Every day is a gift because we just never know if we're going to get another tomorrow. That's for a higher power to decide, whatever or whoever you deem that to be.

This past weekend two people in Maine, out having a good time, probably not giving a second thought to any danger, died unexpectedly in outdoor accidents. There'll be no tomorrows for them.

Tragic and sad, but it happens.

One man fell to his death after slipping on some rocks above Sand Beach in Acadia. Something that seems to happens to unsuspecting visitors every few years. But we can't go posting and fencing off every potentially dangerous spot in the park. Risk is part of life.

Just like the risk you take when you go whitewater rafting. One minute you're hooting and hollering as the boat crashes through the rapids. A split second later everything is topsy turvy and you're in the river fighting for your life.

I know. The Dead River nearly took me for good in a rafting flip in the spring of 1994. And during Saturday's big Dead release, the river did take a man, drowning him at Mile Long Rapids.

Damn, I'm so sorry for both, and their families.

"Life is a daring adventure or nothing at all," wrote Helen Keller. And sometimes we pay a huge price for that adventure.