When Nature Gets Dicey

“Did you see the sunset this morning?” my friend asked at lunch today.

We laughed very hard.

So this blog has to be about nature. Not hard—I love nature. I love sunsets (when they come in the evening); I love wind in trees; I love playing rivers. But the thing is, I don’t really just love to be alone and think quietly in nature. That kind of thing is wonderful, and I do it sometimes, but mostly I love nature because of the adventure it holds. And most definitely adventure with people. Sorry, Henry David Thoreau. No Walden for me, thank you!

Take lakes, for example. Sure, I could sit on the shore of a lake with the dewy grass underneath me and the breeze lifting the ends of my hair, and I could look out at the sun setting in liquid fire at the edge of the water. And that would be nice.

Or—I could climb into a bobbing three-seated inner tube on that lake and intertwine arms with two fellow adventurers, gripping the rough handles with everything in me as adrenalin floods my veins and the boat begins to tow us. I could let the wild spray of the lake rush against me as I fought a war against the raging water to stay on that tube. I’d launch into the air and come thudding back down onto the water’s rough surface; I’d be whipped in great flinging curves that suck, suck, suck to pull me off. Meanwhile, I’d be laughing and screaming and clenching my teeth with my companion fighters. And in the end, I’d be ripped from the tube and crash down against the water, tumbling over myself multiple times with my velocity before finally dropping beneath the water’s surface.

Afterward, I’d be sore and sunburned and shaky and yes, even bleeding. And happy—oh, so happy.

Yeah, I choose Option 2.

Moonlit rivers, whistling graveyards, chalky ravines, rushing whitewater—it’s hard for me to get away from remembering that some of the happiest moments of my life have come to me during adventures through nature with close friends. Some have been simply pleasant, and some have been frighteningly thrilling (that graveyard I mentioned? Oh, yes). Some have scarred me for life. Yes, that’s a joke…I have scars on my arm from one traipse down a river in particular.

And that’s all I have to say on this subject for the moment.