blue skies and cold water

The boy child and I escaped to the cool mountains of Colorado this past week. Colorado is one of my favorite places on earth, despite the tourist trap towns. Sometimes you just have to focus on the bigger picture--hiking among soaring peaks, cold mountain streams, clear lakes at 9000 feet, skies so blue I felt delirious, and especially experiencing all of these things with my teenaged son who some day will move on and have his own adventures without me. We went from Denver to Glenwood Springs for the first leg of the trip. Glenwood Springs is an area of hot springs where the Colorado river flows through the red rocks and vapor caves of Glenwood Canyon. We did our first whitewater rafting trip on a cold, clear Colorado morning. Andy and I volunteered to be the front oarsmen through the area of class three rapids. We were fairly quickly soaked to the bone as we plummeted down into white water and came up sputtering and laughing hysterically. Later in the trip, when we came to a deep, calm area of the river, the river guide asked anyone if they wanted to jump in. Despite already being cold, I had to jump in, and so I stood on the edge of the raft, whooped loudly, and went for it. Whenever presented with this kind of choice--sit in the boat and watch, or jump in and fully experience, I opt for fully experiencing. It is the only way to go, my friends. Jump in with both feet and feel the cold, clear water, no rubber raft between me and the amazing history of these rocks and this river. I finally talked Andy into joining me, and the river guide jumped in too. Andy told me later, "I'm really glad I decided to jump in. Because what if I hadn't and I always wondered what it would have felt like?" So, I know as a parent that this is a dangerous analogy to apply to everything in life. But things like jumping in cold rivers, things that will increase joy, should be experienced.