Lord, Raise me up

If you haven't listened to Matisyahu, do so immediately. Do not pass go, do not collect $200 until you sit down, and hear this guy out.

My lovely wife got tickets to a local show, and we decided to take the boat, which was about an hour ride up-river. No big deal.

Except at dark.

It's a major channel for large ships, and no place to be messing around.

We made it to the show no problem - and Matisyahu put together the best show I've been too...he really got everyone going.

Anyway, we didn't feel like trying to navigate that river at 2am so we took a nap at the dock, and then woke up about 4am, sweating in the hot, still , MUGGY morning.

Wanting our beds, we untied and shoved off, back into the current.

Unlike a car, when you are in a busy channel, you can not have a headlight of any kind. You are supposed to navigate entirely by radar and using the channel markers. (This is harder than it sounds)

This particular morning was one of those pitch black mornings. I could see lights, but it was really hard to tell what was land and what was a channel marker.

About half way home, I apparently took a wrong turn and got out of the channel, because with no warning, the boat's alarms started going off, the engines quit and the boat lurched to an abrubt stop.

4:30 AM, in the middle of a large bay, in the pitch black, in 3 feet of water, with an outgoing tide is not a good place to be.

Anyway, I started just thinking about Matis' lyrics "Lord Raise Me Up...I've been here so long"

Somehow, I was able to navigate out of there, with the engines at full tilt and the depth finder bouncing between 4 feet and 6 inches of water.

It was either luck, or God appreciated me repeating those lyrics over and over in my head...