Some things I know to be true about who I am. I'm a good teacher and a good friend. I like fiddle music and cowboys and I'm an open boater. At least I thought I was.

Ten years ago I was dating an adventurer photographer/ kayaker on the Chattooga. It didn't take long for me to get in a kayak. I was really bad at it. Memorably bad. I didn't kayak — I swam, constantly. Then one fateful night I had a dream about a golden canoe with wings and thought, "That's it. God wants me to be an open boater."I told the open boaters I paddled with that I wanted to switch to an open boat and they were more than supportive.

John McCorvey helped me find a boat and Pat Hagen spent a weekend teaching me how to paddle. I was much better and much happier in an open boat than I had ever been in a kayak. It suited me perfectly.

I had hundred yard swims on the Ocoee, a life changing day on Little River Canyon, a peak experience on the Mulberry at flood and endless joy on the Tellico and Chattooga. I was never going to be as good an open boater as the people who got me into it, but I was good enough and getting better, depending on how often I paddled. Even three summers of injuries and a serious pin didn't keep me out of my boat for very long.

Now seduction is a funny thing and comes in many shapes and sizes, often when you are least expecting it. In my case it was a simple thing. I wanted to be cool. And let's face it, kayakers are cool. They aren't, and will never be, River Gods — that title is for C-1 boaters — but kayakers are cool. Like it or not, they are never going to make commercials about hip open boaters. It just isn't going to happen.

Maybe it was the fact that the group of women I paddle with all paddle kayaks. Or I just got tired of people asking me if I was going kayaking when I have a blue Outrage on top of my truck. Whatever the reason, I was slowly being seduced by the dark side.

It was little things, trying out Debbie Dargis' kayak on the Upper Chattahoochee because an ankle injury was keeping me out of my boat, hanging out with Revel Freeman and Rick Battaglia, kayakers I started boating with, listening to kayakers talk about their new boats and gear while my boat and gear had so many patches that a kayaker accused me of looking like an extra from the Beverly Hillbillies.

Then just before a weekend trip with Barbara Barrett, Jamie Higgins, Kelly Harbac, Gretchen Mallins, and Kate, my boat got a rip in one of the patches. Now it just so happened that Kelly had an extra boat, an extra spray skirt and a paddle I could borrow for the weekend. It was so easy to ask her to borrow it and the next thing you know I was in a kayak.

I was pretty good, better than I thought I would be and better than they thought I would be. At least one of them was seen rubbing her hands and cackling about carnage. I have pretty good balance and wasn't afraid of swimming. I knew that I couldn't slam into eddies the way I could with my Outrage and I expected to have trouble reading the river. It's not nearly as easy to see what's coming in a kayak the way it is in an open boat.

What I didn't expect to have trouble with was getting in and out. Now I know why kayakers don't like to get out of their boat. It's a pain in the neck. It took me a good ten minutes to figure out how to get out of my boat without a bank to pull it up on. Then I couldn't get back in. For some reasons known only to them, Gretchen, Kelly, Barbara, Jamie and Kate all thought the phrase, "I need help, I can't get back in my boat." was hysterical and burst into fits of giggles.

The day was nice enough, little waves in an open boat are bigger in a kayak. That was nice. Being cold and wet all day.... not so nice. Being able to make a move quickly.... also nice. Not being able to see very far in front of you.... not so nice. Still, the Piedra that Kelly loaned me was a great boat and I was seriously considering making the switch to the dark side. I mean, why not? I was going to have to repair my boat and replace the airbags.... again, maybe I should just make the switch.

My friends were kayakers and Revel told me that the new kayaks were better and easier to roll than when I started. And it was kind of fun, but you know what? I didn't feel cool at all.

The next day didn't help. When we got to the put-in there was a tribe of open boats and I longed for my own boat the way I long for fiddle music and cowboys. I tried to convince William's girlfriend to paddle the kayak. She wouldn't. I tried to coerce Doug and a couple in a tandem canoe into trading with me. They wouldn't. None of the open boaters would even consider it. Not a single one. Two of them even told me I wasn't very attractive in a kayak. If I were a different woman it would have hurt my feelings. But I knew they were telling me the truth.

Then Doug let me paddle his Outrage for a few minutes. I was instantly at home and happy and I knew without a doubt that I'm an open boater. Sometimes you have to get what you don't want to know what you do want. I wanted my open boat. I'll never be as good an open boater as Peter, or Dorothy, George, Gaby or Pat and John are. But, it is who I am. And maybe that's what being cool really means.

- Debra Berry, a not so cool open boater.

SYOTR.

From The Eddy Line, July 2005

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