Thanksgiving Paddle

Article by Skip Johnson

This year Susie and I celebrated Thanksgiving with Mike and family at their place on Lake Houston. The reason I write this now is I had a chance to once more indulge in an old tradition and it stirred up so memories from years ago.

Since the late 1990s a men’s group I’m a member of has gone down to a local halfway house on Thanksgiving morning to donate clothing and to meet with the residents while still being back home early afternoon for family activities. The halfway house was in the Montrose area, more or less in the shadow of downtown Houston. After that area gentrified, the ramshackle place was sold for a princely sum and they moved out to Spring Branch, where they still operate today.

In those earlier days it was also my traditional last paddle of the season. After meeting at the halfway house I’d drive down to Eleanor Tinsley Park a few blocks away on Allen Parkway, and launch my little 14’ solo canoe in Buffalo Bayou and paddle down the confluence of White Oak Bayou in downtown Houston and then back to Eleanor Tinsley Park. It was a nice little paddle with the contrast of a fairly natural setting wandering through the maze of columns supporting the many lanes of freeway above. The only hassle was the long carry back up the hill from the bayou to the parking lot.

One Thanksgiving I remember we’d had a little rain a few days before. When I got to the bayou I looked at the current, which was a little stronger than normal, and thought I can do this, I’ll just hig the shore on the inside of the bends. So off I went, nice quick paddle. After turning around at White Oak Bayou and paddling back upstream I realized I was in trouble. There were some straight sections with enough current to both shores that I couldn’t make headway and there was no easy way to beach the canoe and portage in an urban jungle.

I managed to beach the boat close to White Oak Bayou, hid the canoe and hiked back to the truck, then drove down to pickup the canoe. I pulled out near the Riesner Street Police Station and asked an officer I saw there if it was OK to leave my canoe under a bridge abutment and go get my truck. He said no problem.

I had been doing this for several years and it had never occurred to me that there were a number of activities that transpired in downtown Houston on Thanksgiving. A parade, along with a festival with all sorts of concessions, bands and people packed curb to curb on the downtown streets closed for the holiday. I was attired in my customary paddling outfit—worn-out sneakers, ragged cut off jean shorts, short sleeve shirt of similar vintage mostly covered by a really sun-faded kapok style lifejacket. I was carrying a homemade double blade paddle in my gloved hands.

There were a few comments from the throng like “Mister, you’ve lost your boat” and a lot of folks nudging each other and staring. But what I remember most was how the crowd parted to let me pass. I never had to stop or ask for clearance, I just walked at a regular unhurried pace carrying my paddle vertically or sometimes at a slight slant, made eye contact at times as I smiled and walked on.

Once past the crowds, hiking along Allen Parkway, I had time to reflect on my single- minded pursuit of my boating activity and how it excluded anything outside my own personal interest.

In subsequent years I lost some of the self-centered blindness and became more aware of the rest of the world around me, but I’ve never lost the passion for small boats, their design, construction and use. As I write this my canoe waits patiently under cover at the shop next to our winterized powerboat until I can do a little remediation and improvements once the holidays are over. In the meanwhile Christmas is upon us. Family is coming here to celebrate, I’ve got one present to finish making and various tasks to do as Susie dictates. Life is good. •SCA•