The River Runs
The River Runs
Michael Field - Fall 2022
Published in the Anthology
Have you ever drifted down a lazy, winding river on an
inner tube? Maybe you were in the great outdoors, dappled sunlight filtering
through the tree canopy; or maybe you escaped the throngs at a sun-drenched
water park to drift in the shade of tall palms lining a twisting lagoon. It’s
been a while since I got my feet wet, yet I am often immersed in that experience
as I ride on an inner tube down a stream of consciousness, my mind wending randomly
from thought to thought.
Casting off from the riverbank, my black rubber craft
is captured by the current, my thoughts turned first this way then that. Relaxation
flows like an elixir through my body as anxieties and cares are displaced by
misty nostalgia and rose-tinted images. With dream-like magic, my inner tube often
transforms into a flying carpet capable of taking me anywhere, or to any time.
This trip, the undulating motion imparted by the water
takes me back and I am in a canoe in the brook that runs past my childhood
home. My friend, Kim, turns to me from the front thwart and flashes an excited,
boyish smile. We have decided today will be a day for adventure as we are going
to paddle from the waterfall that used to power the abandoned Stevens Mill up
to the ‘headwaters’ of the brook, to Taylor Pond. To our knowledge, no one
before us has been intrepid enough to make this voyage, but today we will. I
recall being out of sight of all civilization, the quiet broken only by the
sound of water dripping off our paddles. I feel the joy of reaching the open
water of the pond.
Sometimes the river waters are not calm; instead, they
run fast through rapids filled with rocks. Some are boulders that loom over you
as you zip by; others are hidden obstacles, submerged beneath the surface, shocking
your system with their unexpected buffeting. Your paddle flails ineffectually
as you try to direct your path away from the threats, but it is the current of existence
that is in control. The river that has flowed for all of time will direct your
craft, not you.
Mentally hanging on tight, I now find myself in a
different part of the stream. I am middle-aged with kids of my own, childhood
innocence swept away by the crashing waves of adulting, the elixir no longer
holding my anxieties at bay. I am out of work with college tuition bills due. I
am not alone on the water; my wife is there, but she, too, has lost her job. Our
son’s struggles are lessening, yet our daughter’s life-threatening health
issues persist. A panic attack grips my heart as my wife and I, each grasping
for the other, are rapidly being swept toward a dangerous eddy where the irresistible
force of the rushing waters meets the immoveable object of the up-thrust rocks.
In this part of the river, the stones are
not smooth, and memories are not kind. A father from whom love would never flow
and a mother whose desire for my perfection could never be met have left me with
deep feelings of inadequacy. Achievements are mere pebbles not capable of
filling the black hole at my core. The river knows that and seems to delight in
throwing me at the threatening rocks before diverting around them at the last
minute. The cold, wet moss that rubs off the rocks as I bump past is a visceral
reminder of how close to destruction I repeatedly come.
At last, the hard, stone walls that constrained the stream,
compressing and accelerating it, have widened and given way to sandy banks
rising to lush fields of vegetation. The stream of consciousness returns to its
calming babble. I am older now; in a part of the flow of life where age is
relative. I have lived past the age at which my father died, yet I am nowhere
near the mark set by my mother’s longevity.
The pliant rubber of my inner tube has
survived the battering of the rocks. I, too, have survived, but my thoughts now
turn to my own mortality. The passing of friends and neighbors reminds me that
life is short and, as I write words of remembrance on condolence cards, I
wonder how I will be remembered. The echoes of the pebbles of my achievements dropping
into the black hole have long ago faded, so what of any permanence remains? I tell
stories, but, if heard by none, do they make no sound as they sink into
irrelevance? I write words, but if read by none, do they, too, fall into the
black hole as the ink that is the only proof of their existence fades?
The gentle waves lap at the side of my craft and, in
their murmur, I hear soft voices offering reassurance. “You have a legacy.”
they say. As the clouds scud over the fields by the banks of the now slow-moving
river, I see prophetic vignettes played out in their morphing shadows. I see
the faces of my children in the rippling images, characters in the story the clouds
paint on the waving grass. The faces change and I see that it is not just my
children, it is all children. And they are not just my legacy, they are a
shared legacy owned by us all. The voices whisper, “As long as the children
hear the stories and read the words, the river will continue to run.”
The current pushes my inner tube until it stops, lodged
on the soft sand of a small beach. The trip down this stream of consciousness has
ended, yet I go on. I rise from my resilient craft, cross the stretch of brown
to the green field beyond. The sun is low in the sky but has not yet set; shadows
are long but have not yet swallowed the objects they touch. I breath deep and
set out for more adventures, more grist for that abandoned mill by Taylor Brook
to grind into stories. And to look for children to tell them to.
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