When I was about ten years old, my dad bought an antique motorboat. It was not a big boat, maybe eighteen feet long, wooden, with a decrepit old Johnson outboard motor. I do not think there was anything fundamentally wrong with the motor, but those old engines are finicky.

One of the first days we took it out, the weather was perfect. Sunny, warm, almost no wind. We were out exploring islands in Georgian Bay. On the way back, the engine suddenly stalled for no apparent reason. We still had plenty of fuel, well over half a tank. My dad could not get it started.

We stopped for a moment to think about what to do. We had paddles and could paddle back, but it would have taken hours. As we were thinking, we noticed a massive storm brewing in the distance. It looked far away, like it was still hours off. Unfortunately, it was not.

Within half an hour, the rain started. Around that time, we saw a newer motorboat heading toward us, coming from the direction of the storm. If you kept going the way they were headed, you would reach the docks where we were going. If I remember correctly, it was someone we knew. They slowed down beside us and said we had two seconds to decide. Either jump in with them and abandon our boat, or stay behind. A terrible storm was coming.

My dad thought about it and said no. He believed he could get the motor restarted. The other boat took off at full speed toward shore, and we went back to trying to start the engine. Pull after pull, it would not start. It was not flooded. It had fuel. Everything looked right. We had no idea why it refused to run.

Then a massive waterspout formed behind us, right at the edge of the storm. It was maybe five or six hundred feet away, about two football fields. It made a horrible sound as it sucked water up from the lake. It looked like something out of a movie.

Then the rain came hard. It was not just water. Small fish were coming down in the rain, sucked up from the lake and falling back down on us.

Finally, my dad got the engine started. The boat was not fast to begin with, but he pushed it as hard as it would go, partly because higher throttle made it less likely to stall again. We headed straight for shore. As we ran for the docks, the storm and the waterspout followed behind us, getting closer and closer.

We came into the docks at full speed, which you are not supposed to do. We jumped out, tied the boat, and ran. By the time we reached the docks, the waterspout was maybe a hundred feet behind us.

I had a lot of adventures as a kid. Many of the most dangerous ones were on the water. Freshwater lakes, especially Canadian lakes, are incredibly treacherous. They are cold. You can have a beautiful sunny day and an hour later face a storm of the century. When the waves come, they do not roll like ocean waves. They come close together and relentlessly pound whatever they hit.

At the same time, it is some of the most beautiful country God ever made. Clear water. That day, the water was so clear we saw a massive bass, the biggest I have ever seen, about thirty feet down. You could see every scale on its body at that depth. The water was as clear as glass.

I suppose the point of the story is this. I take risks in order to enjoy life. And when you take enough real risks as a child, you become more resistant to unnecessary fear responses as an adult.

(The boat in the image is very close to what we had.)