The River Took My Pants Off

We went up to Cadillac for the weekend recently. Jono's parents are Boat People, in a paddleboat/canoe/kayak sort of way, and we get to enjoy their little water crafts whenever we go up there. Perks!

I used to work at an outdoor sporting store, and besides getting to hear Gear Heads talk about all their camping and hiking doo-dads, I also got to take some of the rental kayaks out on the river for free. Our river of choice - The Grand - is about as wide and tame as a four-lane highway, so I basically learned how to paddle a kayak forward, but would've had no idea what to do if I'd actually been required to paddle around a stationery object. My main memory of the old Grand involves chilling with some river people on a sand bar sipping some very bad beer with one of my co-workers.

So anyway... the other day Jono's step-mom offered to watch Jude while Jono, Dad K. and I kayaked down the Little Manistee River. For the first few minutes things seemed peaceful, but then the river got a little fast. I usually had a half-second to think about what to do before being propelled into every other mess of branches we came across. By the end I had flipped my boat three times. I had a cloud of smoke over my head like in the comics. (See "me on the slip n' slide at age 10" -- physical challenges tend to tick me off).

One of those times was because four guys with a canoe were blocking a three-foot area that was the only route around a fallen tree. I fell out (of course) and got dragged under the tree trunk by the current. I grabbed a branch and kept my head above water, but meanwhile the river was pulling my pants off. The four guys were standing on the shore watching. Jono had to come over and pull me out. My pants were still on about halfway, so at least my dignity was preserved. Ha.


There were also spiders in my boat with me. This was not okay. I tried to multi-task by keeping track of where each one of them was while also avoiding the fallen trees and such, but I'm not really so good at multi-tasking, especially when I'm terrified.

I wish I was more of a hard-ass with eight-legged creatures, but no. I flip out. It goes back to watching Kingdom of the Spiders at my grandma's house when I was five, which was a made-for-TV movie about thousands of tarantulas overtaking a small midwest town and killing everyone in it with their poison. After that I was never afraid of monsters under the bed. Just spiders. I ended up going aground early on and made Jono get them out for me. Wimp. (I don't care. Just get them away from me.)

But... finally, about halfway through I started feeling like I knew what I was doing. Kind of. I learned to "reverse paddle" when I needed to, and to predict what a certain kind of current would do to my kayak, and how I should paddle accordingly. I started the trip out annoyed at my lack of skill, but then it got fun. I noticed how pretty it was out there, and I could take a deep breath and admire the huge salmon the fishermen were catching as we passed. It was great. And I felt rather accomplished when we reached the take-out point. And also soggy.

Thanks Dad and Jan. I look forward to many more rivers to come. But maybe once in awhile we can just do a peaceful one. Right?

We're about to leave on vacation to Washington, and this includes a hiatus from the bloggy. See you on the other side :)