about wild rivers
take me to the river, wash me in the water
For 19 years I was a professional river guide, rowing the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. This was in the before-times when boatwomen were a rarity, and the outfitters who would hire us even more so. I rowed my 99th and final canyon trip while 5 months pregnant, gliding the entry wave to motherhood and the most powerful rapid of my life.
As a guide I was there to row and shepherd our clients safely and happily on their two week and 277-mile journey traveling a desert wilderness river flowing through a National Park. What those folks did not know, and what I only came to see in the afterglow of hindsight, is that I’d fallen deeply in love and would be swept away for the rest of my days by the river flowing. My guiding life is how I found myself “in harmony with my spirit,” and where wild rivers comes in, here on Substack.
In those 19 years I collected stories, a few too many scars, and a love for cooking with my feet in the sand. I guided some famous folks and some regular you and me folks. The river carried me places I never saw coming: planting beans with a Hopi farmer, to the confluence of an interest in water rights that funneled me to law school, to working as head farmer for a non-profit providing food and training to Bhutanese refugees relocated to Idaho.
Word by word I’m writing down the waves and currents, reflecting on the rocks and hard places, steep walls and deep currents that can carve a life. Thank you for being here; if you’ve ever tried to speak while underwater then you know the glorious feeling of hearing other voices answering in the dark.
Mackenzie (yes it really is my name) Rivers
I am grateful for the kind encouragement of this community of readers, subscribers, and fellow writers here on Substack.
That’s how you know I’m bowing.
In respect.
Low.
Fuck!
You rage!!!
I am once again in awe.
~~David E. Perry
Gorgeous storytelling.
~~Julie Gabrielli
Dear Ms Mackenzie. I love good prose. The rip-roaring ride-the-wave style was breathtaking. But it was the moments where you swung abruptly out of that white-water ruckus into some quiet eddy, held it, held it for just a moment and then dived back into the current. Those were genius. Form welded to image. One piece like this is enough to stamp the time-card of a whole writerly lifetime, whatever comes before or after. You must be very happy.
~~David Knowles
I’ve been trying to put my finger on what I like so much about the way you write. With this story, I crown you as The Queen of Allusions. Story after story peeking out from brief references within your main narrative. Wonderful participatory reading.
~~Walter Tschinkel
Oh my. I read that as if it was one run-on sentence that flowed effortlessly, powerfully, inexorably to its smoldering car crash finale. Then I realized I had just read a memoir. Bravo. Now I have to breathe.
~~Timothy Sheehan
{All writing, photography, and artwork I share here and elsewhere is human-conceived and human-powered, created by me, without the use of AI. Photos are mine unless noted otherwise.}