Canoeing

I was told enthusiastically that I was going to get a “bang” out of canoeing. Bus #17, taking me to the canoe departure station seemed to be the sign of what was to come. The torn leather seats were stained with the sweat of the preceding passengers, and the ceiling was dripping some sort of repulsive green liquid. I slightly turned my head to the left to look at what was called a window. The grimy, translucent pane of glass was what I would call “near-opaque.” In a state of desperation, I looked at the frightened people adjacent to me. The thuds of their knuckle-cracking and foot-tapping was enough to feel like you were in a war zone. Suddenly, everyone and even the engine disappeared. The pale yellow bus came to a halt in front of what looked like a multitude of colors through the grimy window.

         Stepping into the blinding sunlight from the north, I brought my damp hand up to shade my eyes. The world faded in with breath-taking beauty. Trees of every color known to humankind enveloped me as light covers darkness. The dirt-ridden grass would normally have been unpleasing to the sight, but it complimented the light brown water of the wrap-around channel before me. Although, this only made itself present to  me as everyone else seemed to be too occupied with undertaking the job of snapping three latches together on a Type III life vest.

         At ease, I stepped into the six-foot long, forest green canoe with my paddle in hand and a river ahead. Pushing away from shore with the paddle, I glided through a cloud of water as smooth as glass but had to slow down to wait for the rest of the incompetents. Coasting along the right side, I decided that this would be a hundred times more enjoyable if I went ahead. The curving, sizable trees began to wrap over me as if in a dream. They seemed to cushion me as I took another long stroke through the river current. The river current was so slight that if I cosed my eyes, there was no current at all. Soaring through the hallway of trees one stroke at a time brought serenity and bliss over me. Peeking my eyelids open, I eared a section of trees above me where the trees parted to let through sunlight. The creation of this act of nature caused a glimmer to appear in the right corner of my eye. The light ricocheted off of the image of my sweaty forehead beneath the hazel water.

         My concentration was quite suddenly lost when a rough ball of packed dirt tumbled down the three-foot tall slope. A decently sized splash was made that, in return, produced an abundance of ripples, fluidly weaving around the canoe. The image of myself made in the water was distorted consequently of the ripples.

         With the river as my mirror, I noticed more deeply my physical features. My scanty chestnut beard had grown back over my chin and neck as I had not shaved in a while. My jaw was slightly unsymmetrical near my left side as it stuck out a very small bit. My hazel eyes were almost invisible in the water, and under my right eye were bags showing my poor sleeping schedule. A hole showed clearly through my hat as I could stick my thumb through it. Right under my hat, my arched eyebrows hung thick as ever. To the right of my eyebrows I observed my lengthy hair, chestnut and untidy.

         Snapping back into reality, the canoe was nearing a roaring sound of terror and a metal gate that read, “White Water Rafting, Do Not Enter.” The water level was normally high enough to bounce a canoe back into the river current. Although, today of all days had been the peak of a drought, and the water level was down far enough to allow me to enter. It didn't matter how much I pushed the paddle. I was going in. As fast as possible, I lunged upward and grasped the soggy square bar. My feet curved in under the bar of the canoe as my paddle was carried away by the fierce current. Just as my ankles began to give out, logic kicked in, and I realized that I got nowhere with this because the bar only went part of the way to the cliff, and then shot upward to another bar that connected with the cliff. My choices were either fall in, hang for dear life, or cower in a canoe.

         Obviously I picked the better of the three choices. I knelt down in the canoe and gripped both of the round bars on either side of me as tight as I could. The class three rapids knocked me to and fro all around the water. The only way to keep my balance was to shift my weight as the rapids came. Acting solely on instinct, I blasted down the river into a low pressure zone where the canoe rapidly flipped upside down, trapping me underwater. Thrashing violently I managed to rip my life vest free of the bar only to be thrusted downward into the dark abyss. I had no more oxygen and was once again forced to lash out destructively against the current. I broke the surface only to be looking backwards at my canoe sinking in the distance. Just as I pivoted around, an underwater rock slammed against my knee, causing me to yelp with pain. The edge of my toes brushed against another rock, and I was glad to have hauled up my leg.

         Some more rapids were approaching as I made an attempt to swim to shore, only I was too slow again. Still exhausted from the last venture, I was once again jerked underwater only to smash my skull against the boulder causing the rapids.

         Lethargically, I opened my eyes only to see a crowd a people hovering over me staring and murmuring. As I was sprawled out over a shallow pool of pebbles at the end of the river, I forcedly rose with great pain, and was attacked by paramedics. Maybe it was the drugs or just that tiny moment in my life where I had some Divine Intervention, but whether it be one or the other, I realized that even though my leg was broken, my arm was broken and my skull was cracked, the image of the serenity, tranquility and harmony of the river was the only thing I could accurately remember.