blake walden morstad

He would have been 29 today.

I went whitewater rafting with Bethany and a friend. Smelling the pine, feeling the cold Spokane River, and realizing that the last two times I've been rafting were with Blake W. made it a sweet day. The initial rafting trip was while we were interns at Boeing, and it was the first opportunity we had to get to know each other.

I got rip-roaring drunk and, humiliated and crying, was actually throwing up over the side of my camp chair. Blake W., the gentleman, shooed off the other young men who had been actively feeding me drinks (I have no idea how much I had, but was taken completely by surprise at the amount of my intoxication!), then patted my hand and told me to save my tears for something that mattered. In my bravado of the next day, all I really remember was almost getting tipped out of the raft backwards over a big rapid, having Blake W. sneak up behind me to pull me in the water during a calm stretch, and me swearing more than usual. Good times.

The second time we rafted was the Fourth of July weekend during that same internship summer. We got back to my folks' place, sun burnt and tired, and had a terrifying conversation where I confessed my feelings for him, hopeless in the knowledge that it could only end badly for our friendship. He confessed his feelings for me too, and we agreed, to our mutual fear/awe at what God was doing, that we should start dating. Good times.

And now today. I saw a great blue heron, a raptor of some sort, and though I fell or jumped in three times, I never lost my sunglasses. Good times.