Memoir

Book

20 chapters, 307 pages

I was taught to be a raft guide in a ten-day course. To trace patterns in the wrinkling face of the river, to locate the line, finding a path through rapids. The water looked green with turbulence, more of a rushing blur than a map to be read. The river’s voice is not a roar, but a low and steady whoooosh. Out of the twenty five whitewater rafting companies in the valley, Acquired Tastes Rafting was the only one that did not make paddlers wear helmets. I could see the back of six heads, gold necklaces and ponytails, as the raft rose and fell.

On my way to the river that morning, I biked past the local prison. It was across the street from my campsite, where I was living in a tent for the summer. The squat buildings were painted shades of industrial cream. I searched the towers for movement and gesture, a network of fences. If I ignored the barbed wire spirals glinting in the sunlight, it looked like a university campus. The industrial complex bristled against the flowing river that offered so much promise. I thought of the prisoners staring through the windows, view obscured by bars as thick as hot dogs.

I am thinking about the prison because of the uniforms in the office earlier: khaki brown, rows of buttons, numbers embroidered on the front pocket. The Girl Scouts gathered in small circles, braces and braids, next to the fifteen-passenger van they arrived in. I bit my cuticles to tatters while watching them. The only thing I knew about the scouts was cookie capitalism and the procurement of various patches for desired behaviors. And that I would be guiding them down a river. These girls knew more about the outdoors than I did. It was my check out run, which determined whether I would become a river guide or an official failure. A senior guide would sit beside me, evaluating my every move, as I navigated through fourteen miles of whitewater.

I passed out wetsuits that smelled like the ghost of Pine Sol the guides dunked them in every night. Hands swiped at the stack, a blur of friendship bracelets, chipped nail polish. I don’t know who my crew will be, but I’m rehearsing my paddle talk in my head: Stretch arms forward, dig paddle in the water, spring back with full weight of your body, all said with bravado and authority, traits I admired in other guides but did not possess. The scouts would be captives of my first go.

They all looked young, fresh off the jump rope. Their skin was clean like table linen that had never been folded. I do not know the names of all five scouts in the raft, but they are in sixth grade. I kept an eye on Chelsea and Liz, who I needed most because they are my lead paddlers at the front of the raft. They initiated the paddle strokes the rest of the crew followed. I sat them in the front because they seemed to nod along with the paddle talk. Chelsea was varsity sports material with clean white running shoes, a fancy GPS watch, and confidence.

Chelsea tolerated Liz, who sat beside her in glasses, red hair in careful French braids, chatting away with nervous energy. Liz was worried about flash floods, which I thought to be a sophisticated concern, but this did not impress Chelsea, who was already bored by rafting. The other scouts said their names too soft for me to hear over the river. I was a sophomore in college, not even 21, but they made me feel old, as if I should know why I was sitting in the back of that raft. The world felt like a question I couldn’t answer yet.

The senior guide, Adam, smelled like cherry tobacco. He sat next to me staring straight ahead at the river, paddle resting on his lap, eyes shaded behind a baseball cap. He had eyes like flat brown stones. He named his dog Bullet, and had a collection of guns in his camper, parked in the back of the Gun Smoke Truck Stop. He spent time in the military and bartended at the VFW in the evenings. I hoped I’d remember where the first rapid was. To be able to predict it by the sound of quickening water and the recognition of stone walls. Cold water sloshed over the sides of the raft, chilling our legs and turning our knee caps red inside wetsuits.

It was spring run-off on the Arkansas River, ice transforming to movement, the mountains shedding their snow drifts. A few scattered patches of gray-white remained on the peaks, like mange on a dog’s back. It was my first summer in Colorado and the only bird I could identify in the canyon was the Turkey Vulture, which I recognized from back home in Wisconsin. I was fascinated by these raptors, nature’s recyclers with battery acid stomachs. Ute legend says they bring the lost souls home. Three circled above, coarse black feathers and roving eyes. I could only glance up for a few seconds, my eyes were fixed to the river. The stretch is called Brown’s Canyon, but the granite cliffs looked closer to a light pink shade, streaked with toothpaste green lichen.

“Forward two,” I called.

The scouts bent and pulled in response, their paddles sending up little sprays of water. They were wearing bright orange life jackets, but that’s not what they’re called anymore: Personal Flotation Device is the going term, or PFD. The “life” in life jacket was too big a promise. A thick pillow behind the neck allowed swimmers to remain face-up, even when unconscious. I was wearing the same bulky jacket as the scouts, my guide PFD and river knife were still coming in the mail.

I was the steering wheel, my paddling crew the power. The scouts’ paddle strokes were the only way to fight back against the river, piloting the raft in the direction I wanted to go. I steered the raft’s nose around rocks, determining the angle that would bring us safely downstream. My hands gripped an unfamiliar tool, the bright plastic paddle. I remembered to keep my hand over the T-grip handle liked I’d learned in training. I drew my paddle across the raft’s wake, passing a fallen log. We were so close I could see the intricate lace of evergreen moss, flecked with water droplets. I’d found Acquired Tastes Rafting and the guide training course from the safety of my computer, in a spat of Google soul-searching: “adventure + job + Colorado.” It was 2007, and I was part of the first generation to look for the wilderness online...