Floating Down The River

Evan was unhappy.

The life jacket he was forced to wear, upside down, to secured his bottom

And made any attempt to control his speed a wasted effort.

“This has ruined my vacation” he lamented, in a loud aggrieved voice.

No, this 8 year-old did not like this at all.

That is... until he saw his Grandpa floating on his back.

Now that made a difference.

Everyone, except Grandpa and Evan, seemed to really dig

The calm , bright, blue-green water, and the “tolley” grass

That encroached from the low-lying isles bordering the river,

Where translucent whiffs of fog evaporated before they could ascend.

Evan’s parents and the others on this float trip,

Forced  by the upside down life jacket to sit upright,

Sailed downstream.

Grandpa, unable to see or steer,

Was helplessly drifting into the isles root system

Poor guy, must’ve had strange body weight distribution.

When he tried to sit the life jacket flopped him down.

Leaving him to view the sky and the occasional mangrove branch

That would accept Grandpa into its thorny embrace.

Grandma dragged Grandpa back to the middle of the stream,

Pointed him in the right direction,

Only to repeat the effort 5 minutes later.

She tried to get him upright

But that effort propelled the old guy

Into a face down position,

Making drowning nearly inevitable.

Seeing Grandpa, pulled out of his “dead man’s float” dragged to a sitting position,

Only to flop onto his back again,

And float once more in the general direction of the Pacific Ocean,

Delighted Evan. To him this was “very cool”.