The questions came so often as to become increasingly annoying as the day went on. “Is that a waterproof camera?” “How do you keep your camera dry?” It was with much thought and deliberation that I had decided to bring along my rather new, fancy, expensive camera an a canoeing trip on Michigan’s Ausable river. After all, a single dunk might incapacitate my new favorite toy, maybe permanently. Still, I’d decided to take it along to capture the beautiful scenery we’d be floating through. I figured the risk was worth taking, especially since I could trust my wife not to rock the boat (she rowed competitively in high school).

We weren't feeling too competitive that day.

As we set out from the livery in the morning, we quickly came upon a bridge running over a shallow patch. A couple of canoes and their occupants were getting off to a good start jettisoning the day’s lunch and everything else including the human cargo, all while doing an admirable job of blocking any reasonable passage under the bridge. By some minor miracle we made it around the ongoing carnage without so much as scraping bottom. It made me a little nervous about my decision to tote the camera, because I realized that the greatest danger may not be within my control, but in the hands of the many people on the river who seemed to be experiencing much consternation in their efforts to float successfully with the current.

Yes, I do happen to be related to most of the people in this photo...

Now, I don’t consider myself by any means an expert river runner. I’ve piloted my share of small watercraft, mostly of the human powered persuasion, but the last time I’d been in a canoe was over a year ago. Still, every time we passed a raft of canoes clinging desperately to one another for defense against the inevitable collision with shore, floating debris, or another such conglomeration, we’d always get a compliment on how expert we appeared, along with an inquiry into the water resistance of my camera. It began to strike me that it doesn’t require much beyond a mote of ambition and a willingness to learn in order to keep a canoe’s bow pointed safely downstream. What’s more, once you aren’t constantly trying to avoid taking an impromptu bath as a result of an unwanted rendezvous, you end up able to enjoy the scenery to a much fuller degree. Why were we the best at this?

There can be no good outcome to this situation.

After lunch, as we continued on our way to the extraction point where we’d meet the summer break high schooler in a decades old Ford van who’d take us back to the livery, the comments about the camera and it’s abundant dryness kept coming in. About this time I started replying, at least in my imagination, that I kept the camera dry the same way I kept everything else on my person and in my vessel dry. I found it hard to believe that so many people who presumably were able to successfully navigate the interstate highway system and a labyrinth of back roads to arrive at this remote stretch of river could be so helplessly unable to control their fates once afloat and responsible for their own route planning and safety within the confines of the river banks. What was it? Is there no more desire to be proficient? There seemed to be an unspoken mournful acceptance of mediocrity, to which we were the exception; us, with our vast canoeing experience of many hours.

I'm, like, a regular voyageur or something.

As we pulled our canoe onto the river bank at the end of the day’s trip and waited for the van, I took note of the overwhelming dryness of my camera. My plan had succeeded, and I had captured many wonderful images of family and friends and the scenery along the way. It still bugged me that so many people considered it an impossibility to maintain an upright position while canoeing. I know some people aren’t as coordinated as others, but it seemed to me that many people weren’t even trying. Is it that they don’t want to make others feel bad, and so degrade their own performance in a self reinforcing spiral of sudden immersion (not unlike the one that forms when you drain your bathtub…)? In a desire to commiserate about the difficulties of maintaining an upright orientation, do people actually strive to compromise their stability? Shouldn’t we strive to be a better one, whatever we are?

There, that's better. See, it wasn't that hard.

See, the way to prevent your camera getting wet is to keep it out of the water.