Somehow, all my friends had disappeared and I was left alone, a freezing cold, soaking wet, drunk girl in a kayak, with this cop.

I occasionally like a drink or six, and unfortunately this tends to get me in some fairly awkward situations. Not uncommon for a college student.

But one August night, the week before school was supposed to start again, we were sitting around having a few beers and I got a little more wasted than normal.

As always happens with drinking, we started thinking of new and interesting things to do (the kind of things, that, for some reason, don’t make sense when you are sober) and one of my friends came up with the mother of all ideas “Let’s go kayaking!”

I should explain here that we were all fairly avid whitewater kayakers, and the town of Golden, for all its faults, has one redeeming feature – a mile long kayak course running through the center of the town.

The rest of the group found the idea hilarious, but for some reason (maybe being drunker than the rest) I seized on it and would not let it go. My friends (bless their hearts) tried to talk me out of it – I mean, if you can’t walk straight, it may not be the best idea to strap yourself in a little plastic boat and throw yourself in a freezing cold, fast moving river – but my mind was made up.

So we trekked over to my place, where I gathered my kayak gear and then headed over to the river.

The walk over to the river was made a little harder by the fact that I was throw off balance by the combination of alcohol and a kayak on my shoulder, and kept falling down. My friends, laughing at me, were sure I would get in, flip, swim and that would be it. Little did they know.

Either because the habit was so deeply ingrained or because some little shred of common sense remained, I pulled on my PFD and helmet before getting in. I headed into the hole and tried to surf. Of course, with my spectacular drunk balance, I flipped right away, but, to my surprise and that of my friends, even when wasted, I can still roll my kayak. I was having fun repeating this flip-roll sequence ad infinitem, while my friends on shore made bets about how long it would be till I swum, when, all of a sudden, I was surrounded by a circle of light.

“Get out of the river, now.” I squinted past the glare to see the cop holding the flashlight. Somehow, all my friends had disappeared and I was left alone, a freezing cold, soaking wet, drunk girl in a kayak, with this cop.

To this day, I still don’t know what came over me. I glared back at him “It’s a public park. There’s no law that says I can’t be in here.” I swear, the cop just froze, mouth open. A good minute must have passed, him staring at me and me shivering in my little boat (Clear Creek is COLD in late August).

The, after what seemed like eternity, the light flipped off. “Well, you at least be safe then.” And the cop wandered off.

I gave my friends so much shit for ditching me when the cop showed up. But to this day, I still can’t believe the cop just left me there.