I Ain't Dreaming Anymore; I'm Waking Up

 I think I've decided to reframe this blog. I think I want it to be more about me and less about other people. It started out as people I went on dates with. And it ended about the time I got married. I may be feeling a little cynical. Anyway, I think I'll turn it into a collection of tales from my past.

Yesterday, I went river swimming for the first time in years. It felt like a baptism. I've been having a really tough time for weeks, months, years and I think it's all finally decided to boil over. Explode outward. Folks keep checking on me because I'm so out loud lately. They seem to think my crying out is a sign of something bad. That's the thing about me, my depression isn't so dramatic. My darkness is a desperate quiet. Like I've been living in for years. 

A rather old friend shook me. Hard. Shook me all over and it hurt and it felt good and it woke me up. I don't know how to relate it to anything I've ever felt before. Phantom limb syndrome, but the limb is myself. But there's hope of getting it back. I'm hoping the shaking keeps happening. Because it's feeling. A wild,  half-feral, crushing, screaming, sharp wash of feeling. Like the doctor poking your foot with a pin to see if you feel it. You want to feel it. 

You hear people say that they feel like they're underwater. Underwater is my favorite place, so that isn't right. It's been more like standing in a crowd of strangers all yelling angrily, but you can't understand the words. Long enough like that, and you just feel like all that is directed at you. And I tend to put up walls around my walls and isolate myself and get quiet and turn all that inward.  Underwater would be quiet and calm and underwater would hold you and lift you. Underwater would be a calming weight and a hand in your hand. 

Y'all might be in for a wild ride. But I feel the urge to write for the first time in years. Maybe it's like that one guy said "Write hard and clear about what hurts" and that's all I've really ever been good at.

So the river. I was on my way South from a long day of travel and I told myself that I would get off the interstate at the first exit in Georgia and go to water. Just find it. I've been craving the river for weeks. I wanted to wash my face. I can't explain why I thought that I needed to do that and to do it in a river.  Everything about the water is balm. The sound of moving water is the most soothing thing I can think of. The smells, be it the metallic scent of river silt or the tang of sea air center me. The feel of water moving on my skin is always a tender touch. Always the right touch. The way I feel when I'm underwater, weightless, breathless, focused, the sounds only my own heart and the rush around me. The way it lingers on my skin and in my hair. 

I shot off the interstate and saw a sign for lakes, so I followed it. Lakes lead to rivers. I followed the signs until I saw one that said there was river access. So I followed that. I stopped at an opportune DG and bought a cheap pair of shorts and a soft, black sports bra. I'm nothing if not an optimist. I ended up on dirt roads where the GPS didn't even know how to find me. Slinging gravel on a dirt road. God, I love that feeling. About got my little car stuck. Shit, I did get it stuck, but I got it unstuck. Thanks to all those country boys I've known. Got the hell out of there. Stopped and stripped naked and changed into my makeshift wetsuit. It was much cooler.

I'd begun to lose hope that I'd even be able to dip my hand, to wash my face. And then I saw a sign. Sluice Access. I almost drove past, but she called.  I didn't know that was Bull Sluice. Class Five rapid on the Chattooga River. On the other side of the state from my home, but the name was  familiar and it felt right. I parked and got out of the car. I could hear it rush. I hoped so much I could get to the water, the stones, sharp flats and sandstone worn round and grainy. The fish and the water shrubs and all the smells of wet trees.

I followed  a steep, paved path down and down and down. I could hear her. Growing louder and closer. As if the very blood in my veins was reaching for her, rushing in time. The path split. A sign pointed right to Sluice and left to Beach. I never thought of a river having a beach. They have banks. But I went left. And through the trees, I saw a glimpse of black, the kind of black only the surface of a river can be. The path ended and there she was, sharp around to the right. I tore through the sand until I was standing there at the edge, making enough noise lest I disturb something best left between two. Not a soul around. I don't think I was ever fully still, yanking off my shoes and wading in. I knew the dangers. I know the secrets these rivers hold. A cottonmouth is not only venomous, but also aggressive. I always imagined these when the Egyptians spoke of the asp. No basis for comparison. I know about the pull of a rip current and though I swim like a river otter, I'm not impervious to those and the rocks and branches beneath the surface that I can't see, waiting for a soft spot to crash onto them and get entangled forever at the bottom.

Not a soul knew where I was. No cell signal. I was a hundred miles off the expected path. I did not care. I'm not reckless, but I felt reckless. A reckless abandon as I waded deeper. I could see the center of the river and the strong current. Drawn as I was, I also don't have a death wish. I didn't answer that call. I dipped under the surface and let myself sink to the bottom. The cool water slipping over my burning skin. Curled my fingers into the sharp silt. Held my breath and held and held. Until I couldn't. I thrashed toward the surface, sure enough rapping the back of my skull on a rock as I turned.

My mind was quiet in the cool evening, the fog laying over the surface toward the north bend, a remnant of the rain. A bridge downstream, but far enough that I doubt a soul would have noticed me there at the bank. I took down my hair and dipped in again. I could feel it swirling as I turned so it would wash down instead of over my face. The rush in my ears like a song.

I splashed around and swam as far as I felt wise for maybe three-quarters of an hour. The longest baptism. A washing away of self. I had silt in all my clothes and river water dripping off my hair and nose. I felt truly good for the first time in a long while. It was after sundown and dusk was settling in. I had to make it the fifty yards or so of unfamiliar, uneven, rock-strewn terrain to get back to the path. It was time. I picked up my shoes and my car key and my phone from the flat rock where I'd left them. I snapped a few photos to remember. I thanked the river, thanked my mother. 

I got into the car and drove home. By that time, I had completely lost my voice. Irony, I've found my voice and lost my ability to speak. 

My mind was calm until I went to bed. I felt unfettered. I still slept fitfully and woke up a mess, but that's expected. It was a heavy, momentous day. I can't be too upset with myself for being a little crazy. But I'm just "losing my balance, I'm not losing my mind." Y'all hang on for me. Hang on to me. Try to be patient and offer me a little of that river grace. I promise I will do my best to do the same.

Next up: another river story about grabbing hold of what you can't let go of.