“Little Niagara” by Taylor Tower Elsewhere 2014
David strapped the last of the gear into the supply boat, the needle-prick pain in his lower back crawling up his spine and settling in his shoulders. His breath was shallow and labored and every cough brought up something like wet cobwebs in the back of his throat. It was Wednesday, the final leg of the four day white water rafting trip that covered one hundred and seventy miles through Utah’s Canyonlands National Park.1 Today they’d hit the rapids at the confluence of the Green and Colorado rivers in Cataract Canyon, a remote and Martian-like landscape of red sand and silt-laden water the color of chocolate milk that had been carving moonscapes into the rocks over thousands of years. The group had left from Moab on Sunday at eight a.m., six of them in all. There were the two boatman, Charlie and Brian, plus three travelers who’d paid $1,845 for the opportunity to surrender themselves to a kind of remote and beautiful danger that eluded them in their regular lives. David was there for free, working as a swamper, setting up and taking down camp, and hauling gear. On Sunday, the shuttle took them to the Green river, where they traveled a ways before hiking three hours into the first campsite at Three Canyon. David had muled the gear over rocks and through narrow passageways, distracting himself from the dizzying heat by singing the Gilligan’s Island theme2, though he could only remember one part, so he sang it over and over.
Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale
1
2
See The First Book of National Parks by Norman Lobsenz, page 18.
Visit the Elsewhere soundcloud page to hear a re-enactment (soundcloud.com/elsewheremuseum).
A tale of a fateful trip That started from this tropic port Aboard this tiny ship The mate was a mighty sailing man The skipper brave and sure Five passengers set sail that day For a three hour tour A three hour tour
It was late May, the beginnings of summer. John had said it’d be physical work, but beautiful, and an opportunity to get away from everything, clear his head and make a little money. Monday night, he’d started drinking right after dinner, chain-smoking and shooting the shit with Brian. As the sweetness of the rum mixed with the smoke of cigarette after cigarette, he was absorbed by the peculiar and inexplicable sounds around him and realized he was feeling happiness for the first time in a long while. He shook off the stifling confines of the past few months living with his mother, following dead end job leads, asking for money. His mother’s love was an exhausting thing, a suffocating current that held him under. Always smiling, she doled out shallow encouragements, proclaiming that a man could do anything if he set his mind to it. It was her response to the many low periods throughout his life, a loop that kept repeating. She was in her early sixties but weakened by emphysema, trailing an oxygen tank wherever she went, the tubes in her nose now a part of her identity. He had trouble remembering what she used to look like. Careful to step over the oxygen tubes as he walked through the house, he was reminded of a day in kindergarten when a classmate warned him to avoid cracks in the sidewalk. He’d return home from school, always relieved in the same way to see that his mother’s back was not broken. The emphysema kept her indoors, that and Moab’s sweltering heat, and after a while she stopped getting dressed. Instead, she spent hours in her ankle-length
nightgown, a faded mauve with lace trim, sitting in his father’s La-Z-Boy, a picture of him on the TV tray beside her. For David, that picture had become a kind of ghost, his father’s stern face as stiff as the suit he wore, a man well over 6’ who’d made a fortune from inventing indoor sprinkling systems for commercial buildings. He must have been about forty or so in that photograph, the same age David was now. By that age, his father had settled into an insidious, claustrophobic simplicity that seemed to David a relic from another time: a wife, a family, a successful career, a house with a den where he could shut everyone out. When he was sixteen, his father died of a heart attack. His secretary found him face down on a pile of papers. David and his father had never shared a full conversation. His father saw his son’s passions, shifting and changing every day, as a fleeting, sinful thing. It was an adolescent preoccupation, a phase to pass through. David was a fat kid whose pubescent growth spurt to 6’5” took the fat with it. He occupied himself with plans of becoming a successful entertainment man – a talent agent, a big time record executive, a television producer. He role-played in his room, signing deals with stars, one of his father’s unlit cigars hanging from his lips. TV captivated him from his earliest memory – the worlds flickering, flirting with him through a glass screen. As the baby of the family and the only boy, he had the luxury of both being and not being – coddled by his mother when she noticed him and left to his own devices when she didn’t. So he’d sit cross-legged on the rug, inches from the television, until his mother abruptly turned the dial and the image flickered into nothing as she rasped into his ear, “you’ll ruin your vision.” He’d close his eyes then, hoping to hold traces of what he’d seen on the screen for just a little longer.3 His memories of his father were of his smell more than his physical presence. His father smoked cigars that coated the downstairs den in a thick haze. He lumbered through the house, his smell marinating everything in its wake.4 When he
3
Take one of the viewfinders from the shelves or table near you and see what image David held onto. 4 Take a moment to smell the tie that is tucked inside of The First Book of National Parks by Norman Lobsenz. That is what David’s father smelled like.
wasn’t traveling, he was in his den with the door closed. He was present in the way fathers were present in the 1950s and 60s – as a sentence uttered by his mother when she was upset with him: “Wait until I tell your father about this.” After his father’s death, David was left alone with his mother. When she looked at him, she could only see his father. She waited for him to become that man. Immovable in her desire, planted in his father’s La-Z-Boy, she continued to wait, placing her tea cup next to the photograph on the TV tray and telling David he’d get his break soon.
Out of the corner of his eye, David saw Jerome, the doctor who was traveling with his wife Jan.5 Jerome was sitting on a boulder about thirty feet from the tents where his wife and the other travelers and crew were getting into their rainsuits and life jackets. “Hey Jerry, mind if I join you?” David collapsed heavily next to him without waiting for a reply. “Good afternoon,” Jerome said, his eyes still fixed on the sprawling red rocks ahead of him. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it? You know, my mother lives in Moab and I’ve been staying with her for a while, only until I get back on my feet. I just can’t get enough of this landscape.” Jerome nodded by way of agreement, but said nothing. “I think I’ve just been taking it for granted,” David said. He picked up a rock and it dusted his hands the color of rust as he turned it over. “You’ve been on these trips a lot, haven’t you?” “Yes, for the past six years. My wife and I really enjoy it. We look forward to it all year.”
5
Turn to the back of The First Book of National Parks by Norman Lobsenz to read the witness reports from Jerome and Jan Sobieraj.
“Yeah,” David said, nodding with his eyes closed. “I think it’s just that I’m bored, you know? That dulls your senses, your drive. It dries up your ideas. I feel like I’ve done everything I can do but nothing’s getting going. John’s a friend of mine, actually, that’s why I’m here.” He let the rock fall between his hands and wiped the dust on his shorts. “Our mothers are friends, old friends. They introduced us about fourteen years ago, I guess it was, in Moab. I went off and did my own thing in Portland, working at Mincey studios, and then made my way to L.A. and recorded some people there but John and I always managed to stay in touch. Navtec Expeditions6 is his family business, you know, I’d always heard about it but never went on any trips myself. One night, after my mom went to bed, I was sitting in my father’s old La-Z-Boy, watching some garbage on TV, probably on my sixth beer, and I thought, what the hell am I doing, just spinning my wheels like this?” He opened his arms up in a quizzical shrug. Jerome shifted over on the boulder. David pulled out a cigarette from his pocket and tapped it against the rust-colored stain on his thigh. “Smoke?” he gestured to Jerome, who shook his head. David placed the cigarette between his lips and lit it, all in one motion. “So I decided to call up John,” he said through a deep exhale of smoke. “We’re on totally different schedules. He’s one of those up with the sun, down with the sun kind of guys and I’m sure I woke him. I said to him, ‘John, I’m bored, I gotta get moving. You got anything for me to do with Navtec?” He flicked gray ash onto the red sand and laughed at his own temerity. “But John didn’t miss a beat. He said, ‘well, we need a swamper for the trip to Cataract Canyon next week. I can throw you a little cash for that and you’d get a trip out of it for nothing.’ I had no idea what a swamper was, but John said it was basically an assistant to the lead guides, hauling equipment and stuff like that, so I figured why not? This heat is something else though. I was gonna go swimming with you guys the other day but I just ended up dousing myself with a bucket of water.”
6
Book a rafting trip with Navtec Expeditions by visiting their website (navtec.com).
Jerome stood up and sighed deeply through his nose. David dropped the cigarette from his fingers and crushed it into the earth. “I can’t shake this hangover. I even took a nap yesterday and had a little hair of the dog, just a drop, but it won’t let up.” Jerome had already started walking towards camp. “I think we’re about to head out,” he said, one hand swatting at the air towards the rafts.
A sign on the shore read “Cataract Canyon. Warning: Dangerous Rapids 2 mi. Welcome to the Fun Zone.” David climbed into the supply boat with Charlie and they pushed off towards the first of the three “Big Drops”, three rapids that run together, the second one a fall of nearly thirty feet and nicknamed Little Niagara.7 The Big Drops are some of the roughest rapids in the country, powerful hydraulics reducing rafts to a child’s toy circling a bathtub drain, heaving and spinning helplessly in the foaming water. David and Charlie’s raft entered the rapid and bucked like a wild horse. The water slammed the boat in waves that engulfed them both, David blinking and gasping for breath. The raft took on water and David couldn’t tell when the river stopped and they began. Charlie called to him to help punch the waves, but the thrashing was so strong it threatened to pull his arms from his sockets and he didn’t dare move. Brian followed in the remaining boat with Jerome, Jan and the third passenger, Don. They rocked and tossed but stayed afloat, Jerome and Don punching the waves and Jan bailing water. They joined Charlie and David where they’d pulled ashore above Little Niagara. Charlie and Brian climbed a rock that hung over the water in order to scope out the best approach to the remaining two rapids. David sat on the shore, watching them. His body was soaked and heavy. He could barely lift his arms. The trip was almost over, and this weekend he’d see his daughter. He was traveling to Oregon for his nephew’s high school graduation and could crash with his sister. Money was 7
Watch a video of a raft going through Little Niagra by searching this phrase in YouTube : 2009 Cataract Canyon Big Drop 2 - Chaos as Little Niagra eats Karen for lunch
running out and he already owed his sister a few thousand from the trouble in Nashville, trying to record his friend’s album. It had seemed like such a sure thing. Maybe his ex could offer up a few dollars. He heard she had just sold her house and bought another one, a bigger one. He winced at the thought of speaking with her, the judgement, the accusation ripe in her voice. Still, she would have to let him see his daughter. He’d pick things up again, maybe move to Portland and get in touch with some old contacts, start up some new projects. He noticed Charlie and Brian coming down from the rock and stood up slowly, water sloshing in his ears, and headed towards them. Jerome and his wife were standing by the second raft, Jan shielding her eyes from the sun with one hand. “I wonder if I should volunteer to help Charles bail water,” Jerome said to her. “No, I don’t think so honey. We should stay with the boatman specifically assigned to us.” “I suppose so,” Jerome said, and put his life jacket back on. The two of them climbed into the second raft and Charlie and David got into the supply boat and pushed off towards Little Niagara.
David never thought he’d have kids. By the time he was in his 30s, single and moving around every few months, he had pretty much determined that it wasn’t going to happen. A friend of his, Theo, who he’d met at a casting agency in Portland, told him about her friend Danielle. Theo and Danielle worked part-time at Poncho’s, a little dive bar and restaurant that had live music three nights a week. “She’s amazing, David,” Theo said over drinks at her apartment. They sat on her balcony, overlooking the complex’s pool. “She’s funny, smart, sharp as nails and absolutely gorgeous.” David had been single for a while at that point, a trail of false starts and failed moves on roommates and co-workers behind him. He agreed to stop by during Danielle’s shift the next night. Theo would introduce them.
For him, the attraction was immediate. He saw her the moment he walked through the doors. Ten people were clustered around her in rapt attention. She had a tray of drinks balanced on one hand and was waving wildly with the other, underscoring the dramatic peaks of the story she was telling. Her deep voice radiated from her small frame, and when she laughed, the bun on top of her head flopped back and forth. They had shared a few drinks and taken a cab to her place, an old 1920s farmhouse that she had renovated with her ex-husband. They walked the property, her voice filling the darkness with the plans she had, the house she would build on the empty lot with her own hands. He’d never met a woman whose drive was so fierce, whose humor was based, as his was, in confrontation. Just six months later, she was pregnant. He hustled for jobs and managed to get a few contracts, recording rock bands in a bathroom-sized studio in the warehouse district. When Taylor was born, he held her in his arms in the weak light of dawn, her new smell overpowering the sterile stench of hospital. Her body warmed his arms and he leaned in close, singing softly, “tator tot, tator tot, she’s the sweetest girl I’ve got.”8 She clutched his index finger and they swayed together in the rocking chair, a simple, full happiness rising up in him. It was about this time that things began to bottom out. Contracts fell through and the ones that remained weren’t earning him enough money. One night, as he took a smoke break outside the recording studio, a woman edged towards him from the EconoLodge parking lot across the street. “You wanna party?” she asked, her voice like a scratched recording coming from somewhere far away. David took a final drag of his cigarette and smiled, dropping it without stomping it out. “What do you have in mind?” he asked. She pulled out a crack pipe from her purse, black pleather with tassels on a gold strap. He took out his lighter and lit the rock for her, the smell overwhelming him, filling his stomach with butterflies. She passed it into his hand.
8
Real song that my dad used to sing to me as a kid.
He didn’t get home until well after three a.m, and Danielle was on the floor of Taylor’s room, holding her in her arms. Her stomach muscles were cut up in the C-Section, and two months later, she still had to crawl on the floor and use the bars of the crib to pull herself up and reach inside to get the crying baby. David didn’t know why, but he told her about the woman and the crack. Her eyes were lined in red, her lips chapped. She told him he could go into rehab tomorrow or leave the house and never see her or their daughter again. He checked himself in the next day. That was nine years ago and he was clean but he had never come back to the house. He moved to L.A., taking Taylor to Universal Studios and Disneyland on her trips to see him every summer. He loved to sing to her, to make her laugh, and he looked forward to those visits with an anticipation that shut out everything else. Once, after a day at the beach where they’d seen a dolphin in the waves, he woke up in the middle of the night to her cries from the living room. He padded lightly on the carpet and saw her sitting up, holding a picture of her mother.
One of the most remote districts of Canyonlands National Park, Cataract Canyon is cut through with fourteen miles of rapids, fed by snowmelt from the Rocky Mountains. Peak flows in late May and June create the biggest whitewater in North America. David sat in the back, watching Charlie strain against the water with his oars, trying to get the raft at the right approach. The water thundered in his ears, thrashing all around him, as the raft plunged over Little Niagara. The force was incredible, and David felt the raft “dump-truck,” a term he’d learned during the safety instruction session they’d had at camp the day before as something you do not want to happen. The raft became perpendicular to the water, propelling David forward and over Charlie. He screamed, his voice muted in the roar of the water, and threw out his arms. He got a hold of Charlie’s life vest, his fingernails scraping the surface in a sickening and pointless motion before there was no feeling but water all around him.
He closed his mouth and tried to hold his breath, looking for the surface of the water. He felt that he was moving and still all at once. His eyes were open but he saw nothing, the urge to take a breath burning his chest, mounting pressure in his head. His mouth unhinged, taking in water full of sand that clawed at his throat on the way down. He felt relief, a heavy, powerful hold on his body, and closed his eyes. He saw his apartment complex in L.A. and Taylor in her yellow water wings and red life jacket, bobbing in the pool.9 “Go to the bottom and let me ride on your back, like a whale,” she said, dog paddling towards him in the pool. He helped her onto his back, her smooth little arms encircling his neck, and she made herself flat against him. He took a deep breath, his chest rising with warm air, and told Taylor to do the same. He felt her chest expand against his back, and he counted down from three and plunged under. He had his eyes open and the sun was slicing up the water with light, so clear he could see anything. Taylor’s arms tightened around his neck and her legs waved in the water like seaweed. He tapped the bottom of the pool and headed back to the surface, the world quivering through the waves they had made. When they broke through, they were both laughing.
“People in the water!” Brian shouted as the second raft approached Little Niagra. Jan, Jerome and Don punched the waves and the raft lurched through the rapid and kept moving. Jerome saw Charlie on the shore, running downriver, following the empty raft and the gear. “Do you see Dave?” Jan screamed over the pounding water before she saw him, being carried upstream by the current. They rode towards him, shouting his name. He was floating on his back with his head resting on his life jacket. Brian rowed upstream after him and Jerome and Don pulled him out of the water. They
9
Look in the envelope at the back of The First Book of National Parks by Norman Lobsenz to see a picture of Taylor and David at the pool.
laid him across the front of the raft on a mat. Jerome gave him a firm punch to the chest, a precordial thump. Brian felt both sides of his neck for a pulse. “Do you feel anything?” Brian said. Jerome alternated sides, his fingers resting on David’s neck for a long time, and he leaned in, putting his ear to David’s chest, listening. He raised his fist and gave him two more precordial thumps and a breath into his mouth. Water came pouring out of his nose and Jerome turned his head to the side to let the water out. He did this two more times. The water didn’t stop coming. “Should we start CPR?” said Brian. “His pupils are fixed and dilated. His lungs are full of water,” said Jerome. Jerome brought one hand over David’s face to close his eyes. Brian steered the raft to shore and anchored it and they went upstream on foot to get Charlie. Towing David’s body in the second raft, they traveled towards Powell Lake and the Park Rangers.10
It was Saturday, nearing six thirty, and Danielle was scrubbing a pot with steel wool at the kitchen sink. Taylor was sitting on the front porch, waiting for David to pick her up for the end of season trophy dinner at Roundtable Pizza. All her baseball teammates would be there, and her coach, and the first trophy she’d ever receive, a little golden figure in mid-swing and her name engraved on a silver plaque below. She’d been sitting out there for an hour already, watching the empty space in front of the house, willing his car into being. He had called before he left on his trip to say he was coming up to Portland this weekend and was going to see Taylor. It was a demand. He had hung up the phone before Danielle could speak, and she stood clutching the receiver until her knuckles turned white and her fingers ached.
10
To read the Incident Report from the Glen Canyon Recreation Area Park Rangers, as well as the Medical Examiner’s report, turn to the back of The First Book of National Parks by Norman Lobsenz and look in the envelope.
“Where’s dad?” Taylor stood in the doorway, startling Danielle out of her growing rage. She dropped the pot into the sink and it made an unnaturally loud noise. Taylor winced. “When your father dies, we’re going to dance on his grave,” Danielle shouted. The phone rang then, and she wiped wisps of hair from her forehead with her soapy hands and picked it up. Taylor could hear a murmuring on the other end but could not make out the words. Danielle hung up the phone and kept her hand on the receiver. “What’s wrong?” Taylor asked. Danielle answered without taking her eyes from the phone. “Your dad was in an accident. He drowned.” Taylor imagined a mound of dirt with a drooping daisy marking her father’s resting place. Her voice bubbled up and escaped her mouth with urgency: “Are we going to dance on his grave?” Danielle walked into her bedroom and closed the door.
Glen Canyon National Recreation Area Ranger Station: (435) 684-2457 Hite, Utah
INCIDENT REPORT Cayonlands
NP
rangers
encountered
the
river party while
conducting an upriver control and transported three of the party members back to Hite where Glen Canyon rangers were notified. Canyonland ranger Walton then went back upriver and towed the raft with Tower’s body and the last two party members
to
Hite.
The
San
Juan
county
sheriff’s
office
responded to Hite and arranged to have the body transported to Blanding. The boat accident happened in Canyonland NP.
Office of the
Medical Examiner 48 Medical Drive Salt Lake City, UT 84113
Deceased: David Stetson Tower Age: 41 Sex: Male Race: White Date of Birth: 9/28/53
Summary: Last seen alive at 1:30. He was notified at 2:15pm. Body ordered to the morgue by Zita Baer, mother, over the telephone.