Redemption

Redemption

June, the month the Colorado River gorges itself on mountain snowmelt as it picks up steam, weaving its way down the Western Slope. Rapids, calm, wide, narrow, shallow, deep, left turn, right turn. Six million years in the making, but it was today that mattered.

Carl often came to this place at river’s edge, the magnetic pull of the imagined and the unforgettable. The images played in his mind as often as the sun rises, creating a tapestry of memories and dreams competing for places in his mind. God made the human brain in such a way that it can only focus on one thing at a time, and Carl would do his best to push himself into the land of happy thoughts, far away from the terrible memory. It didn’t always work out that way.

“Don’t get too close to the riverbank, Carl. You don’t want to fall in. The current is pretty strong.”

Young boys don’t always listen. Carl got too close to the river, slipped on the wet grass, and fell in. His dad jumped in to save him. He saved Carl, but he couldn’t save himself. Try living with that.

Carl kept the part about his dad’s warning a secret, and he felt guilty about that, too. Throughout his life, the burden of knowing he was responsible for his father’s death never diminished. Age just made him a little more able to carry it.

It was easier for him to beat himself up over the tragedy if he stood at the riverbank where it all happened. It was a rerun bonanza, the sequence playing on a loop over and over again. Carl would switch the beginning around- it rained that day so they never went fishing in the first place; the snowfall in the Rockies that year had been less than average, reducing the water’s depth and flow; it hadn’t rained the night before, so the grass wasn’t slippery; he was the one who drowned that day and not his dad; and the one that tormented him for a lifetime, he hadn’t listened to his dad. No matter how many times Carl altered the what-if variables at the beginning, the end was always the same. His dad drowned in that river trying to save him.

“Carl, it was God’s will. Accidents happen. No, your mother doesn’t hate you for it. Let God be God, forgive yourself.”

Father John’s words couldn’t erase the guilt.

“Carl, you still have your life to live. You cannot change the past. You need to discipline your mind and think of the here and now… and your own future. Here’s some meds.”

Repeated visits and thousands of dollars on therapy didn’t move the needle.

“God, please… please remove the pain, or help me to find a way to live with it.

There were no answers to his prayers,

Some days, as a diversion from his reality, Carl would think about where the water had been and where it was going. He tried to picture the headwaters at the Divide, and its diminished state as it trickled through Mexico and into the Gulf of California. He thought of its effects on this land and its people. He imagined people fishing, rafting, and swimming upstream. He recognized that an indomitable force flowed before him, so powerful that it carved out the Grand Canyon and killed his father.

Self-inflicted blows hurt more than regular blows, and Carl was relentless. There was no explaining it away, no possible rationalization for what happened, no grey area. He had been warned. He didn’t listen. His dad died as a result. It was a prescription for sleepless nights and daily headaches.

His wife tried to dissuade him from coming to this awful place, but he wouldn’t… couldn’t stop. Sometimes she came with him to share the pain.

“Carl, you have to let it go. It wasn’t your fault. It was an accident. Try to find some comfort in the fact that your dad loved you so much he went into the river to save you.”

Carl was alone with his thoughts this rainy day. He replayed it in his mind, sliding down the riverbank and plunging into the cold, dark water, the overwhelming force of the river, the panic, and the fear. He remembered he didn’t call for help; he called for his dad. He remembered the strong arm of his dad wrapped around him, the words- “I’ve got you, I’ve got you”- and the long struggle to get to the riverbank. He could feel his hands grasping an overhanging branch, and the sight of his exhausted dad being pulled downstream and disappearing below the surface.

Carl often sat on a stump at river’s edge, but today it was surrounded by water. Tributaries swollen by the melting of record mountain snowfalls had overflowed their banks, and heavy rains the day before put the mighty Colorado into flood stage. Today had a special feel to it, as the rapid flow of the water helped put Carl back to those dreadful moments so long ago.

He heard there had been serious damage in several communities upstream, and he was disturbed by all the material, some natural and some man-made, flowing past him- tree branches, pieces of furniture, slats of wood, and… something unusual.

Carl focused on that one strange item bobbing around and rapidly moving downstream at the far side of the river. He strained his eyes through a light rain, and the image became clear. It was a small animal clinging to a piece of wood. He walked along the riverbank keeping pace with the flow. His pace quickened, and finally Carl needed to jog through the tall grass to keep up with the terrified animal.

Carl concluded it was a small dog, pobably a puppy, struggling to keep its front paws on the board. The puppy and board were being violently tossed about atop the waves, and Carl couldn’t believe the poor thing was still hanging on.

Who knows why men do what they sometimes do under duress? Carl didn’t think about anything. He didn’t wonder where the dog came from. He didn’t consider whether the dog could make it to safety on its own. He didn’t worry about his own well-being. He only saw a dog struggling to survive. As sure as his slide into the river was unintentional, his action today was without thought. An outside force was driving him to do the instinctive, the natural, the right thing, much as his father had done to save him. He ran alongside the river to get ahead of the dog, peeled off his shoes, and jumped into the river.

Carl was shocked at how cold the water was as the current grabbed hold of him and shot him helplessly down the river. He immediately forgot all about the dog as he was now in his own battle for survival. He had no control. He became part of the river and moved right along with the floating debris that once meant something to someone upstream.

The cold water numbed his arms and legs, and he thought this time the river would take his life. He thought of his wife. At least she would never know how this happened, that he had been so foolish to jump into a raging river to save a dog. And of course, he thought of his dad. He was now in the same battle. He could feel the fear and the sense of hopelessness his dad must have felt before the river took him.

He stopped fighting. He quickly learned it would be best to focus on keeping his head above water and let the river have its way with him. He was tossed around like a rag doll, and he thought of the moment his father wrapped his arm around him, but today he was on his own. Carl took a few shots to the head from the flotsam bouncing around alongside him, a few bumps and bruises, and one nasty cut to his forehead, but he was beginning to think he would survive.

The dog. The purpose of his being there. He looked around. No dog. He felt bad for the little critter, but having just survived his own brush with death, he couldn’t help but feel relieved.

The current slowed as the river widened. Carl figured he had traveled at least a mile in the frigid water. As he made his way to shore, his heart sank when he saw the little dog lying motionless on its side on the riverbank.

He didn’t cause the loss of a life like the last time. This time, he just couldn’t save one. Either way, he was again on the wrong side of a life-and-death struggle. An exhausted Carl sat on the shoreline with his head down. He was overwhelmed by thoughts of the terror the little dog must have gone through, the dog’s fight for his life, and his failure to save him. The saddest place on earth just got sadder.

And then it hit him. He remembered a story on the news. It was a video of a fireman carrying an unconscious puppy out of a burning building. The fireman was giving the puppy mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, and the puppy began to move in his arms. Carl had nothing to lose.

He picked up the lifeless body, put his mouth over the dog’s mouth and nose, and blew into it. Carl was shocked when the little tummy and chest expanded. He did it again, and again, and again. The dog moved ever so slightly, then coughed, squirmed, and spat up some water. Carl had brought the puppy back to life. It was the most exhilarating moment of his life, and he dropped to the ground and cried.

We’ll never know what the puppy was thinking at the time, but having no other friends in this world, he sat down next to Carl. He had survived the ordeal of the river and may have felt a bond with the guy who saved him. When Carl raised his head, he was happy to see the puppy beside him. He had no idea what kind of dog it was, other than it was living, and he made it so. He thought of how hard that little dog had struggled to stay alive out in the river, how its life mattered to him, and now it had a second chance at life. It occurred to Carl that perhaps he should make better use of the gift of life his father had given him.

Carl carried Swimmer back to his usual spot overlooking the river, holding his new friend close to calm his nerves and warm his body. He gazed out over the river and tried to put it all together… this place, life lost, life saved. He remembered his dad’s heroic dive into the river, and now felt a little bit like him.

“Let’s go home, Swimmer.”

Carl would often reflect on his common history with Swimmer, both plucked from the Colorado River to move on with life. In a strange way, Carl also felt a different sort of bond with his father. Maybe there was something in their genes as they had both done the same thing at the same place under the same circumstances. He knew what it must have felt like for his father to save him. There could not have been a greater purpose for his father’s life than to save his. Carl felt good understanding that.