A few evenings ago, when my broken and surgically repaired elbow had healed sufficiently to be able to turn the steering wheel, and I had already driven my car to physical therapy two days before without a problem, I still asked Tony to drive me to my next PT appointment,…
I was in the health food aisle of the supermarket yesterday, amongst the cans of beans, tomatoes prepared in various ways, and pre-made soups, when an unexpected image popped into my head: a vibrant green leaf, made of glass. It was just a fragment, but I thought I recognized it:…
“How’s your day going?” I asked a new canoeing friend, R, as he pulled into the eddy. My class, the more experienced solo boaters, had already scouted Staircase Rapid, just below. From the boulders on the shore we’d picked our lines and were heading back to our parked boats as…
I know, the proverb goes, comparisons are odious, as in horrible. But Shakespeare’s Dogberry makes it odorous (in Much Ado About Nothing) and I like it. Comparisons are stinky. Indeed, so I’ve been thinking lately. This is a story about hooping, so I will need to start at the beginning,…
After a leisurely Memorial Day breakfast, we decide to swing by the take-out of our local dam-release river to see if any of our friends might be around to take a run with us. We still have our canoes strapped to the roof rack from yesterday, but all our gear…
I was getting jostled in my whitewater solo canoe in the swirly eddy next to gate 11 of the slalom course when it occured to me, This is my problem in my life: staring at an obstacle I know I can negotiate, but don’t trust myself to make the move.…
It feels like I am clinging to shore above a massive waterfall. My heart pounds against my life jacket, the paddle slips in my clammy hands, and my limbs have turned into silicone replicas which don’t make any promises to follow my brain’s commands. W in his bright orange canoe…
