I sat with my sister on the course bank of the Shoalhaven River. Tracking mildly and darkened now by rain-driven particulates, I thought about the perennial stretch. This was our second visit to the bend in the day. The first we swam till the thunderstorm came over, but, nearing calm dusk, we now looked for platypus. Beginning south of Braidwood, the Shoalhaven eventually meets the Pacific Ocean east of Nowra at two points (one permanent and one intermittent) - a 327 km passage. Raincoated, we settled on a blue beach towel dimpled by the wet sand under. We considered the adjacent remains of bowed, hung and tented matter delivered downstream by past and powerful flooding unto the feet of gum tree recipients. I unfolded my plain cotton fat quarter, cloaked a small square of river, waited, took a photo, stepped, took another, retrieved the christened fabric. I set it to dry on a concrete rest-area platform back at camp and wondered what kind of remains existed now in the cloth, if only the memories of the action.