Chapter 27

May 9, 2001

Once again, the roar of the propane burners woke everyone early. The habit of getting going early was with them now, and it was just as well, since they had a longish distance to run today, and the river was slower than it had been in places above. Even though all of them felt the trip starting to come to an end at the campfire the night before, Crystal had warned that this would be an interesting day since they were well into lava country now and things would look a bit different. In addition, the Canyon would be more open much of the time with the opportunity for longer views.

"While we’re at it," she said, "we’re starting to get a little stuck again with who’s riding with who. Mom and Al’s raft and the gear boat we can’t switch around much, and I promised Randy he could row mine again today. That ought to be OK, since there ain’t no bubble line run for him to show everybody else up with. Everybody else, switch around a little, will you?"

Thus it was that Jon and Tanisha found themselves loading on board Mike’s raft, where Ben and Joy were already sitting. "Hi, neighbors," Ben grinned. "Fancy meeting you here."

"Darn it," Jon said. "Tani and I have been meaning to ride with you at least once, but, well, other things got in the way."

"We noticed," Joy grinned. "It hit her pretty hard, didn’t it?"

"Yeah," Jon nodded. "You’d have to understand how far she’s come to realize how hard she’s been hit. It was pretty heavy the last couple days."

"There were questions she needed answered," Tanisha said. "And I could help. But what do you say we take a moratorium on religion today? I missed half the Canyon yesterday because I was concentrating on something else."

"Fine with me," Ben nodded. "We’re starting to run out of Canyon, now. I think I can say we’ve enjoyed the second half of the trip a lot more than the first half. I’m really going to hate getting back to work."

"Yeah," Jon agreed as he noticed the other boats starting to pull away from shore. He started to get up to help give the raft a shove, but Trey and Nanci came along and did it for them, so as Mike took the oars and began to row, he continued. "It’s been a nice break, the first real one we’ve had in a couple years, and those were pretty short."

"We went to Disney World down in Florida, two years ago March," Tanisha added. "Since then, it’s just been work, work, work."

"Hey, I know you guys don’t want to get near to talking about what you actually do," Ben smiled. "But it sounds pretty important."

"It’s actually a little scary," Tanisha said. "But yeah, we really can’t talk about it. So, how did you get involved in civil engineering, anyway?"

"Through the back door," Ben replied. "It was a minor, but a job’s a job. Actually, what I concentrated on in college was lasers, especially high-energy lasers, but I haven’t been able to find work in the field. GIS is pretty interesting in its way, but it’s pretty much old hat, although there are a few new interesting applications every now and then."

"Yeah," Jon replied, his ears perking up a little. Although they couldn’t talk about it, much of what he and Tanisha did was involved with high-energy lasers. "Tani and I had a couple courses and an independent study on lasers down at Tech. I sort of grew up with laser applications. Back before I was born, my Dad came up with an application using computers to control lasers and machine tools. It was groundbreaking work at the time, but what he came up with is pretty primitive by today’s standards. In fact, it’s downright obsolete now. A controller unit the size of a bedroom dresser has been reduced to a little chip controller about the size of a PDA. All a pretty low-power laser diffraction, but pretty exact."

"Sounds interesting," Ben smiled. "Back when I got out of college, they were trying to recruit me to work on an application like that. But it was up in Chicago where they have ragweed, so no way. An outfit called Hadley-Monroe. They’d just come up with a new controller like that, and were trying to expand the applications. Besides, while it sounded like interesting work, it was just mopping up other people’s work."

"Yeah, that’s a slick little unit," Tanisha smiled. "That was the last project Jon and I did before we got pulled into the classified end of things."

Ben’s eyes grew wide. "You two? That’s pretty darn good."

"Not really," Jon shrugged. "We were still summer interns then; it was mostly cookbook stuff, right off the shelf. Not really groundbreaking, we wanted to use proven tech. But hey, if you worked on high energy lasers, you must have worked on gas lasers some . . . "

Ten minutes later, Mike turned to Joy. "Do you have any idea what they’re talking about?" he asked.

"Not a clue," Joy smiled. "They lost me a long time ago. I’m just a bookkeeper, remember."

"Me, either," Mike shook his head. "All I know about lasers is that they’re starting to replace radar in checking traffic speed."

"Sorry," Ben smiled. "It’s just nice to talk to someone who knows what I’m talking about."

"You do seem to have a pretty good knowledge of high-end lasers," Tanisha said. "Kind of a shame you have to mess around designing culverts. But yeah, maybe we’d better change topics a little. I mean, something simple, like a criminal justice major can understand," she ended with a tease.

"How about the Canyon?" Mike grinned. "I can bore people with that pretty good."

"I don’t think this place could ever be boring," Joy smiled.

"Well, we do have some things here that are pretty different than elsewhere," Mike said. "Take a look over on the right, you can see how the lava flowed down over the rock layers that were already there. Now, geologically speaking, the lava is pretty new, only a million years or so. I always think it’s kinda interesting that there really hasn’t been that much change in all that time. So when you think that water did a lot of the cutting you see in the Canyon, and still see that little change in a million years, well, it took a long time to make this place.

"That’s true," Joy nodded. "It really does put you in your place, doesn’t it?"

"Yeah, it does," Tanisha nodded.

"Hey, wasn’t it you who Crystal said ran a marathon?" Joy asked. "I don’t know how I could ever do that."

"I don’t know how we ever did it, either," Jon smiled with a knowing glance at Tanisha. "I know when we met, I’d have taken long odds against the thought that I’d ever even think about doing something like it. I was your typical computer nerd; my idea of exercise was climbing the stairs up from the basement in Glen Ellyn for supper."

"Yeah," Ben shook his head. "I always wanted to be able to do something like that. I mean, it was just so damn dull watching the other kids go out and play and know that I couldn’t. I guess it pretty well made me a stay-at-home computer nerd."

"Been there, done that," Tanisha said. "You do breathe OK as long as you’re out here, don’t you?"

"Pretty much," Ben said. "Once in a while I’ll have some problems, but an antihistamine clears it up pretty good."

"Not too late to start," Jon said. "When we started running, we kept it way down for a long time. We can’t always run as much as we like, but we still try to get in a mile or two even on the killer days. Since you’re right across the street, maybe we ought to get together some time and get you going."

"It’d be nice," Ben said. "I really feel like I ought to exercise more."

"I remember our company CEO saying one time that the main problem engineers have is they sit on their butts and stare at computer screens too much," Tanisha said. "He’s right. I can tell you from my own experience that a lot of things are better if you’re in shape."

"I suppose I should do it, too," Joy shook her head. "But it seems kind of boring."

"Well, it is," Jon smiled. "But the results are worth it. I mean, it pays off in other ways." He and Tanisha sent a knowing smile at each other – one that Joy could hardly fail to miss.

"The running is worth it," Tanisha added. "I mean, it pays off when we go skiing, too. We’re not much good at it, but Crystal and Scooter literally dragged us out on the slopes a few times, and we’ve been picking it up little by little."

"Damn," Ben said. "There’s something else I always wanted to do."

"No reason you can’t," Jon said. "It’s the wrong time of year, right now, but maybe next winter we could go hit a slope some place."

"Might be fun," Joy said. "We’ll have to think about it."

They continued to chat, just becoming friends, as the Canyon continued to flow by in an unending tapestry of considerable beauty. In the clear air, and given the fact that there was little to base distance on, Ben commented that his ability to estimate distance was off. The miles seemed very short to his eyes, compared to the figures Mike gave them. Often, there was the perspective problem, rock layers sloping up or down, making it almost appear as if they were going steeply down a slope, or that the river trended upward. Jon noted that he was just about totally unable to estimate height, too – a wall on the far side of the now-wider Canyon might be a thousand feet high, or three thousand.

After running a few miles to Whitmore Wash, at Mile 188, they pulled in at a wide sandbar to have lunch and to take a short hike up to some old Anasazi pictographs. Here, they met an irritating noise – the comings and goings of a couple of helicopters to and from a landing pad up in the rocks above a beach just upriver. There was a motor rig party there, rolling up side tubes of two of their rafts, getting set to make the long trek to Pearce Ferry without passengers. Getting organized, they got back on the river.

"Now there’s something you don’t see every day," Randy grinned as he caught the current in front of Whitmore and pivoted the raft to catch it.

"What’s that?" Crystal said.

"Your mom rowing by herself, and Al riding with Preach in the gear boat."

Crystal shrugged. "Guess Dad wanted to see how he’s doing, even though this is pretty flat water," she opined.

"I suppose," Randy agreed. "Well, maybe Preach will get the chance to run again sometime."

Crystal frowned. "I thought you were planning on getting a third trip in late next fall, maybe," she said.

"I’d like to, Crystal," he said. "You have no idea how much I’d like to. But Nicole and I were talking last night. Four out of the last five years, I’ve had project closeouts that have eaten up the month of November, and I just won’t know until the last minute. April, well, it depends on the weather and the projects coming up. I’d like to hope I can do it, and I’ll make it if I possibly can, but don’t be putting me on the schedule. Maybe that January trip, if it comes off, I can probably make that."

"It won’t be this winter," Crystal shook her head. "I talked to Dad about it, back up the river. The Park Service probably won’t let us change dates, so that means we’d have to put it on the schedule. We have to publish that a season in advance, and next year’s dates are already fixed. So, that means a year from next January, at the earliest, and then if we think we won’t need the launch date for the company. Sorry, Randy."

"Well, shit," he replied disgustedly. "I knew it was too much to hope for. Guess that means more bass guitar this winter." He snorted. "Maybe I’ll have to take after Josh’s brother, build a big model train layout or something. I can’t even volunteer to go over and work on his, he’s an accountant, but he disappears into his office on January second to do taxes, and his wife brings him meals until April fifteenth."

"Maybe not," Nicole laughed. "He may have to live on delivered pizzas. It isn’t exactly public knowledge, and don’t you dare say anything to him when we get home, but she qualified for the Iditarod when she ran the Beargrease last winter. Tiffany says she’s thinking about it real, real hard; she’s just trying to get up the guts to tell him."

"He’ll just about shit," Randy said heatedly. "And I know just how he feels. The only difference is that he doesn’t want to get out and do something like that himself."

"All right, Randy," Nicole said, understanding him perfectly. "I won’t do the trip in August. I can’t hurt you like that again."

"No, Nicole," he told her. "We’ve had this discussion before. Crystal, you were there when she offered to not do the AT. Nicole, I’ll tell you exactly what my thinking is. You had a lot of fear of white water before this trip. You’ve managed to overcome it. I’m hoping the trip in August will reinforce it, because if it does, I intend to try to get you in a whitewater kayak again next spring. If that doesn’t work, maybe I’ll get a small raft we can use on some of the bigger rivers. Maybe we’ll at least have that we can do together some weekends, even in the summer. If it weren’t for that, yeah, I’d get out the handcuffs and chain you down to keep you from doing it, just like I once threatened."

Crystal shook her head. "The same old summer-winter thing again, huh?"

"Yeah, and the winters get damn boring, except for having Nicole around," Randy said. "The local ski lodge is up for sale again. It needs to have some decent investment and management. I thought for a while about taking a shot at that, until I realized it would just piss up the evenings and weekends with Nicole in the winter, so the hell with that idea."

"Randy," Nicole said. "I told you last night that I wouldn’t mind if you took off sailing with Crystal and Scooter next winter, or whatever."

"Yeah," he said glumly. "And I told you that it wouldn’t be with you, and it would look like hell around town if I left you behind and spent a couple weeks in the Bahamas or something with a couple of single women, one of which happens to be a real, real close old friend. You may say you don’t mind, but if I was you, I’d damn sure mind."

Crystal shook her head. "Randy, just talking, but would it be any different if there was another guy along, maybe two? That might keep it from being quite so, well, overt."

"It wouldn’t look quite as bad," he conceded. "You got something in mind?"

"Absolutely nothing is set in stone," she replied. "Scoot and I decided we wouldn’t firm up anything till we’re running together next fall. There are maybe a couple of guides from other companies who could be talked into a week or two like that. Maybe Preach, there’s a possibility he may be free, maybe not. Maybe even Jim. Hell, even Buddha said he’d like to get out like that some time. I don’t know. I just know that you got the short end of that stick from me a lot, and got even more of it from Nicole. I realize you want to do the right thing, but I’d sort of like to help do my part to even things out a little, if I could."

"Randy, you could consider doing something by yourself," Nicole offered. "You mentioned that winter mountaineering course at OLTA last night."

"It was just a line to throw out," he said. "It really doesn’t interest me. Besides, I’m not a loner like some people I know. I like to have someone to share things with, both on the trip and after it’s over with. Believe me, Nicole, I’ve thought about it for years. Like, a year or two ago I thought about doing a sea kayak tour down in Baja. It costs a ton, you’ve got newbies who’ve never been in a sea kayak before, and it’s just a bunch of strangers. Crystal, you met Rod, one of our construction superintendents? Does martial arts with me? We talked about doing it, just the two of us, but now he’s taking college classes and he can’t go either. If Josh ever gets to the point where he’s not chasing off to Alaska to support Phil in the Iditarod, well, maybe, but he’s going to have a kid by next winter, and I don’t think he’s going to want to get away."

"Randy, you’re just making up excuses," Crystal said.

"I know," he sighed. "I’m sounding bitter. It’s just that I do like to get out and go once in a while, and I’m having trouble coming to grips with the fact that I can’t."

"There’s no reason you can’t," she protested. "I’ll tell you what. I’ll go talk to Josh and Tiffany. Under their new schedule, what with flying the dogs up to Alaska, they’re not going to be leaving until like early February. I’ll bet even Tiffany will tell him that he’ll be sick enough of dirty diapers by then that he can stand a week’s break sailing in the Bahamas, even if I have to pay for it. Hell, she might even be ready to leave the kid with her mother and come along."

"No, not this winter," he said. "It’ll still be too new. It is an idea for another winter, maybe. But hell, who knows? I may get lucky on construction schedules and get to run a half trip down here, anyway."

"You know," Nicole said. "There is an inkling of an idea. Phil and Josh and Duane, probably, will be going to Alaska in February. You could go up and help with the dogs."

"I thought about that, too," he said. "The hell of it is that I’m not quite like Josh. By February, I’m looking for something that’s a little warmer, not a little colder."

"Randy, will you quit making excuses?" Nicole said heatedly. "I’m getting so tired of hearing you make excuses that I’m about half ready to have Blake and Gil and Rod put you in handcuffs, put you on the plane, and send Crystal the key. I want you to get out and do something, I don’t care if it’s with me or not. It’s got to be better than having you drag your ass around all winter wishing you could get out and do something."

"Well, all right," he sighed. "I assume we’re going surfing down at Buddha and Giselle’s over Christmas, right? Maybe I could stay over a few days, and I could go sailing. That’s about your schedule, right Crystal?"

"Like I said, nothing’s set in stone," she replied. "I won’t be talking to Scooter until September, now, but we can at least pass notes back and forth slowly. I’m sure we can work out a week or two right after the first of the year. Nicole, you see what you can do about getting some guy from up in your neck of the woods to go along, I’ll work on it from this end, just to keep Randy from thinking we’re going to have an orgy or something."

The Canyon continued wide, with many distant views, and only gentle rapids which they rode through without much comment. Crystal and Nicole and Randy talked about it quite a little more, and Randy finally found himself warming to the idea of going out sailing in January if he couldn’t run the Canyon in November. He still wasn’t real comfortable with the idea – but at least it was something to look forward to. "Look on the bright side," Crystal grinned at one point. "You might just get lucky enough to run in November, go surfing in December, and go sailing in January."

"Now that," he said, in a somewhat better mood, "really is too much to hope for."

Along in the afternoon they were passed by the three motor rigs, now with side tubes rolled up and stacked on the decks, running hard for Lake Mead. They waved at each other, but the motor-rig guys had a long way to go and didn’t stop to talk, although Crystal commented that if it had been Jim in one of the GCR rafts, at least he’d have stopped to gossip for a minute.

Not long after that they were passed by a private trip of nine oar rafts, all rafted up in a huge cluster around one boat with a motor. As they only had the one motor, they were running very slowly, and there was the chance to talk for a bit. It turned out they’d been out for seventeen days and hoped to push to Fall Canyon at about Mile 211 that night, as they were limited to eighteen days and were behind schedule. In the process of talking, though, they found out that there was trouble on the trip: someone mentioned that the guy running the outboard had been out of cigarettes for two days, and was getting pretty cranky. "No problem," Jeff smiled, "been there and done that!" He dug around in his day bag, and pulled out a pack, then as Kevin pulled his raft alongside, passed it over, to a cheer from the whole private trip – there would be peace in camp that night – and a heartfelt thanks from the guy at the motor. Late that afternoon they pulled into camp at Parashant Wash. This was another side canyon, but this one wide and open compared to the ones that had gone before. There was a bigger view of the sky at this camp than at any they’d had for days.

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