The world has a new measurement – six feet, reinforced by marks on the floors, arrows, signs. When you sign a receipt there’s a bin for clean pens and one for used. Hand sanitizer is suddenly everywhere, every office, every store, every car, every bathroom.
We mask up to go in stores, step back if someone gets too close, give each other a wide berth on the sidewalk. If we plan a hike with friends, everyone drives their own car to the trailhead, keeps well spaced on the walk. We sit with family and close friends only outside and at a distance. Marypat does virtual workouts in the driveway with the kids, all distanced from each other on their yoga mats, following coaches on a computer screen. No socializing, no going out to eat, no movies, no gym workouts, no school, no yoga. Hunkered in, staying solitary, watching the human world flounder. But it would be a lonely life indeed without friends to chat with, a partner to share life with, children to marvel at, and a farflung web of human connections I feel embraced by.Īnd so, spring is pushing in all around, rivers are rising, the sun booms up in the mornings, birds flood north, boats are always drying out in the yard, and life is as delicious as ever. I enjoy that mental space, the lack of chatter, the focus on contemplation. What matters is simple time together and the sense of solidarity that comes from that network of humanity. The interaction doesn’t need to be momentous or meaningful.
More and more every year, I find that what matters is my company, my pod of humanity, the people who I hold in regard and who might hold me in regard. The other thing that has been impressed on me is the value of companions. That I have the good fortune to go on adventures and embrace exhilaration is a daily benediction. I am very cognizant of how precious and frail a thing life is, especially as we age. For me, it means life goes on, more rivers will be paddled, more friendships will develop, more time with family will unfurl. In both cases I was lucky to find the problem in time, and to live in an era of treatment where it could be dealt with. Twice now I’ve skated past the edge of the abyss. Now it’s prostate cancer, which would have done me in if I’d been born fifty years earlier. My first confrontation with mortality was my cancerous eye tumor a dozen years ago. Prostate surgery was my second encounter with an ailment that would have killed me a generation earlier. The box of pads gathers dust in the bedroom and I hardly need to think about that any more.
Ruby animal wandering willows full#
Three-plus months out now, and bladder control is close to normal – I can go on a rigorous hike and not pee myself (mostly) and I’m back to full activity – gym workouts, bike rides, walks, river trips.
What’s more significant is that my recovery from prostate surgery is on track. So, the paddling season has officially begun, with plenty more to come. The three of us spent the better part of a week descending a low-flow current through the deserts of eastern Oregon, complete with volcanic canyons, fun water, side hikes, and sweet camps. In the end I also invited my friend Grant, who has been a paddling companion for more than 40 years, who was my best man 35 years ago, and who Ruby agreed would be a great addition. Soon after our return to Butte, Ruby got in touch and asked if I wanted to go on a dad/daughter trip on the Owyhee River in Oregon. It was a leisurely jaunt with lots of time for diversions and contemplation and indulging good company. We navigated rapids and played cards by headlamp and studied ancient rock art and wandered around.
For 10 days we rode the silty flow through gooseneck canyons, past petroglyphs, stopping to explore side canyons and trails. Nothing.Īnd so, some weeks back, at the end of March, we joined our friends Molly and Jeff, Lee and David at Sand Island on the San Juan River in southern Utah. But there is nothing, and I mean nothing, so soothing, so exhilarating, so seductive, so compelling, so evocative, so church-like, as riding the back of current feeling the pulse of water responding to gravity under the hull of a boat and following its cues. I like a long bike ride as well as the next person. Never fear, the tribute to rivers and springtime and the first outings of the paddling season is as robust and irrepressible as ever. But I realize that, this year, it is layered with so much other meaning. I sit down to write my predictable yearly ode to the start of the paddling season.
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