The Current Take Me Too

The airmattress was deflated when I woke up. There was some punkass kid walking around with a fucking bell ringing it and telling everyone it was time to wake up. He walked by every single person's tent, I'm sure, and he loved every minute of it. I opened my eyes to the sound of the bell and I could tell that the sun wasn't even up yet. 6am the board had said and it was no joke.

"Wake uuup! ~ringring ringring~ Get your stuff together and get it in the trucks. Clean up your site and get ready for breakfast. Waaaake uppp! ~ringring ringring~ Hey you guys wake up you were looouud last night."

He was talking to us. Just for that comment I rolled back over till he came around again. No one else in the camp had moved, either. Finally I roused and so did James and we set about cleaning up the shitpile we had created around the campchairs the night before. The sun sets and people get drunk and everything goes to pot. But the beautiful thing is we just sort it out and clean it all up and together it takes moments at best.

Coffee was on where they had served us food and played horrible dance music the night before. It had been a combination of new hip-hop and oldies rock and roll. Steve Miller and shit. Joan Jett. On the picnic tables they had water brewing, instant coffee and hot chocolate. It was still chilly so the warm liquids felt good.

I chuckled to myself when I thought of the controvery the night before and how it had all come to a head with the lameass guitar solo by that dickhead who stole our inflatable guitar. We had this pink inflatable guitar that had made it through a few parties, including my recent bachelor party. It was an obvious choice to bring on the river, the only problem was, of course, the rapids. It moved from raft to raft for a while, but then it was lost to the river. We figured someone coming up behind us would find it and back at camp whoever it was would battle us in a good-spirited air guitar battle for possession of the toy. But unfortunately, the people that found it were a bunch of shitheads. People in our group tried talking to them about it, making it fun, but they would have none of it. It was finders keepers to them and that was that. At one point during the danceparty later on that evening, one of the kids got up on a table and played along to a Joan Jett song. It was pathetic and boring. The Gil would have crushed him had he been around. No matter, I thought as I assembled my breakfast burrito (they cooked eggs, potatoes, had guac and salsa, some tabasco, sour cream and quesa-dillas we could toast on the grill).

But, what I had to focus on was not getting hurt on the river that day. People had been banged up the day before! I couldn't head into my wedding with bruises or breaks or anything like that. Paddle through, paddle through.

We broke camp, loaded our stuff up into the moving trucks and waited in bunches at the doors of the eight blue and white school buses. The sun was just coming up, but it rose into low clouds or high fog. We boarded the buses and had a 40 minute ride ahead of us. We had no idea what we were in for.

The bus went through the river and over the hills until we found the mountain. Then it started going up. I was in the back seat. That morning I had consumed some OJ, some Bloody M., some eggs and sour cream, and definitely 2 cups of coffee. I was in the back seat. And up we went. A dirtroad switch back up the mountain and I know the guy at the wheel had something to prove. He never looked at the rearview mirror and he never got us more than three feet from the steep edge, but he never tried to take it easy, either. Up and up we went, around hairpins, then another, then up again some more until the road we had come up was a ribbon of brown in the greenery below. And the river we had ridden was but a sliver of blue at the bottom of steep, steep slopes. And up we went, fishtailing around the corners as we shouted and laughed in the back like a bagful of monkeys. The Big L. showed up and demanded his Johnson back. Donnie was told, repeatedly, that he was out of his fucking element. I gripped the window as though that was safe, and together Jen and I plotted at how we would take out the guitar pirates we knew would be on the river that day. And still, we went up. Then finally we hit a peak, but it wasn't over yet. Oh no. There was still a razortopped ridge to cross that we traversed at top speed while all around in every direction mountains cut sharply into the endless, gray expanse. The sun was hidden and the entire sky was suffused with light.

Finally we made it to the dropoff point. Warnings, instructions and pointers were handed out as we found our rafts and hit the river. These were slightly smaller than the ones the day before, and no where near as nice. Ours, in fact, sucked, but Heather and I forged on. I complained about the fact that the self bailing wasn't working and that the back rest was fucked up, but I really really tried not to. It wasn't as much fun having a raft that kinda sucked. But eventually I sucked it up. Having the sun come out halfway down was a huge help. When everyone had gathered for lunch on one of the shores there had been a lot of chilly people.

All weekend Heather and I had managed to stay upright and afloat. But on that second day we became the Soggy Bottom Rattlers. Soggy bottom 'cause that's what the boat was giving me, and Rattlers because just as Heather was setting up her tent, the night before, a guy found a baby rattlesnake right near her stuff. A capsize was inevitable.

We were taking it more easy on this second day. And the river itself was not nearly as treacherous. We created some large floatillas by all holding on together and floating blissfully along, but during the rapid parts things didn't go as well. The first time, the raft on the outside was crushed into the brush. The next time we almost didn't get past some people hung up in the middle on a large rock. The third rapid, though, was the charm. Four rafts together all in a floatilla, but then we broke away as the rapids approached. Not soon enough, though. It's much better to be all by yourself in the rapids because with others around, they get you all tied up. And that's exactly what happened. The water pushed us together, and then heaved us at the turn where some other people in a three-man raft were already pinned against the bank. We clogged up, but the water didn't stop. 3 of our rafts filled up fast and then dumped us over. I felt myself get consumed between the raft I was in and the one next to me and then I was under water. I didn't let go of my paddle, though. Chaos reigned. The water was moving fast but I remembered what I was supposed to do. Get facing downstream and put my feet up in front of me so my toes were above the water. I could see the tips of my brand new lime green Crocs, and I was thankful that they floated. Heather was next to me as we rushed downstream and she called "Toes up toes up!" and I shouted in agreement back to her. It had been seconds only since we were plunged below.

I turned around to the strangest sight I saw on the river all weekend. Our friend Ryan was in a canoe all by himself. Marty and Sue were floating along unscathed. Gil and Jen were working hard to get back in their raft. But Marina, somehow, had ended up on top of my and Heather's upside down raft. It was hilarious to see the boat upside down and her perched on top of it. She had never even hit the water. When everything spun in and dumped us, it had popped her right on top of the raft we had just been in.

It was fun floating through some rapids. Heather pulled to the side and was picked up by friends. Ryan scooped me up and we gathered detrius before pulling over to the side. Marina managed to get our raft right side up, and then jumped back into it so she could steer it over to the side. On the bank together we relived the awesome dumpage and then soon got on our way again.

We went faster than we intended and got back long before we expected. But it was time. We were beat. There were pictures of each of us in The Mother and although Heather and I agreed we both looked great, $20 for the pix just seemed a little steep to us. The memory was enough.

I couldn't lift my arms when I got back to the apartment, and it took only moments on the couch before I was fast alseep. When I dreamed, I felt the river pulling me along, and I couldn't tell if it was water or time, but I knew I had to paddle hard and paddle through, but also I had to remember to let the current take me, too.