Meander Scars: Reflections on Healing the Willamette River

Shards of Beauty in a Fragmented Landscape

25 Shards of Beauty in a Fragmented Landscape vvv There are at least two ways to get in a kayak. If you have the guts and grace of my husband, you will grab the lip of the cockpit, nose the prow into the water, and kick off into the current with nary a splash. If you are like me, you will read books on how to use your paddle as a balancing device and practice on dry land before hitting the water. And you will still get wet. I had plenty of practice getting in my kayak the summer we paddled the John Day and Deschutes rivers, Anthony Lakes, and Wallowa Lake. But more than any other place, we paddled the Upper Willamette River. If it was a weekday, I’d watch the clock at work, making sure I wasn’t there an unnecessary minute, and dash home so we could do the trip before dark. Once home, we’d gather our gear without saying a word to each other. No time for conversation. Then, we’d throw everything in, make sure our dogs had plenty of water, and whisk out of the house. We could do the ten-mile Peoria to Corvallis stretch in a little under three hours and with enough light to find our way home. 26 Meander Scars During the first trip on the Willamette that summer, we drove to the put-in at Peoria, accompanied by gentle winds carrying the fluff of cottonwoods like snowdrifts. Summers here are pleasant dreams after a long spell of restless sleep. The rain stops, and people trade wool socks for sandals. They put away long johns, waterproof jackets, and wool hats. During this time of warmth, full of swallows and the chatter of western tanagers, the air carries the distinct essence of the valley: flat fertile fields, and beyond that, tree-stitched hills, ridgeline after ridgeline, and sunsets that lap the sea with an incandescent glow. This flash of beauty charges our batteries for the drudgery of rain and darkness during the rest of the year, and for this reason, no people may appreciate sunshine more than western Oregonians. No matter how much I hustle to the water, Ben’s always in his kayak first. This time, he was doing figure eights in the shallow slack waters of the put-in spot. Meanwhile, I was in the car fumbling with keys, stashing my purse under the seat, and trying to skitter out so Ben couldn’t tease me for being slow. My first time back on the Willamette for the season, I had to re-acquaint myself with the water after being away from it for so long. I felt awkward and tippy, and my arms burned as I tried to stay straight and keep up with Ben, who seemed calm as ever picking at his cuticles while waiting for me. Floating rivers—even open, relatively tame ones like the Willamette— requires reading the water. Not everything can be planned, and what can’t requires a mix of reaction and correction, which is likely more intuited than instructed. I’m fascinated by white-water guides who know how many forward strokes it takes to skid around a rock. But even the most practiced paddlers have to rely on split-second reactions. This is an important lesson to remember for a planner like me. Ben has a natural way of reading a river. He knows to hang on to the outside bank and catch the fast flow—something I had to figure out in a textbook. Sometimes, I’d be huffing and paddling red-faced to keep up, while Ben was letting the river do the work for him. My logical brain, which doesn’t shut off even when contradicted, thinks the inside curve is the shortest path, and I’ll be damned if it’s the slowest. 27 Shards of Beauty in a Fragmented Landscape Once you learn to read a river, you find it has a way of reading you. Personalities float up and become accentuated, in the same way water magnifies stones beneath its surface. The water reflects back your image, but not in exact form. What you see appears dimly familiar, but somehow changed, larger, and fuller than you imagined, and in that regard, a river can show us our essence. I am already prone to lingering; the Willamette brings out my inner slow...