i love that dirty water

swimming in that river, as everyone told me it would, backfired on me.

that nasty brown river called my name again during another rainy season downpour. a couple of us, jumped in, amidst the lighting into the muddy, trash-filled river. what a wonderful place. in a sky of grey, a muck of brown, i could barely see 5 ft in the chaos. I felt like Forrest Gump ¨when there was rain that flew in sideways...and sometimes rain even seemed to come straight up.¨

lets go back to an important fact of the story. that day, my parents sent me in some new shoes, Crocs. almost like sandals, but as Jon told me during Bonarroo, they were perfect for mud and concerts. so with this storm, with the lightning, in the muddy river, i went out in my new shoes.
they were as Jon described. I was outrunning my friends outside the river in the mud, my feet were invincible. to quote the best movie of all time again ¨i could run like the wind blows.¨ with the storm, the water was rising fast, we played a game of tag with a couple kids who were already at the river. as i was dodging being tagged, the river conjured up the its strength and bit my shoe right off of my foot.

i plunged under to find it in the mud, but the water was moving too fast, and the lightning picked up. it was getting dark and we had to leave. i walked away from the river with one, brand new, shoe.

for three straight days, as standard searches go, we went back to the river to look, unsuccessfully. digging up mud stained my fingernails for a day for two. in the mud, we found about 30 bottles of coke, tree limbs, a couple dead fish, and about 20 other shoes. but not mine.
it was a lost cause, and i accepted the fact that i just contributed to another peice of trash in our polluted river.

....

this all happend last month. and last week, one of my friends invited me over to tell mea story. he told me, as Joseph and I were walking past the river, i through a ball of mud at him, then he threw me off a 2 meter cliff, and i landed on that expensive shoe of yours. IT WAS FOUND

after a chicken dinner for everyone in the search party, it would seem like i learned my lesson, right? i know swimming in the river is dumb and i forgot to mention the rash i got on my back too (possibly how i wound up with those amoeba's and worms in my system as well) but then i thought....

the river is where my neighbors go if they want to go swimming. they dont get in their car and drive to Fradette´s or Provencher´s pool. they dont get in the car and do to Hampton Beach, much less do they go to their parents´ lake house. they go in that nasty, dirty, polluted river behind our houses. So Ive got my mind made up, and this year, I will too.