Paddling used to be as primal a need as food or sleep. Now it fits into my life about as conveniently as polo or skydiving.
I fell in love with a woman who’s afraid of the ocean. The same thrills that drew me to kayaking in the first place—bobbing on open ocean swell in a tiny boat, navigating by the frenetic boom of waves on rock in a shroud of fog—scared the bejeezus out of her.
Accepting this was my first lesson in the great compromise of marriage. Despite all we share in common, a handful of the things we most love will never be understood by the other.
Our biggest argument ensued after I left for a kayaking expedition two weeks after our honeymoon. I didn’t see the problem. I mean, it’s not like you’re supposed to suddenly change everything you do just because you’re married, right?
Now that my wife and I have moved to the city and have two children, kayaking has reached a crisis point of arch-irrelevance. To the Inuit hunter, the kayak and paddle were his livelihood. For the modern This is 40 dad who doesn’t happen to be a kayak guide or instructor, the mid-size hybrid and iPhone have taken its place. Pretending otherwise introduces a tension of trying to maintain a relationship with a competing reality. It’s like having an affair, being a mountaineer or becoming an Ironman triathlete. Trust me, I tried that too (the triathlete, not the affair). Entire books have been written about the lives these pursuits have destroyed.
Money got tight and I sold my beautiful, British racing green expedition kayak to a mid- dle-aged family man. Recently, I heard he was fighting to hide the boat from his wife in divorce proceedings. Letting go of that kayak strengthened my marriage, so I’m not entirely surprised to hear it worked the other way for him.
The kayaks I still have sit idly in the backyard gathering tree resin and pigeon poop. Last year I went almost the entire season without paddling. Then I discovered that a raccoon had completely chewed out my kayak’s front bulkhead and foam thigh braces.
That explains all the screeching I heard out the window at night, which sounded not un- like a chattery version of, “ What are you doing spending so much time in that kayak?” And now there’s one lonely raccoon with foam stuck in its teeth that won’t be having any babies this spring—but at least I’m still getting laid.
If I did convince my wife to go kayaking, we’d need an armada worth several months’ mortgage payments. When did kayaking become so expensive? I can’t imagine justifying the purchase of even one more piece of gear. I’m as likely to buy a ticket to the moon.
Every time I go through the old kayak gear from my bachelor days, I thank God I bought it all when I still could. I hear a cash register ringing as I caress these carbon fiber and Gore-Tex artifacts. The Easter Island heads of my youth—monuments to the decadence of times past.
A select few of these items—despite their high potential resale value—have survived wave after wave of de-cluttering our tiny downtown house. Partly due to their totemic value, but also because, deep down, I am still a believer. Days spent on wilderness coastlines taught me who I am, the values that keep me going through the day-to-day.
Like the raccoon sleeping away the long winter in my kayak, munching on its insides, my paddling self is merely hibernating. Dreams of the open ocean still gnaw at my bones.
Tim Shuff has dedicated his summer to repairing varmint damage and getting back on the water.
This article was originally posted in Adventure Kayak, Early Summer 2013. Download our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read here for free.
