HERB BENHAM: Pull of the river almost impossible to resist -- so don't
| Friday, May 21 2010 10:00 AM
Last Updated Friday, May 21 2010 10:00 AM
At first, it was a trickle. Like a scout sent down the riverbed to see if it was safe to send more soldiers. If the trickle met with disaster, no use wasting good water to rescue a rivulet left writhing in the sand.
This was a couple of weeks ago, at Yokuts Park, when visitors were met with the pleasing sight of water flowing down the center. Not wide yet, but promising. We watched the river from the corner of our eyes as we would a solar eclipse because staring straight ahead might render us blind.
We heard the announcement. Water banking. Some water would be released for water banking. We heard it but it had been awhile, so long that even seeing the first trickle was not enough to convince.
At first, nothing changes when water flows into a dry riverbed. The riverbed itself hardly believes it, and in fact, seems to draw the water beneath the sands as quickly as it can as if it were slaking a long-held thirst.
Walking around where the wet sand stopped and the dry sand began was easy the first few days. It was a curiosity, like blue lupines that had been growing in the river bottom this spring but were sure not to last.
The riverbed was impassive and was certainly not going to waste its proven reputation for parched and dry on false promises.
Each day, however, the river advanced like an army that had broken through the last of the enemy's defenses and now was almost galloping to victory.
Something had changed. Not only in the riverbed, but in the river watchers too. We make peace with dry, but an expanse of water stirs us in a way that will surprise even the most flinty among us.
Do not count dogs among the skeptics for whom even a tire rut filled with water is akin to the Big Blackfoot River.
The Kern River Parkway with the squirrels, old cottonwood leaves and the leavings of family picnics is dog heaven to begin with.
Add a river to that and thrilling has become epic. Especially if you are a blind chocolate lab or a black lab mix that has sight enough for two. The dogs knew something was different after the first day when they sprinted into the paw-high trickle. They looked at their paws as if they belonged to someone else.
The next time, with the river having spread five-fold, Poco, the blind dog, plunged in and out of the water, as if she couldn't believe her good luck and as if someone might take the water away if she were to spend too much time on the warm sand. In minutes, she looked like a seal, hair brown and matted.
Gennie, older and more dignified, swam steadily towards the middle, where the current was strongest, and then turned back toward the south shore.
The river changed (and changes) day by day. Like the ocean, it can look somber before sunrise and then bejeweled as the river flows west into the sunset.
The river people have gradually arrived. They put up tents by the water's edge, let their children play tag in the ankle-high, knee-lapping water and carry their chihuahuas carefully as if not wanting to spoil an introduction.
More people come every day. News of a river does not depend on the flash of social networking. When souls stir, people hear at a higher frequency.
Even at Yokuts, far from Isabella, and more than 100 miles away from the lakes west of Mount Whitney where the Kern begins, the water still smells spring-like and cool. Snowmelt is not a stretch.
A river supplies its own climate, cooler on the bank than the dry land behind it and cooler in the middle taking our breath and testing our bravado about swimming in cold water.
The river brings more than water. It carries memories of which we cannot always make sense but that feel compelling nonetheless.
If we cannot be cured then at least for 15 or 20 minutes, we can be comfortable.
We are drawn to the river. Do we have a choice? Would we want one?
