River Passing
Another friend has ceased to be. Now, rather than drive to a birthday party in Houston this weekend, I’ll drive to a funeral in Uvalde. The friend in question owns a ranch on the Nueces and we camped there at least once every year, sometimes with just our family but mostly with a group of friends (see the above picture). She and I weren’t talk everyday friends, but she knew my name and knew my family and I know her name and knew her family and now she’s gone.
Her name was Sky, which seems pretty appropriate for a girl who lived on a river. She loved that river and worked hard to protect it, and now her daughter is taking up the cause, because river’s need protecting from careless people, and it’s a full-time job. I first came to her river on a July 4 weekend of lord only knows what year, maybe ‘82 or ‘83. But it was hot, and I wondered how in the hell we’d survive a camping trip with three young children in this desolation. Then I saw her river and we were all hooked.
I missed our trip to the river this year because it was graduation weekend in Houston, and now I’m going on the much sadder business of mourning. But if loving a river teaches you anything, its that it never stays the same, and some years it’s full and some years its shallow, and sometimes it runs underground until its safe to come out. Now the task of protecting the river falls to her daughter and son just as it fell to her when her father passed. I believe it will be in good hands, and I’ll give those hands a squeeze this weekend to say we’ll help as long as we’re able because that’s what Sky would have wanted and its what I want.
John W. Wilson is the author of The Long Goodbye: A Caregiver's Tale