This is how it is supposed to look. Pretty, huh? The photo will give you a reference for post below : ) Beginners have a coxain, too, so there's 5 total.
At a Friday evening party-type event at the boathouse, there was an activity announced that we decided not to participate in. The members who signed up would row an hour and a half to Elbouef to eat boef bourguignon and drink the new 2008 Beaujolais. We didn’t go because it was a little out of our budget this month but really.. the truth was...it's really really cold here...and…and…they don’t seem to think it's cold or hard to eat and drink outside in the freezing cold.. and I hate eating when I’m freezing...because you're nervous system gets all f*#&ed up trying to decide on fight or flight or rest and digest. It seemed festive and fun in theory. In reality, I'm from SoCal and its really just too damn cold.
I’m sure they had a blast, though. They don’t hold back here – at all-and they don't really show their fear or concern either. They just go for stuff. I like it and I'm scared of them too.
Speaking of spontaneity, this past weekend, we rowed to our halfway point and stopped. The coxain, Jean Jacque and Karin exchanged some fast French which I didn’t understand. I didn’t care either because I was trying to breathe hot air into my hands that had developed 4 nicely plump blood blisters and was wondering if my thumb would ever thaw out or would it need to be amputated because of frostbite. When I came back mentally, I asked the Italian, sitting in front of me, what they said.
He glanced back to me and said…“They’re going to switch seats.”
“Oh.”
Whoa.?! Is what I was really thinking. The last week we came to the boat house, Sophie, our organizer, gave us like a 30 second lesson on how this would happen, should we need to switch seats in the boats. I let out a very American sounding “NO WAY!!” when I saw what it entailed. They laughed at me and sounded very sure of themselves and of our beginner abilities, like they always do, and then pushed the boat away from the dock, waving with confident parental smiles. They really do have the sink or swim mentality.
But here we were. It was going to happen right now! It was sprung on us just like most everything has at the boathouse, because otherwise I probably wouldn’t have tried much of what we’ve been asked to do so far. The sink or swim style of coaching has been good for me here, since I over-think most everything I try : )
And so the process of switching began!
The coxain was switching seats with the three seat – behind me. How did they do that, you ask? In the middle of the river? I know. I was scared too. Because what that particular activity entailed… was the girl behind me….beginning rower… not having ever made a switch like this before….was moving out of her seat, while we, the others, balanced the boat…(there’s only room for you to put one foot on thin wooden plank in front of you, which is about the length of your foot, in order to get in and out of the boat. The boat would be damaged if you step anywhere else inside the boat.) Okay.
So she had to put one foot there on the thin wooden plank in front of her and place the other foot- ever so very gingerly on the side of the boat (about ½ an inch of wood..aaah) while holding onto the other side to balance the weight of her body.
(By the way,her feet were clothed with a clunky pair of sneaks with rubber bottoms– slippery looking, I thought)
Next ..my heart beats faster as I remember this….she must trust the process enough to take the other foot, replace her hand with this foot, so that she is straddled, with her slippery soled sneaks, balanced precariously on either side of the boat and each hand gripping for dear life on each side too. Oh, but that’s just the beginning, my friends.
Next, she must inch walk her way along the boat from the three seat to the coxain’s seat. Okay, which means, she must inch walk over my crouched body as I let out little whimpers of excitement and fear and encouragement and then over Matthew’s 6’5” crouched body and he’s big no matter how he folds himself.
I nearly passed out just thinking about it. I did the "tuck and hope". She made it over my head and placed her ever large looking tennis shoe on the left side of the boat. Whew. One down. As I glanced up from my tucked position, Karin’s bum was nearly resting on my forehead as I could feel her hesitance to lift her right foot from its oh so stable position and move forward with it. You know how you always have one side that works better than the other? Well, for Karin, I think her left worked better, because she gave it the "fling and hope". She picked up her right foot and flung it forward hoping it would all work out. That clunker of a sneak, though, slipped and the shoe and the right leg slid down the side of the boat and into the freezing cold Seine.
I tucked and squealed into my leggings. It’s been a while since I’ve felt so out of control of a situation. At the same time, I was thanking the universe with extraordinary guilt and ever so profusely. “Thank you for that not being me. Thank you for not letting that be me. Oh thank you so much.” I was never so happy to be freezing cold numb in my life because it wasn’t me having to walk my crotch over people’s heads in the middle of the river on a frigid Saturday morning.
And it wasn’t over yet. I looked up again and Karin was bravely making her next move over Mati’s head. Good Luck. Please get her there. She was smart too. She lifted that weak ass right foot first. Good Girl. Do that. Yeah. She carefully lifted the hypothermic foot over Mati’s head and meticulously placed it on side of the boat. She landed it and I turned back to Melanie, in the 4 seat, and we exchanged worried glances. I looked up again and Karin had taken the left, more confident foot and successfully managed it. A couple more steps and she was in. I was exhilarated with endorphins, adrenaline, dopamine..you name the stimulating hormone, it was pumping through my veins. When she finally sat and Jean Jacque made his experienced way with sleek looking grippy rock climbing type shoes – no less- up and over our heads and into the seat Karin had left. I nearly jumped in the river with exhilaration.
We made our way back to the boathouse. The strokes I took felt stronger, I squarred my blades better than I had been in the previous weeks and I was in better harmony with my boatmates. Thank you, Karin, for taking one for the team. Thank you.
When we hit the dock, I had four bleeding blisters on my hand and a smile on my face. Mati and I completed our boat chores. We were giggling at the craziness of it all - the ‘grip and rip style’ which Mati calls it, and our joyful harmless risk taking adventurous Frenchie friends on the Seine.
“That was INSANE.” I can’t believe that just happened. How are you?” I was shivering more with excitement than cold, probably.
“That was Crazy. They’re Crazy…We’ve could’ve just gone to the dock” The logical Italian said through icy lips.
I thought back to the river and our location where we 'made the switch'and the dock was indeed just on the other side. He was right. They are Crazy.
“I’m sooo cold and happy right now.” I blurted.
“How are your hands baby?” He knew about my blisters because I showed them to everyone in the boat during the rest period.
“They’re great. I couldn’t actually feel my hands until they started bleeding all over themselves.” I stated.
We laughed a worried kind of laughter as we hurried down the street, happy to have made it through another Saturday and heading for the Bakery Man with the good Quiche.
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