It started thus: I was awakened by a Pounce from an Abigail Taylor which soon recalled to my memory the fact that it was our first day home from the fabulous girls' retreat. After getting back into the groove of things, Daniel mentioned to us that he did not have to go work today and we ought to find something out of the ordinary to do.
It was a beautiful day--blue sky, fresh breeze, warm sunshine--so we fixed upon Canoeing. Do not ask me why we thought such an idea to be a sane one. ;) But Daniel called 'round and found that some of our friends who live not too far away owned a canoe that we could borrow. All we had to do was drive to their property and hike down to a creek and get it. All well and good in theory.
When we arrived at the property we rumbled down the drive and poured out of the car--Daniel, Sarah, Abigail, and I.
But our directions were erroneous. The good chap who had cautioned us to go to the right fork was mistaken in which direction we'd be standing when we viewed the forks. We got lost and had to call for an SOS. The good chap hurried over and became our Sacajawea. We found the creek and the canoe and portaged back to the truck. The good chap hurried home for an online class.
We were hungry, Lewis and Clark and the rest of us, so we found our favorite, darling little ice-cream parlor and got some lunch. After lunching we drove down to the River to launch our boat. We strangled ourselves into our life-preservers as Madmen strangle themselves into strait-jackets. Then, satisfying ourselves that we were unsinkable, we continued our Lewis-and-Clark pantomime by getting into the canoe.
All four of us.
We sat a bit low in the water, but we were afloat!
All was fine sailing for a bit. The water was wide and blue. The herons laughed at us. The sun sparkled for us. The spirit of Adventure gripped us. And that's where we went wrong.
We saw a little estuary off the main course and thought what a lark it'd be to Discover something....ahem. Paddles poised we drifted into the branch and began the trek down the little river.
By and by I began to feel rather Marsh-wigglish as the little river shrunk to a creek. "Daniel, shouldn't we turn around?"
"What? And miss the chance for adventure?"
So said our Lewis-and-Clark leader.
He must not be related to that species of persons who don't relish the idea of getting stranded. I imagine there is too much Crusoe in him for that. But it was rather fun exploring with a chance of danger so I kept quiet...for a bit.We plowed forward, laughing over the spider-crabs and herons and raccoon's prints. The creek was getting more and more squinchy and I began to feel a tad like Puddleglum:
"Are you sure you don't want to turn around?" asked I, the figure-head at the prow of the canoe.
The canoe's other three occupants said something that meant "Never" and I kept quiet again. At each squinching of the creek and scraping of the bottom of the canoe I asked The Question. "Are you sure?" I wanted to be sure that as Sacajawea (and therefore the person who could see best, as I sat forward) that I had given all and sundry the chance to avoid danger.
We were now touching bottom but Lewis-and-Clark and the other girls were adamant. "It'll get wider presently," they said. I put my oar too and tried not to mind the hoards of adoring midges that assaulted us on every side of the shrinking stream.
We were no longer Lewis, Clark, Sacajawea and the rest. We were Mike Fink using our paddles like river-boat poles. We got stuck repeatedly but no one but Dear Old Puddleglum (that's me.) kept giving them Chances. Lewis-who-became-Fink hopped out of the canoe and began succumbing to the quicksand-like material that coated the bottom of the little trickle. (Yes, we'd down-sized from stream to a trickle at this point.)
They were loathe to give up. It must broaden soon. It must come out to the main River eventually. It must! But Daniel was sinking ever deeper. They relented. We would turn about. It required the lot of us to do a Chinese fire-drill and switch spots. Daniel squish-trotted through the horrid muck and pushed the canoe as we Mike-Fink'd it back up the trickle. It became a stream again. It became a creek. It became a little river...and we were out!
Muddy, disheveled, triumphant, we pushed onward to the little marina where we knew we could get ice-cream. After mooring and wandering up to the store, we collapsed on a bench eating our ice-cream with extreme satisfaction.
"I wish I had a camera," Daniel said, admiring us from his seat at a wrought-iron table. "You all look so happy and grubby like a bunch of six-year-olds."
And we were. We were happy. We were crazy. We were perfectly, utterly content.
The paddle home-ward was uneventful and we sang as we rowed. We floated into a section of pollen and petals that reminded us of the entrance to Aslan's country. We clambered out of the canoe and tied it to our roof, then grinned at each other with that preciously silly grin of childish satisfaction in getting hot and sweaty and grubby and tired.
After all--who can grow too old for a bit of Adventure, even if it does involve smelling like a marshwiggle for an hour or two? :D
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