Tales From Exit 22 by Al Batt

Dad whittled on a stick with his battered Barlow jackknife.

He didn’t carve anything, he just made the stick shorter. I thought it was a mindless task, but now I know better. Whittling was my father’s method of meditating.

I meditated while canoeing the Missouri River, following the trail of Lewis and Clark on their epic adventure. I’d been to Great Falls and Fort Benton before floating away from Virgelle, population two and one of the two was out of town.

Montana really does have a big sky. Clouds were scarcer than affordable dental insurance plans for hens.

I didn’t encounter many people on the Big Muddy. Most of those I did worked for the Bureau of Land Management, which is responsible for 8.7 million acres in 10 states.

I put up a tent each night and ate by campfire while removing mud from my shoes.

I saw rattlesnakes, horned toads and prairie falcons. I heard a sonic boom that brought memories of rattling windows of my childhood. Western kingbirds feuded above my tent during the day and bats, acting like winged welcome wagons, pooped on it during the night.

The poet wrote, “And what is so rare as a day in June?” I don’t know, but I do know that I’m lucky to have 30 of them every June.

I carried binoculars and a camera. When I wasn’t using a paddle, I was using binoculars or camera.

As I glided through the water, I saw a beaver near the shore. The animal looked as if it’d make a swell photo. I readied my camera and paddled closer to the critter.

I took some photos. I followed the advice of Earl Weaver, former manager of the Baltimore Orioles, who believed, “If you play for one run, that’s all you’ll get.” His strategy was to bunt only when one run would win a game. He claimed swinging away was more successful. I had photos that were good enough, but I decided to swing away and get closer to my subject.

The beaver had been busily eating and ignoring me until I entered the water it had determined to be sacrosanct. It gave me a nasty look, tossed its food away, and slapped the water with its tail. The warning made a sound like a sonic boom. The question was whether I was going to use common sense and paddle away. The answer was either “no” or “not applicable.” I inched nearer. The beaver swam in my direction. It appeared irate. A beaver can weigh up to 60 pounds. This one was part bear and I guessed that it punched above its weight.

I couldn’t undo what I’d done. You can’t unsneeze a sneeze. I considered calling in an airstrike, but I didn’t know how. I had neither cellphone nor signal.

There was no whining on the yacht. I’m a strong believer in the adage, “Whatever you do, do something.”

The something I did was to put down the camera and paddle furiously. At first, I paddled in circles in an unconscious attempt to baffle the beaver.

Harry Fosdick wrote, “Life is like a library owned by the author. In it are a few books which he wrote himself, but most of them were written for him.”

The library available to me while being chased by a beaver down the Missouri River was skimpy.

Harry Fosdick is no relation to Fearless Fosdick. Fearless Fosdick was a character in the comic strip “Li’l Abner” done by Al Capp. Fearless, a parody of Dick Tracy, was a dim-witted, but determined police officer.

I didn’t have any time to wonder what Fearless Fosdick would have done. I was too busy doing what I did.

A Siberian elder, neither Harry nor Fearless Fosdick, said that if you don’t know the trees, you might get lost in the woods, but if you don’t know the stories you might get lost in life.

As the beaver that refused to retreat reduced me to a stammer, I knew I had a story. The problem was that I didn’t know the ending.

I stopped several times to look back. I had to. The canoe had no rearview mirror. This action infuriated the beaver.

The ill-tempered beaver chased me down the Missouri River. I made good time. It was Lewis to my Clark. I feared the Minnow would be lost, but the beaver finally tired of the chase.

If the beaver’s behavior had been pleasant, it might have a holiday named after it, like its fellow rodent, the groundhog.

 

Hartland resident Al Batt’s columns appear every Wednesday and Sunday.