This Thursday by John Wagner

It was Thursday. I had predecided that my plan was to drop into left side Phil’s and that was it. I said that I might go into right side but I never actually thought I was going to, at least until I got flushed so fast even I couldn’t consider it a beatdown. So I tried again and flushed almost as fast, at that point it no longer held any thrill and so there was no point, I was going to just run thread the needle but Becca somehow convinced me to run right side. I have never in my life been as scared as I was then, in a seemingly shrinking eddy. I decided to get it over with, with a lot of encouragement from Becca and paddled out. As I went through the waves above with my heart pounding I almost chickened and ran the tongue, but after a mental debate ran into the side. I felt the boat flip over me and popped out the other side of the hole, Phil’s cheated me out of a good beatdown three times. In the eddy below I was quite disappointed and frustrated that I had wasted my runs flushing, then David asked me if I wanted another go, I had to resist the urge to jump out of my kayak as I scrambled up the shore for a real beatdown, or at least a more satisfying one.