Willis Greiner Photography -- Landscape Photography

"The Human Factor"

So what is it then, that brings this group here? What possible motivation would a "successful'" 53 year-old fully-educated man have in experiencing; factually, in choosing to be pounded mercilessly from his rowing seat by the huge lateral waves in Upset rapid, only to get back on the rowing seat and have the event repeat itself? What is it that would excite and intrigue me enough to enjoy being whisked off my rowing platform (like a common gnat) by the backwash (not the actual wave, but merely the backwash!) of everyman's unknown lateral wave at the base of Lava Falls? Why not sit favorably at home, comfortably watching the football game and admiring one's possessions? Indeed, why. Because what we have become -- what, to the greatest extent all of us here in the land of plenty have become -- is not real.

Because what we have become -- what, to the greatest extent all of us here in the land of plenty have become -- is not real.

We spend 99 point whatever amounts of our time in a God-awful synthetic reality, mostly put to sleep by the mundane chore of earning a typical living to pay for whyever we decided to own whatever.

We've all been duped into believing this is real living, but actually its real dying. Slow death. Death by attrition of one's mind, body and soul. The real cancer of our generation. Living? Yes, for maybe 3 seconds in a lifetime of 2522880000 seconds (assuming a lifetime of 80 years), 3 over 2522880000 of my life, for that nano-percentage of time; 3 seconds under the boat, in the drink, sucking foam, for 3 seconds certainly (and other times, surely, down among the living rock of this timeless magnificent Canyon); for 3 seconds I was alive! This was living, not fear, but real living. "Damn, have we flipped, NO, great!" I'm celebrating under the boat, under water, in the torrent, by myself, in the tail waves of the "largest navigable rapid in North America," envisioning the raft as it slips through the last of the 15-foot reminders of this tremendous cataract; then surfacing, fist clenched, to a confused Steve (my passenger on this great journey). For these 3 seconds, I was alive. That's what we're here for -- all of us -- to be trounced by the water, beaten by the heat, challenged by the rapids and the eddies, intrigued by the geology, awed by the power and the glory -- our senses to be overloaded, our bodies to be thrown about like insects in a typhoon -- because, for this 16 days of our lives, we have the potential to live, to really live, in an actual, non-synthetic reality.

-- because, for this 16 days of our lives, we have the potential to live, to really live, in an actual, non-synthetic reality.