So, if you really know me, you've probably heard of the beaver hole story. I have used this story at least twice for english papers, retold it numerous times around campfires on family camping trips and it is mentioned with a laugh at least twice each year in my house. Yes. The beaver hole story. First off, I would just like to mention that a beaver hole is little underground canal that a beaver digs directly from the river to inland as an easier way to transport the logs, sticks and branches they drag back to their lodges. It makes perfect sense, right? I mean why wouldn't beavers make these tunnels and why wouldn't someone know about these things? Common sense, right? Wrong. I didn't know that there were such things as beaver holes. I had never heard of them and I don't know if anyone who doesn't live in idaho would either.
Once upon a time there was a family who was extremely outdoorsy and went on family camping trips every summer to isolated areas such as Wyoming, Idaho and Montana and stayed in isolated campgrounds because the parents didn't like social contact while on vacation. A bit odd, but it's home for me. So, as my family and I were camped beside a river in Deadwood Idaho one afternoon my father decided to go fishing up river and we bid him good luck, hoping he would catch a big one. Meanwhile my sister and I stayed at camp playing like any awesome 7 and 10 year old would. We could smell the dinner Mom was cooking in the little red and white camper, and as it started getting dark we heard the familiar tune of my father whistling, coming into camp. Instantly my sister and I made eye contact, each knowing exactly what the other was thinking. "Race you!" was barely out of my sisters mouth before we started running. The goal was to get to my father the fastest, running down the road and onto the short path along the river. Alomost there, I was running as hard as I could, no stopping now. What's this? I could hear my sisters footsteps right behind me, she was gaining. So close to the trail, but she was over taking me! My little legs couldn't go any faster, she had three years on me! So, what did I do? I cheated like the true little kid I was. Yep. I cut the corner, running through the brush and getting ahead of her on the trail. I was so close, I could see my Dad stopped right there with his fishing pole! I was thinking how clever I was for taking that shortcut, beating my big sister for once! I really showed her. My dad standing there about to say something, just a few more feet and victory was mine... and then WHOOSH. The ground went out from under me, pitch black and I couldn't see a thing! Yes. I had fallen into a beaverhole. I don't even remember my feet hitting the ground before I shot back out of the dark void and back into the light. The gap had been smack-dab in the middle of my Dad and me, I didn't even notice it. I was balling my eyes out. One minute I had sweet victory in the palm of my hand and the next my whole world had been pulled from beneath my feet. All that was going through my mind was Dark. Light. Hole. Running. What? It was an eye opening and quite frankly a frightening experience for a seven year old. Looking back though, it was so funny. My Dad, who was just about to warn me before I fell about the beaver hole said that he just remembers me being there one second, disappearing and reappearing suddenly out of no where. Not many people can say they have fallen in a beaver hole before and I'm proud to have that experience :) But I guess I could say the moral of this story is don't cut corners. Karma gets you in the end and if you cut corners (in my case, quite literally) you may find yourself in a beaver hole.
:)
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