I Am Responsible

Stone Town, Zanzibar

When I was arrested my immediate thought was “This isn’t my fault!” When the officer took my passport away I thought “This REALLY isn’t my fault!”

I was in Kisangani, heart of Zaire, doorway to the Congo River and not the kind of place that gets five stars on Trip Advisor (for anything). My goal was to traverse the length of the country by barge, ending some two weeks later in the capital of Kinshasa (maybe 2 stars, but you should arrive armed). 

The barges are massive floating villages that slowly work their way downstream. Rather than the barge stopping at the endless, small villages tucked into the surrounding jungle, the villagers come to the barge. As the barge approaches, the villagers paddle upstream with their wares, tie up and then engage in frantic trading with the passengers, trying to unload most of their fruit, vegetables, insects, monkey before drifting too far past their village. The faster they sell, the shorter the paddle home.

It is 24-hour entertainment. 

On the day of my “arrest”, I had been strolling the dirt streets of a local village, killing time before my barge adventure. I remember my right index finger was tightly wrapped around a doobie the size of a small zucchini and I was calling out the Swahili greeting “Gumbo!” to any villager unfortunate enough to make eye contact. After all, when in Rome…

I’m not sure the officer was really an officer. As he approached me I noticed his uniform had a sort of mismatched look—like something you would patch together the night before Halloween when all the good stuff was sold out—and lacking the kind of gravitas that demands servitude. But as I handed over my passport the situation seemed serious enough. My instructions were to return the next morning and receive my penalty.

I don’t think I slept all night.

Selfish Phase

I grew up surrounded by powerful men who opened life-changing doors for me and mentored me as I stumbled forward from one adventure to the next. After a mishmash of jobs including dish washer, fence builder, software developer, bookkeeper and river guide I was invited to the rarified world of small business, specifically the business of inventing some of the most remote adventure tours on earth.

It was pretty heady stuff.

Some summers we spent more nights in a tent then in a bed and lived the swashbuckling life of “opportunistic feeders and breeders” always looking for a free meal and a free soul who admired the romantic notion of going home with your guide enough to overlook their fairly obvious shortcomings in the arena of commitment.

Let’s call this my selfish phase.

I’ve dragged these memories around with me for over thirty years—trying to reconcile why I wasn’t as kind and thoughtful as I pretended to be? I could blame my poor choices on youth or circumstances but I know that’s a dodge. The truth is that - just as my left leg is a tiny bit shorter than my right - there is a part of me that can get a bit confused between right and wrong and sometimes is simply not very kind. 

Own it

As I write this I am aware that this is as close as I’ve come to owning a certain black cloud that’s followed me all these years. I’m also aware there is a certain lightness when I put it in ink (so to speak). I’m not perfect - never was, never will be - but I do believe I’m good enough. 

Piss on the cloud because I don’t want to own it anymore.

Maybe as you read this you’re thinking about your own black cloud, how it’s been shadowing you for too long, how it feels tiring even to be reminded of it. And maybe it’s time to put it in ink and maybe even let it go.

After all, you are super, perfect, pretty cool and terrific the way you are, warts and all.

Consequences

The following morning, completely devoid of sleep and somewhat terrified that my fate meant I would soon be learning how to catch fish with a string and hook and which bugs were the safe ones to eat, I arrived at the small outpost building.

The bullet holes in the wall reminded me of the fateful scene in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and I almost expected the director George Roy Hill to come rushing out from behind a Banyan tree shouting “Cut! Cut! Culver you don’t look guilty enough!”

The officer character sat me down and then, with lots of theatrical hand motions, launched into a fairly lengthy diatribe - all in Swahili. I didn’t understand a single word but he seemed to be miming the action of taking a deep drag on a very large roll of ganja. 

I was starting to get the picture that not only was I not going to have to spend the rest of my days in Zaire, I was simply a part of this man’s income stream. Once the attaché case opened - small stacks of foreign currency were clearly visible - I could guess the punch line to this whole charade. 

I handed over a hundred dollars, took a selfie with my capturer and headed to the river.