CATWALKS
The
canoes first appeared as dots, emerging from behind the slim
silhouette of an island across Devil’s Bay. At first I wasn’t
sure. No one else had seen them yet. Children were jumping off the
diving tower; parents were milling on the shore. All around me,
there was a thread of adrenaline rippling through the waiting
families. But when I shifted my stare just a little, I could see them
in my peripheral vision: five canoes on the silver water.
Of
course, from where I was standing on the camp’s dock I couldn’t
tell they were wood. But like my daughter, I too had traveled this
raw landscape in these timeless boats at the rhythmic pace of a
paddle stroke. I had portaged loads over the ancient pathways between
lakes. I knew her anticipation of this moment, this
victorious return.
Her
canoe trip was coming in after nearly forty days. These girls -- no
longer girls but hard-tested young women -- had traveled far to the
North. Some of them would be changed physically, from soft to
muscular, round to lean, thin to strong. All of them would be
changed emotionally. The exuberant whooping they would sing as they
closed in on us would be a song of triumph – a band of women bound
together through trial, mishap, deep beauty, and intimacy. The
moment of return, to “civilization” we had called it, was both
glory and despair: we had done it! -- it was over.
Instinctively
my heart tightened. Though I stood on the dock among the families as
just another mother, in truth I was out there, on the water, under
way.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“Air
raid!” shouted Heather in the front canoe. In my boat, the two
campers and I threw down our paddles, kicked off our boots and jumped
over the gunwales into the cool depths of Florence Lake. As my body
left the glittering sunlight and sank through the blue, I opened my
mouth, drinking in the clean water. This was no boggy “piss pond”
between portages. This was a big, deep, clear, rock-lined lake that
captured the blue sky in fluid play. I burst through the surface and
laughed out loud as the others leaped from their canoes around me.
Air raids were the champagne of a canoe tripping day: a mischievous,
chaotic, giddy reward. And we had earned it.
In this glacially carved land, travel is easiest on water. Crossing
between lakes is hard. I had lumbered across many miles of portages
over the summers as a camper, bearing a canvas Duluth pack with
leather shoulder straps and a broad tump band across my sweaty
forehead.
This
summer I was a counselor, and I carried the wanigan, a rectangular
plywood box as wide as my shoulders. It held difficult-to-pack items
like the billy set and the knives, and for the first few days, a
couple dozen eggs. Borne by only a tump, it was a certifiable
torture device. My campers laughed at my “wanigan wiggle”, a
trademark walk the wanigan bearer develops. My hips and legs would
deftly zigzag around rocks in the trail while my neck and back
remained rigid under the box. Particularly tricky was walking the crude log
catwalks over a bog. They required balance and agility. I was good at carrying a wanigan, though
a sore was developing in the small of my back where it rubbed.
An
hour before the Florence Lake air raid, we had arrived at a
notoriously difficult portage. As usual it was a scramble. We
dragged the packs out of the canoes and hoisted them onto the
campers’ backs. It was like loading a mule train, except most of
the girls looked more like long legged colts. They were anxious,
but, tumps adjusted and paddles in hand, they staggered off together,
one behind another.
The
portage was long, wet and buggy. Relief would come only at the end,
when the trail climbed up over a dry ridge before it came down to the
landing at Florence Lake. As I trudged along with the wanigan, lost
in the Zen zone that allowed me to ignore the mosquitoes, I looked up
to see one of the girls sitting slumped on a rock ahead. It was
Heather. Her canvas pack and paddles were on the ground. Everyone
knows that on portages you don’t sit down, because it’s even
harder to get up – it's best to just keep going. Two-stepping in
front of her was a still-loaded girl, urging her onward. Heather
just shook her head. As I approached, the dancing girl said, “Well
I’m going to get them over with”. She turned and walked on.
Ahead were catwalks.
Old pine and birch logs lay paired end-to-end, stretching away from us like a narrow raft over the marshy muskeg. Catwalks inspired dread. The girls had all heard stories about someone who fell off and was either stranded like a turtle on her back, or mired up to her hips unable to escape. Crossing catwalks took self-assurance. These were the first of this trip, and the sight of them had crumbled the will of the already faltering girl.
The only way to get Heather across was to splint her weakened spirit to mine. We got her pack on, and I told her to follow my steps. Humor helped, and as I mounted the logs with her close behind, I told her to watch my wanigan-wiggle for the infamous marsh-wiggle variation. Step-by-focused-step we walked log lengths, crossing from fat logs to narrow, some decaying, some partially submerging under our weight. The mosquitoes clamored around our ears, but we didn't swat at them for fear of losing our balance. A forward rhythm seemed to help, giving us the momentum to move lightly. At long last, the mire underneath transitioned to mud, and then finally to dry land.
Heather unlocked her
gaze from my feet and looked up: a whooping and hooting started.
Three girls had waited for us. Fully loaded with packs and paddles,
ignoring their instincts to get to the end, they wanted to cheer on
their tripmate and walk the last section together. Heather surged
toward them, victorious. The four of them high-fived and set off in
unison up the trail, singing. I shifted the wanigan away from my sore
spot and followed.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
I
found myself gently massaging the small of my back when a shout went
up around me on the dock. The five canoes on Devil's Bay had been
sighted. Younger children clambered out of the water to stand
dripping, watching. The approaching dots on the water became canoes
with flashes on both sides, sunlight reflecting off the blade of each
wet paddle dipping in time. We waited.
In numbered minutes,
the trip would be over. Each girl-woman would be welcomed back into
the throng of parents to resume her role as daughter, and tomorrow
she would be driven away in a car.
But none of them were the same: the wood, the water, the sweat and
their shared stories were in these young women now, and they were
beautiful and strong.
Their song rose
suddenly across the water. It was a glorious moment.
As the crowd on the dock roared, the girls raised their paddles high
in the air, in salute, in unison.
The details of this story -- place names and locations, tripping style -- are real but not perfectly accurate. For example, the portage I describe goes into a different lake than Florence, but I love those clear blue waters and there is no better place for an air raid.