A paddler's paper & ink dreams

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote, "And it floated on the water like a yellow leaf in autumn." His poem about a birchbark canoe infused the boat with the mystique of wilderness. "And the forest's life was in it, all its mystery and its magic."

Among the magical trips I've taken with the Prairie State Canoeists, a majority of whose trips take place within a 100-mile radius of Chicago, include the twisty, oak-tree canopied Bark River near Sullivan, Wisconsin; the north-flowing Turtle Creek near Delavan, and past the heron and egret rookery on the Fox River near Wauconda, Illinois. A day of paddling can refresh the soul and shed the barnacles of civilization.

But lately, with the mad dog pace of modern life, it's as if someone taped a "to do" list over all the Saturdays on my calendar.

I hope to get back to those weekly paddling adventures, but in the extended interim, I've kept my dreams alive with Prairie State Canoeists' monthly messenger of hope - a little, stapled, folded-over publication with no photos, color or glossy ads. It's called a newsletter, but for me it jump-starts my canoe dreams and rests next to my favorite outdoor magazines (Silent Sports among them).

I've been reading the Prairie State Canoeists newsletter with my wake-up coffee for 20 years. The brief "Trip Reports" of canoe journeys are like reading Lewis and Clark's journals. Here are some samples:

• "You can pull your loaded canoe over the snow ... the icicle formations, like chandeliers, were once again great to see." (Des Plaines River, February 2010)

• There was "a raccoon running along the shoreline. One of our group tried to get a picture but ended up with a shot of his finger." (Salt Creek)

• "Max is really sorry about those muddy paw prints in your canoe, Joe." (Du Page River)

• "We stopped by the dam in the tiny town of Rural, Wisconsin. We even had a 25-cent ice cream cone from the store near the bridge." (Crystal River)

• "Caution: The mosquitoes near the Ashland takeout are the size of small birds." (Apostle Islands)

• "Good weather. Good water. Good company. Life doesn't get much better." (Salt Creek)

The newsletter pages announcing upcoming trips offers a tantalizing adventure calendar, which is especially inspiring in winter.

It has always been a popular publication. When members move out of state, they keep their memberships current so as to keep getting the newsletter.

Going digital

Then, one day, the newsletter arrived with a note from the editor suggesting it might be time to put the newsletter entirely online. Some months later I received the newsletter in an e-mail.

Marshall McLuhan said, "The media is the message." Personally, I prefer a handwritten note or letter from my wife than an e-mail. We've treasured longhand letters from our grandkids. There's a song, "A kiss on the cheek is worth a dozen in the mail." (An emoticon kiss is just not the same: ":-x")

Take away my Chicago Tribune, take away my Evanston Review, but not my paddling club newsletter. Articles online are written in invisible ink. Click and it vaporizes. While there are Twitter fiction websites featuring 140-character stories, I can't imagine Tolstoy tweeting War and Peace or Shakespeare tweeting Hamlet.

Now, I'm no statistician, but while newspapers are struggling as younger readers turn to the Internet for breaking news, other print publications still are doing quite well. Seventy-six percent of college students prefer textbooks to electronic readers, according to a recent study. According to the Association of Magazine Media (MPA), 92 percent of adults and 75 percent of teens read magazines. And the 18-24 age readership is growing, says Mediamark Research Inc.

The MPA reports readers like magazines for three reasons. First, people keep magazines an average of 17 weeks. We have copies of Silent Sports going back to 1987, and my neighbor's vintage National Geographics are stacked to his attic ceiling. My wife has a bumper crop of old sewing magazines, and I have years' worth of my beloved canoe club newsletters, too.

Each magazine reader passes along their copies to an average of four other people. My wife reads my alum magazines and Chicago Magazine, and I read her Cooking Light.

Finally, people read magazines as much for the ads as the stories. That's me, for sure. Inspired by an advertisement, my daughters once bought me a pair of pink and black paisley running tights that make me look like an extra in Swan Lake. I only wear them at night. And my sweat pants are good for potato sack races, but not 5Ks.

But then I found a pair of running pants in a SportHill ad. From similar outdoor ads I've ordered a runner's ID bracelet, a kayak sail, pogies and throat coats. There aren't commercial ads in the club newsletter but I check the "ads" for river trips.

So when I read about the club newsletter possibly going online, I panicked.

No Luddite here

Now, I've been a technology nut ever since I bought a Dick Tracy wrist radio as a kid. Nowadays, I marvel as I watch my granddaughter on YouTube singing with a rock band in Belgrade, Serbia. I can talk to her via Skype and exchange text messages with our daughter as she travels the deserts of North Africa on medical assignments.

As a teacher, I use voice recognition technology to do lesson plans, I maintain a class website and a blog (to which I post photos and videos), utilize Facebook and Twitter and respond to students and faculty via e-mail. And I constantly turn to Google for information about everything from kayaks and bike wheels to polypro underwear.

In fact, except for the time I'm talking in class, I'm a classic homo sapiens digitalensis - Digital Man.

But don't expect me to do my pleasure reading online or cozy up to a log fire with an e-reader. You would have better luck persuading the mailman to take a 10-mile hike after being on his feet all day.

"Hold fast to dreams, for when dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly," wrote Langston Hughes. When our canoe club newsletter drops through the mail slot it's my wings. I dream of paddling the Wisconsin Dells in the fall; the splash of a wood-canvas canoe in the Bois Brule River; rafting the Oconto River and sleeping next to Bagley Rapids, and swimming in the pools below Amnicon Falls. And I could go on.

There's a saying: "Old wood, old wine, old books, old friends." The canoe club newsletter is an old friend. While I love my high tech toys, print publications are my pleasure reading companions. As the saying goes, "Books are your silent friends."

Give me the Girl Scout motto, "Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver one is gold."

Bob McCray is a community college journalism teacher and writer, who lives with his wife in Evanston, Illinois.