The best comment heard so far, from a woman at a gas station looking at the strange kayak on the roof of the car out in the rain: "Aren't you worried that thing'll get wet?"
Today was one of those days that are tough to get out of bed on. Wake to low thunder and rain and Scout having jumped up on the bed with me, alert and trembling. It's Wednesday and I have no job. However the rain means the rivers will begin rising again this morning, due to last week's saturation. The rivers I like paddling the best are both perfect today. Did I mention that I have no job?
Before I head out I do my daily duty, calling my headhunters and looking in the paper, all to no avail. I have four people around Birmingham scouring the job market for me, which will cost me once I land a job, but what do you do. I have probably twenty resumes sitting in human resource offices around the city, waiting patiently for attention. Normally I don't allow myself much paddling time when I'm jobless, but today.. well I allowed myself an immersion.
When I arrived at the take-out it was pouring. Good sign. My paddling buddy and I loaded up and headed to the put-in, leaving one car behind, and within ten minutes we were in soft brown water, sloshing through the wet canyons. Rain would shower down at intervals. Damn, my boat's getting soaked..
The levels were great, meaning there are just enough rocks exposed to make the paddling technical, but the water is high enough to form holes and other playspots. All the big rapids were loud and pushy. It is amazing how vibrant a river canyon feels after days of rain, too. All the beaches smooth and newly carved. Piles of monster logs and jetsam shoved against trees where the high water forced them. The rocks, the water itself has a scoured look, as if scrubbed clean. The rain is keeping most of the critters in their holes, though we do see some wood ducks and lots of sparrows out enjoying the smorgasboard of drowned worms and insects. The snakes that usually are out sunning themselves on the large flat rocks are thankfully gone.
We make Powell Falls with a minimum of trouble, though my buddy did hit a rock at the bottom and scraped his boat up nicely. No noggin troubles today. I love approaching the falls from above. Once you pass under Swann Bridge (the old wooden trestle one), the river lapses into a silence carried by the slow, wide pace if the water there. You will drift for a few minutes past it when a slight rushing sound emerges, building slowly into the dull roar of the falls. Though I have run them many times, there is always something exhilirating about approaching them. After I'm down I like to paddle up into them, just feet away from the churning hole, surrounded by thousands and thousands of churning violent gallons that pour over the rocks and boil beneath me in a landscape of bubbles. And just yards downstream the water is cool again, calm and collected. Nothing to see here, folks. Move on.. We leave, but before we go around the bend we always stop and look back at the falls, that event, that liquid singularity.
We stop at the oft-heralded playspot "Ender hole" and throw a few cartwheels, and chat with a local fisherman who's managed to catch a few nice largemouths. Unlike many of the locals, he is friendly and doesn't find our outlandish appearance and watercraft a threat. We talk a bit about lures and he moves on with a "Take 'er easy". The rain is picking up. We drift toward my waiting car, warm and dry.
I may not have a job, but I know I have a life. It is one carried on currents.
