Life Lessons from a Canoe….
August 2022
Let me begin this one by giving you a taste of this area of the country. The Boundary Water Canoe Area (BWCA) is unlike any other I’d had been to. At over a million acres, it sits along the border on the U.S. and Canada and is compromised of hundreds of interconnected lakes to form one giant ecosystem. Folks from all over come to explore this area by kayak or canoe through overnight paddles to designated primitive campsites scattered all throughout the entire protected area. Each site is different with it’s own fire grate and latrine (bring a short handle shovel just in case).
My M and I were camping on the Kaswishiwi (pronounced “KAH-WISH-IH-WAY”) River. Having lived on the Mississippi as a youth I found this to be one of the most beautiful rivers in the northern United States. It starts deep in the heart of the BWCA and works it’s way through, showing it’s true beauty around every corner.
We decided one day to rent a canoe while at the South Kawishiwi State Park, near Ely (pronounced “Eel-E”). In previous days the winds had been calm, the water placid. Not so on our day of adventure. We steeled ourselves as the winds where at 25MPH, or was it knots…not sure, but they were strong! Now neither of us had really spent much time captaining a canoe and our first clue was that we put the canoe in backwards. Our plan was I’d be in the back to paddle and as “rudder control” and she’d be up front. So she climbs in with the dog and Your Humble Correspondent (YHC) push them out. As I hop in I notice the seats are lipped slightly with a fore & aft in mind. (like how I did that….you know those are Navy terms 😉
OK, so she’s now the rudder control, no biggie. We agree to push to the far side of the river and hug the shore in the hope the wind would have less impact on our self-propelled yacht. YHC dug in with fervor after having identified the optimal trajectory. With knife-hands I pointed to my M the goal. Two strokes to the left – pointing downstream, two strokes to the right – now we’re facing too far to the center of the river. Back to the left side – stroke…and on until we are in the middle of the river. “Hey hon, you know you’re the rudder control and determine the direction?” I say with the safe wisdom of a seasoned canoe captain. Her reply, “I can’t keep up with your powerful stroke.” Well, if that doesn’t boost the ole’ F3 ego! (Must be working out too much I thought). When we did make it to the other shore we switched places.
…by the way I didn’t know any of the three
So now that we were in our “proper” places we began again. The wind remained a factor, but not as bad. Two strokes to the left – pointing to shore, two strokes to the right – now we’re facing too far to the center of the river. Determined I put more into it…two strokes to the left – she stops paddling. We begin to lose ground. Err water. Mmmm we were going backwards. Harder, stronger, deeper I dip the oar. One left, one right, one left. Ok, now we are at a standstill. “A little help please?” I say a bit tersely. She begins paddling and we start moving forward again. After a while (still zig-zagging a bit) my M’s muscles needed a break so we drifted into the shore and up against an outcropping of rocks. She puts her paddle down, adjusts herself and leans back in a enviably comfortable pose. Meanwhile I’m in the back with a death grip on a knob of the boulder about the size of a half dollar. As the wind still beats against the side of the small craft I hold her steady, for a while. The M glances over her shoulder and notices my herculean efforts to keep our boat from being dashed upon the rocks. “Why are you struggling so my love?” she says. I explain all the effects of wind and physics to which she throws a foot over the side onto another boulder and says, “There, that’s better. Now you can rest a bit.” DOH!
After a while we decided to venture back for lunch and a nap. So we pushed off with the pleasant concept that going out the wind was at out face, plus we were going upstream, so going back downstream and the wind at our backs this would be easy. But as in life, winds change. So now the wind was back in our face. We’d both fought, struggled, figured and refigured how best to move this Clearly defective water craft forward. By the time we made it back across the river and to the camp site we weren’t speaking much and were done. She was done with my overpowering and damned the torpedo’s mentality and me with her apparent laissez-faire attitude and willingness to stop paddling so she wouldn’t be fighting my stroke.
Lunch, a nap and abating winds proved a help. Towards nautical twilight the M and I decided to give it a go again. The water, once white capped now appeared glassy. We shoved off and two strokes in an angelic voice floats back to me, “I’m not going to fight you.” Her presence in being peaceful stopped me. WTF was I doing? This wasn’t a race, there was no agenda, no where to go, so why hurry? I recall saying, “No fight, let’s go again.” I lightly dip my oar into the water and match her rhythm. Going left again…one stroke to her two. Ahh, that’s it. We putter along for a bit and then stop paddling altogether and just drift. We watch the first stars come onto the night sky. A few partnering strokes and stop. The long, mournful sound of a look (the bird not me) calls as if to say It’s-All-Right or maybe Let’s-All-Rest or just maybe…Ca-Noes-Suck.
Marriage can be a lot like an outing in a canoe. Here’s how I think so:
- It takes two!
- It’s a lot harder if one person does all the work
- It’s a lot harder if you don’t pay attention to what the other is doing
- It’s not until you work together do you make headway
- Somebody has to lead and leading doesn’t mean ‘do it my way’. Leading means instructing, guiding, candor, vision, articulating the vision all with Love at the core of it all.
- Communication is essential
- Canoeing is hard work and so is marriage
- Sometimes the journey is easy, don’t always make it hard.
There are times in marriage when everything is clicking and when it does – pick up your paddle and float a while and enjoy one another.
Aye!