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Show RIVER accepted it as my fate. This had a strangely calming effect on my fevered brain and as we approached Paducah I began to have a manic rush. I drank a beer and was soon as elevated as I had been depressed. About four o'clock we pulled into Paducah and drank coffee in a garishly lit orange truck stop. Richard took the wheel and drove the last ten miles out to the Kentucky Dam. The smell of water made my blood pound. We pulled off onto the downstream side of the huge dam, looking for a place to launch the boat. The dam was as high and stark as the I walls of a prison, and the obstructed Kentucky River seemed to rage with anger and pain. Brilliant floodlights illuminated the huge structure. Its spillways were fully open and torrents of Whitewater cascaded into the Tennessee River like some watery hell broke loose. The swells surged as high as ocean breakers,! louder than any surf or whitewater. Phosphate from half the states in the South was pounded back to foam as it tumbled over the floodgates. The white-lit night crackled with electricity. "You're going down that?" screamed Stockdale over the roaring water. "In a rowboat?" I howled like a berserk coyote. My state of mind seemed loosed upon the world. We drove to the other side of the dam and found a marina and calm water. We took the boat off its rack and manhandled it down to the water. Thor ran wild, pissing on every tree he could find, nervous as hell. I loaded my supplies into the boat: two oars and oarlocks; two five-gallon jugs filled with spring water; a lot of pineapple juice, canned peaches, bread, and beans; sleeping gear and pillows (I was traveling for comfort, not for speed); a sack of books, notebooks, and manuscripts; a shovel, an axe, and a machete; maps, a camera, and binoculars; a duffel bag of clothes, and fifty pounds of dog food. -143- |