and when I am there I am hidden from view. My main complaint with most outdoor areas is that I feel exposed. When I am on Bali Ha’i, I feel as though I am wrapped in the protecting arms of God. If I did not have Bali Ha’i, I would likely spend my time indoors, where I feel as though no one is watching me. Bali Ha’i serves as a link between my world and the wilderness. As nations reserve wild places, my family has preserved this small speck of wild as a refuge. When I am on the island, I find myself desiring to see other people’s wild places and to nurture them as I do Bali Ha’i.

I have planted and babied the infant trees on Bali Ha’i in hopes that future generations will enjoy their shade and birds will continue to nest in their branches. Because of lightning strikes, many of the old trees which I have climbed and slept beneath are dying. But someday the baby trees that my family and I have planted will rise up to take their place. Already the maple tree flames in the fall to take away our breath with its beauty, and the pines grow taller and stronger each year.

Bali Ha’i calls to me. It is there where the sunset sky meets the sea — though Grand Lake may hardly be called an ocean — and it calls ‘come to me, come to me. . .‘. I will go. I will watch the eagles soar, their wings turned to copper by the sun. . . beauty untold lies as in a dragon’s lair. It waits for me. Farewell . . . farewell . . . now I go to Bali Ha’i.