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Illustration by Catherine Chan
This past summer, I asked my son, who was at our family cottage for his annual visit, whether it was time to get rid of the old red canoe.
I had bought it in 1970. It was not all that pretty, a red fibreglass 16-footer that was spartan and rather heavy. It served us well but eventually fell into disuse. It had spent years tucked away near the waters’ edge in a hemlock forest.
Should I sell it for $50 or just take it to the dump? My son told me we (meaning myself) had to keep it, then decided to put it in the water after removing the leaves and twigs that were covering it and some of the moss and lichen that was growing on the gunwales.
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He went for a brief paddle, claimed it to be seaworthy and left it tied up to my new dock before departing. My wife and I eventually pulled it out of the water and turned it over near the dock.
For the next few weeks it lay there but now it was more readily in my view. I am rather elderly (80+) with torn rotator cuffs in both shoulders and a bum knee, but I started to entertain thoughts of actually trying to get in the canoe and heading out for a paddle.
I was quite sure I could access the craft from a sitting position on the dock. Although I had not paddled a canoe for many years, I felt (sort of) confident the canoeing skills I had acquired more than 60 years ago as a summer camper and working in northern Quebec as a timber cruiser were still there. It must be like remembering how to ride a bicycle.
On a glorious quiet still summer evening and inspired by noted canoe worthies such as writer Roy MacGregor, canoe collector Kirk Wipper and explorers Radisson and Groseilliers, I carefully (and painfully) launched the old red canoe.
Without incident I lowered my geriatric self onto its bow seat facing the stern and disembarked from the dock. Forward progress was rather wobbly as my balance issues on terra ferma were magnified onboard the canoe. Using the paddle was another problem. My torn rotator cuffs meant the J stroke was a non starter; I could not raise the top grip of the paddle vertically to gain efficient forward propulsion. I settled on extending the paddle horizontally and dipping the side of the blade into the water, changing from side to side (again painfully) to keep the vessel moving in a straight line. My destination was around a point a few hundred metres from the dock, an area frequented by deer and moose.
What I originally envisioned to be a pleasant experience was turning out to be an excruciating event. My buttocks were hurting on the hard canoe seat (I had forgotten my seat cushion). My life jacket was nearby in the bottom of the craft and it could suffice as a cushion if only I could retrieve it. I decided to defer this until I was in shallow water around the point. Once there I struggled to reach the life jacket using the canoe paddle to try and drag it toward me. (I know, I know, I should have been wearing it, not tossing it out of reach where it was totally useless in case of a real emergency!)
Suddenly the canoe seat collapsed. The paddle went flying out of my reach into the lake and I had crumpled to the bottom of the boat, laid out lengthwise with my shoulders wedged down in the interior walls of the canoe. I lay motionless staring skyward. Now what? I realized if I wriggled too much I would overturn the canoe, which could be a very messy, if not my final, outcome. Is this how Tom Thomson met his demise, I wondered? I was out of sight and calling distance from my wife. Of course, I had forgotten my phone.
I slowly moved back and forth and extricated myself from the bottom wedge of the canoe but I did not have the strength to sit up; I could not lean on one side or I’d fall in. I now regretted quitting yoga for seniors many months ago. I finally managed to roll over in the canoe and push myself up and kneel facing backward. What a relief!
Then I noticed my paddle was now 10 metres away. Using the broken canoe seat as a makeshift paddle I slowly and painfully managed to reach the paddle and fished it out.
I slowly made my way back to the dock where my anxious wife was preparing her kayak to mount a search mission. Suffice to say her comments to me cannot be printed in this publication!
The canoe seat is now repaired and I suggested to my wife I might take it out again. “This time wear your life jacket, take the seat cushion and the damn cell phone!” she said.
This summer, however, I’ve chosen to enjoy the view from a chair on my floating dock, scanning the shoreline with my binoculars, drink in hand.
Tom Griffiths lives in Orillia, Ont.
