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Show RIVER VII. THE STRANGE MYSTERIOUSNESS After I left Ralph on the shore below Cairo, I rowed back and forth between the Kentucky and Missouri banks, trying out the current, watching the muddy brown waters of the Mississippi mix with the steel-gray waters of the Ohio. It got warm, almost balmy, and a gentle south wind blew a few scattered clouds up the wide river. I was still shaken by my plunge in the river to retrieve the oar: once again, I was seeing one of the river's new faces. It took a while to get the experience out of my head. Having never felt the full power of the river's current, I kept thinking about the thin barrier of wood that separated me from the cold torrent that I now knew was much more powerful than I could imagine. The thin skin of the boat seemed a perfect metaphor for my distance from a watery death. It was close, too damn close. The swim seemed like a bad omen, coming as it did at the mouth of the Ohio, just as I was entering the Mississippi. I didn't want to examine this particular omen too closely and tried to put it out of my mind. The past week had been so renewing that the last thing I wanted to think about were my chances of drowning. Starting at the Kentucky Dam on the Tennessee River, those days had been dreamlike, yet sharp-edged and clear like the late-winter days they were. After Richard let me off, I rowed across the Kentucky Lake. It was a couple of miles from the marina to the dam's lock, a long row, and I put my back into it. Thor danced uneasily around the boat, getting accustomed to riding on the water. He didn't like it much, but gradually he got used to it and nestled down next to his fifty-pound sack of dog food. -145- |