Doctors return home

When Shan (pronounced Shawn) Wilson and a group of friends celebrated their 2002 graduation from Miller High School, west of Springfield, they took a float on the Current River. It was from Akers Ferry to Two Rivers. The river was clear and deep, rimmed with grey bluffs and white-barked sycamore trees. They paddled into a cave spring; they soaked up the sun, and they cooled off in the cold water. That night, the boys laid their fried and uncovered bodies on a gravel bar where swirling, grey clouds of appreciative mosquitoes blanketed them. Two days later, when they hit the take out point, burned to a crisp and covered with inching welts, Shan was sure of two things – he had just experienced the best trip of his life, and he wanted to live in the area.