It was late afternoon and my friend Kathy Zerkle invited me to be a safety boater with another Kathy on the Lower New River.  As we were paddling below the Lower Keenies the Kathies called my attention back up stream.  Something was moving just beneath the surface of a slow moving current.

I paddled upstream rapidly.  As I approached I could see something small swimming.  It was a squirrel swimming for its life, caught in the current, over 100 feet from each bank.

A Basic Instinct:  The Will to Live

Squirrel with its head barely above the water and at times submerging paddled with all its might.  We looked and wanted to help it onto our kayaks, but were afraid of being bit.  The squirrel at times would try to climb our slick kayaks with no luck and then continue to paddle its feet.

Soon I tried to push squirrel along with my paddle speeding the process and helping the navigation.  But I sometimes inadvertly was pushing squirrel further under water and feared I would drown her.  Next, I figured out to run my blade below squirrel and push upward and forward.  Squirrel would take two or three running steps and jump.  She was now moving faster and getting breaks.

It took ten minutes of this process to get her to the bank.  Once she arrived she climbed onto the nearest rock and sat.  She sat coughing and choking water.  I drifted away backwards in the current as I watched her not move and simply cough and sputter.  I thought, “Hmm, one of the most basic instincts must be the will to live.  The fight she made to live was an instinct.  I think she came from the other side of the river.  But she lived.  Despite the consumed water, the exhaustion, and the rapids she kept the will to live.  I am glad she lived.”