BOATS AND I DON’T GET ALONG
It seems like anything that can go wrong does go wrong when
I get in a boat. If the lake is too
choppy that’s the day I’ll rent a boat.
If a boat motor decides to quit, it will happen when I’m in the middle
of a large lake. I had always wanted to
go on a canoe trip. Someone told me that
Glenwood Springs, Arkansas would be a good place to rent a canoe. We could put in on the Caddo River, and float
down about eight miles which would take all day, and the canoe people would
pick us up. I made the necessary
arrangements.
I had planned the trip for Elliott and me, thinking the
others were still a little young for such an adventure, but Nannie wanted to go. The next canoe trip I took after the
Arkansas misadventure was my second one.
There were only two seats in the canoe, but the canoe guy said that a
third person could sit in the bottom of the canoe. We did a little improvisation to improve my
mother-in-law’s seating arrangement. We sat
her down on a minnow bucket and she made it just fine – well at least most of
the day.
We put in just before daylight. For some reason I had enough presence of mind
to tie down the minnow bucket and the ice chest. We hadn’t gone a hundred yards before we
tipped the canoe over. We had to hunt
for our stuff in the dark. The minnow
bucket and the ice chest were firmly tied to the canoe. We had to hunt for our rods and reels, but we
did find them. Of course we were soaked,
but it didn’t matter, it was summer and we dried out pretty quickly. I was really concerned about dumping a sixty
something woman in the water when you couldn’t see fifteen feet ahead of you,
but she came up laughing like a school girl.
As far as she was concerned we were creating a memory. Water had gotten
into the ice chest. We had packed
sandwiches in plastic bags, but they didn’t keep the water out. We ate soggy sandwiches, but they kept us from
starving. The rest of the day was pretty uneventful
except for some remarkable scenery.
Mother never let me forget how sore her bottom got after sitting
on a minnow bucket for eight hours. She
wasn’t afraid to try anything. When she
died there were only two dreams that remained unfulfilled. She wanted to put on a black riding habit and
ride a rose, and she wanted to jump out of an airplane. I’m glad I never wanted
to do the parachuting thing. She would
have insisted on going with me if I had.
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