Katie's birthday is on Saturday; she has asked for a new tube for the boat. Hmmm...yeah. I am going to have to think about that.
We spent a lot of time last summer at my dad's lake house tubing with the kids. It all seemed like good fun (and it was) until that last ride. I used to be able to tube with the best of them. I would DARE anyone to throw me off. Couldn't be done, I said. I had a death grip like no other and could withstand G forces that would make even the hairiest of pilots reach for their complimentary barf bags.
This last day, we had been tubing with the Marshall's and my dad all afternoon. Angela could hang with the best of them. For a California girl, she could holler woooooooooooooohoooooooooooo when flying over a wake better than Daisy Duke jumping a washed out bridge while being chased by Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane. You know Mike was proud.
I don't like to get into the water...personally. ON is fine. IN, not so much. It may sound a little sissified...but I don't care. I know that there are all sorts of things in there, weeds, large catfish (maybe even those bitin' kind like on River Monsters), oozy mud, more weeds, and lets not forget the GATORS. Plenty of them. But they only come out at night...so I am told.
Anyway, everyone had already tubed for the day...it was my turn. I didn't want to seem like a big wuss (although I am), so I made my way over to to the boat. I also don't feel comfortable getting into the tube from the back of his boat, but I am unable to get into the tube if I am already in the water. I look like a large seal trying to flip itself up onto a high dive. How many times have you seen that happen successfully? Yeah, I didn't think so.
So, I fall back into the tube, grab onto the handles and see my husband look backwards, thumbs up, and off we go. yay.
At first, he was taking it easy on me...a nice little grandma ride that I enjoyed immensely. It was a trap...he was just trying to lull me into a false sense of security. I saw him look back again, and maybe it was because I was kicked back, legs crossed, only holding on with one hand and sipping a fruity beverage, that he felt that I needed a little more action. I saw him push forward on the throttle, and the front end of the boat came up out of the water like the Titanic...in its final death throes...
Oh Lawdy...
OFF WE WENT like a bat out of hell. He started doing donuts and I could almost taste the butt enema I was getting, as I skated across his wake, while simultaneously being slung nearly around to the front of the boat. Maybe it was the maniacal grin on his face, but I started trying to recall if I had ever mentioned the value of my life insurance policies to him.
I was screaming at him to Please for the love of God and all that is Holy STOP, SLOW DOWN, ANYTHING. I couldn't let go to give him a hand signal (and I had a very specific one in mind) because I knew that would be the beginning of the end.
You see, I have water splatted many times before, and each time...I vow....that I will never ever ever ever get on a tube, water ski, or knee board again. Each summer rolls around and it is as if I have amnesia. Splat? What splat? I didn't do a face plant. I didn't ski myself into reeds cutting my legs into thin ribbons of flesh. I didn't hit a stump and catapult 29 feet into the air and oh so gracefully land on my face. That wasn't me.
OH...but it was.
So, there I am, my face has become rubberized, cheeks flapping much like a skydiver having just fallen 1500 feet in 4 seconds, I am contemplating my beneficiary choices, when the boat slows.
oh...thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou...
HOLDUP...I am leaning too far back in the tube...OhNo...I better reposition myself before I hit the wake or I will....
BOOM!...
I see sky...
and a pontoon boat...
and the Mississippi River...
(ok...I didn't see that last thing, but I shot way way up there...)
falling...need to turn so I don't land on my face again...almost there...(yes, I was multitasking my contemplations with some girly screaming)
SPLASH!
I'm in the water...ugh, this stuff is so nasty, please don't let me touch bottom, it's going to be gross... Good thing for the jacket...it just pops me back on top. AIR...sweet air. Oh hell no. GASPGASPWHEEZEGASP. Can't breathe! no air. wind must be knocked out of me. Relaaaaaaaaaaax. ahhh oooooommmm aaaahhh oooommmm. Breeeeeeeathe. Caaaaaalm...I suck in a little air. I still feel constricted, can't get in a deep breath. Lord...what have I done this time?
So, I floated...just laying there...like a dead whale gone belly up. Couldn't swim, couldn't take in a breath. I could hear Lloyd laughing as he pulled the boat along side me. I imagine that it was quite a spectacle to have launched me 50 feet in the air then watched my less than "clean" landing. She should get a 10 on the dismount, but a 2 on the landing.
He tells me to pull myself up on to the deck. I am only afloat because of my jacket and my double D's. I can't breathe, and can't move. I can't talk either. Maybe it was my lack of communication, maybe it was because I was gasping and wheezing, or it could have been the fact that my eyes had rolled back in my head...
The next thing I know, a long rod has been hooked into my jacket and I am harpooned and tossed onto the deck like a large fish. Only I didn't flop around. I just laid there, much like a dead one.
I could see him standing above me asking me what is wrong. I told him I didn't know....but I think I may have broken a rib or two. "DAYUM. that sucks.", he says.
you have such a way with words...
I waited three days to go to the Dr...yeah, dumb, I know. But if you have read my Dr stories then you know why I typically wait until I am on the verge of death before paying him a visit. I didn't break my ribs, but I did tear the muscles in between them. Hurt like a....well, it just hurt real bad.
So here it is...nearly summertime again. We have already had a few days in the 90's, the humidity has also returned with a vengeance. Maybe it is the humidity that plays tricks on my mind causing my amnesia or dementia, as it were.
I am contemplating the new tube that Katie wants. A bigger, badder 3-person tube. With additional jet propulsion. In green.
Hmmm...maybe I don't need to be DamYankee...I need to be DumbYankee.
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