Let’s talk about summer fun; boats, kneeboards, inner tubes, seasickness, being sent into orbit, you know, the usual.
Mr. Presley takes it as a personal challenge to ensure you exit the inner tube within 2-4 minutes of ride time.
If you don’t remember him from a previous story, I’ll link it here to refresh your memory.
It was 2003. We went to the lake with close friends. They brought their souped-up Bayliner. First up for the day was me and Matthew Hutson.
Mr. Presley has figured out a way to create waves upon waves. He can generate them. He’s a professional wavemaker. Jesus calms them, and he creates them.
We won’t give away any secrets, but creating waves involves low speeds, a high bow, a low stern, and a dumb look etched across one’s face as they pretend they can’t figure out how to level the boat and increase its speed past “one-hundred-year-old tortoise with a limp.”
Such a thing was happening at that moment in time. We, the teenagers on the tube, didn’t realize the enterprising and cunning deed taking place a mere sixty feet ahead. We hollered and yelled and tried to tell him to go.
We wanted the thrill of gliding on smooth glassy water beside the boat as we zoomed across the lake.
But no. God forbid we should have a good time. He wanted to put us out of commission. He’s got an ornery streak a mile wide.
We didn’t realize that he was circling and crossing the waves. He finally pulled the tube out to calmer water and brought the watercraft around. Making sure to keep the rope taught, he made his way to the Maverick-sized waves, his very own detrimental creation.
“Man, what’s he doing?” I asked, exasperated.
“I don’t know…”
Matthew might’ve said something else, but at that moment, we looked down from the crest of a wave ten stories high. Then we knew.
We descended below the water line and completely disappeared from the surface of the lake.
Mr. Presley looked back and noticed there were no innertube or teenagers in sight. Then he gunned it.
Have you ever been to outer space? We’ve been. We came up the other side of that wave and went into orbit.
While we were floating in the stratosphere, I felt something smash into my head.
I thought it was my fellow tube enthusiast. I looked over, and he wasn’t close enough to reach me.
So I assumed the foot floating beside my head was my own.
An indeterminable amount of time later, we landed. All you could hear was a dull thud, what sounded like throwing a bag of feed into a concrete floor. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the opportunity to land feet first.
When we came up for air, the motor was off, and all we could hear was the ceaseless maniacal laughter of Mr. Presley.
At this point, it’s best to throw in the towel, make your way toward land, crawl up on the gravel bar, and pray the sky stops spinning before you lose it.
You haven’t lived until you’ve launched into orbit from the canvas covering of an inflatable raft.
Like I said, summer fun.
to my fellow space cadets,
– Caleb
caneymountainblog.com 