Whoops

Yesterday morning. Terrible night's sleep. Dreamt I slept through my rowing class--my last real one!--to...sleep through my rowing class.

The alarm was set for 4:45 a.m. For some reason, the volume had been turned down--I think I knocked it when I moved some clothes on my dresser.

(Hey, it's a $5 alarm clock. It doesn't play music, it plays static.)

I woke up, panicked. 5:45.

I missed the class.

I couldn't even go down to the boathouse, because they would have already been well away from the dock.

I was sad.

You know what bothered me? Not only missing out on something I like, but the paranoia that creeps in--oh my gosh, what if people have a great rowing day out there and they start thinking that *I'm* the one who's the fuckup?

There are a few practice sessions before the regatta, but I can only make 1 of them (and barely at that).

Saturday @ 7 -- I'm running. it'll be early because of the hot.
Monday @ 5:30 a.m. - Can't make this one.
Wednesday @ 5:30 a.m. -- Can make this one, but it'll be on not much sleep and I'll be shitty, I bet.

I'm annoyed.

But I still want to do this. I said I was interested, and I will follow through.

I think.

I am a big planner. A big committer. I like to say "hey, yeah, I'll go and do that, " or "Let's get together," or "I'll throw a party!" anything like that--but really, when it comes down to it, there are very few things (if anything) that I don't want to cancel last-minute.

I think I've gotten better at this, but it's still my first impulse. To say "Naw. I won't do it, after all."

I don't know why I do that, but I do. It is innate. Oftentimes at parties--even ones I throw, especially ones I throw--I go upstairs and hide a little bit. Like, I use the pretense of checking in on the cats, which are sequestered in a bedroom. I just feel like I need to hit the "pause" button on myself.

That's a feeling that's not concrete enough for me to make one of my Tries. It's just something I'm sharing.

But I think I need to go to this regatta.

Eek.

Wow, have I not written since July 8? That's not good. I must become a better blogger. maybe that will be one of my tries--blog every day for a month?

Rowing is going pretty well, I think. Yesterday out on the water was nice--it doesn't hurt that it is insanely hot for Portland lately, and it's much nicer than to gut it out trying to do a 8-ish mile run that involves Mt. Tabor and improper hydration. Do as I say, not as I do, kids.

I've decided I'll do this regatta the first weekend in August. I think we'lll kind of suck but at least we'll have fun. Right? I hope? There seem to be some cool people in the class, I'm not worried about that, but it's more of the "Wow, I hope we don't completely embarrass ourselves."

So I've been thinking about my next try. I'm pretty sure it's going to be having to learn to ride a bike.

We are planning a quick roadtrip to SE Oregon soon, but I can't really use that as one of my tries. I'm not trying anything. I'm just going somewhere. By that end I couldn't use the Japan trip, but the "I'd never been to Asia" element kind of makes up for it. Right?

Also the eating meat thing will probably have to happen.

Maybe.

More soon, after I've thought more about bikes.

Today was not so the greatest day

Haven't posted in a while.

Monday it was too windy to go out there. There were whitecaps. So a few of us used the ergs and then I left, drove home, changed and went for a 4-mile run. Too windy to row = wonderful to run. Cloudy, breezy, felt good.

They will tack an extra, make-up class onto the end, but I'll be unable to go that day. So either we can apply it to another class or just get $15 back (10 classes are $150). I haven't decided which I am going to do. More on that later.

Monday I was up late and so woke up too late on Tuesday to get my run in. I went in the evening. By then it had cleared up and it was hot! I think running in the heat (and when you run, 70 and sunny = heat!) is something I will always have a hard time getting used to.

Since I moved to Portland right around the time I started running (outside, as opposed to treadmill), I don't know if it's that I got used to the cool vs. the hot or that I just got older and less able to deal with the heat or quite frankly if I've become a big fucking wuss...but I like cloudy + 50s/60s. At least to run in. If I want sunny and hot, I also want an umbrella drink in hand.

Or to be on the water.

Because this morning it was cool, and a little bit breezy. Certainly not as windy as Monday (and ironically, Tuesday, the day I don't have class, the water was super-calm and still). It was definitely the choppiest water we'd been in.

Rowing this morning was a pain in the ass (and, I suppose, the wrist).

Today was one of those days that you just don't have confidence. We learned to feather the oars, which I still haven't mastered. Feathering basically means you slightly angle the oar by twisting your wrist when the oar comes out of the water. I can't remember which wrist it is, I think it's the inside. Let me find a link that, once again, explains it better than I can.

Oh! Look! Wikipedia to the rescue. Not only does it describe the feather, but it also describes what I haven't yet tried to explain about the "catch" and such:

The two fundamental reference points in the anatomy of a rowing stroke are the
catch where the oar blade is placed in the water, and the extraction (also known as the 'finish', 'release' or 'tapping down') where the oar blade is removed from the water. After the blade is placed in the water at the catch, the rower applies pressure
to the oar levering the boat forward which is called the drive phase of the
stroke. Once the rower extracts the oar from the water, the recovery phase begins,
setting up the rower's body for the next stroke.

And here's the feathering info:

sweep oar rowers usually feather and square the oar with the inside hand (the
one closer to the rowlock), allowing the handle to turn within the outside hand, whose wrist remains flat throughout.

I totally did this wrong. I think. My wrists were sore, which is how I know. How are one's wrists sore? I don't know, but I can tell you that it is possible.

What feathering meant to me is that you turn the oar so that the blade is flat and then turn it back to straight before you dip it back into the water.

I don't know, at least I wasn't behind the guy who doesn't know what he's doing. And continues to not know what he's doing. He kept getting called out "Slow down!"

And the boat wouldn't balance, and it wasn't my fault, so that every time I tried to row the bot would go all cockeyed and I couldn't get my stroke right. And then we didn't have a cox today, so folks took turns steering. We need a cox. We're all pretty sad silly novice rowers. We need cox. Ha. That's funny.

Anyway, I knew today would be like one of those days, we were told it would be one of those days.

So now I might go to Seattle in August for a regatta. There is a category for novices who have not learned to row before June 1. I'm tempted; the houseguests I thought we were going to have might move until Labor Day weekend. We'll see. I might know more today.

I also haven't decided if I want to do an intermediate class. If so, I'd do the one in the evenings. Getting up that early is freaking tough. But then I'm glad I'm up.

I'm indecisive today.

Speaking of indecisive, I've been thinking about the next thing I'll try. It probably should be riding a bike.

But here's the thing: I don't own a bike, or have access to a bike. Or a helmet, for that matter, and there is no way I am getting on a bike without a helmet. Getting to a bike might take me some time. And I have visions of falling off it and then fucking up my chances to run a good marathon. Stranger things have happened.

I want to see if any bike shops would be interested. I want to pitch it as more of an article too, I need to get on that.

Okay, today is a rambling kind of post. I'll think of it as a freewrite for the other writing I'm about to start.

Maybe after lunch.

Happy July!

Today is July 1st. It is (was?) the birthdate of both my late uncle and my late grandfather. If you're out there, reading or watching, hey there and I'm sorry we had such strange relationships, respectively.

Anyway, onto rowing. Today was a good day!

I don't know why, I woke up this morning just dying to go back to bed. I was talking to one of my fellow classmates on if it's easier to get up early on Monday or Wednesday. We both agreed that Monday was ever so slightly easier. As I'm typing, I'm kind of thinking...maybe it's this: Easier to get up on Monday, but easier to row on Wednesday?

Today was windier out there, so harder to keep the boat level. And when not everyone is rowing, when we row in pairs and fours (described in a sec), you have to work harder at keeping the boat level. Your oar has to float, flat, on top of the water.

I was watching my oar lying flat this morning, when I wasn't rowing, and it came to me: Like frosting a cake. When you get the flat spatula/icing knife loaded with icing but have to maintain a flat edge to make the cake appear seamless...that is sorta what it's like. Stay flat, even, smooth...it helps everyone else on the boat.

When I get out there I sometimes wonder if I'm going to get seasick. It's not bad, but it's a little topsy turvy and unbalanced. It's also so strange--not bad, just odd--to see the river from three inches above it. I see runners like a speck, much in the same way as a runner, I'd see rowers like a speck. Nifty. I feel very much a part of Morning On The Portland Waterfront, no matter what I'm doing. And I like that.

I realized that driving there and driving home--I think I like mornings because I like avoiding other people, and mornings are when you can usually do that. Hee.

(this is what happens when you go and get coffee in the middle of a post. where the hell was I?)

So today I was in Seat 6 for most of the time. It went really well, I thought. The guy who doesn't know what he's doing was behind me, phew. I don't mean to sound like a bitch, but at least I know I'm not wrong for thinking what I think when I hear him get called out on going too fast or stuff like that. I should be nicer, okay, I'll stop.

Anyway, it was a good row, though I later learn that seats 5&6 are actually the easiest seats on the boat, so of course paranoid me is thinking "I got put there because I need the easy seat!" But then I got pulled out to let other people switch off, but then got put back in again at seat 1 because the woman there was having back issues. That seemed really easy, so I dunno. On one hand I kind of want the challenge of seat 8. That is supposed to be the toughest, but it's also the most kind of...topsy-turvy, so you need good balance. I don't know if I am coordinated enough. But I had good, consistent strokes.

I kind of like this stuff. It's fun.

But dear lord! it is early. And rowers are tough. I don't know that I'm tough enough.

Part of this is, I would like to be a natural at something.

I think in what I try, part of me wants to succeed, immensely and immediately. I totally have no patience. I want to be a natural. I want to be more than that; I want to be a prodigy. Some weird, supernatural talent that's immediately identified.

I learned I wasn't a natural at the drums. At least not natural enough for me to run right out and buy a drum set--not to mention the conundrums (hee! -drums. conundrii?) of where to put it and with what money? So yeah.

I'm not like that with running. But I enjoy the hell out of it. And I can say I have improved immensely since I first started doing it. But I'm not a natural. The fact w/running is that I ding my body up so much doing something which should be natural--it is a pretty good indication that I'm not a natural runner! I would also have to be shaped differently, long legs instead of a long torso. Trust, tall & thin does not a runner make. I can't tell you how many times I've been lapped by short chunky people.

But running is teaching me that effort matters, too. I once wrote something for my running club publication about how running's one of the only things where my level of effort exceeds my achievement. Previously I wouldn't have kept doing something that I wasn't great at. But I do it. And what's weirdest is that I enjoy it. I enjoy that growth. I don't know if that's because of maturity or because of running. but I do it.

With the rowing, I wonder if this is something I could be a natural at. This probably sounds really narcissistic, but what the hell. I enjoy it so far (save the early and the drudgery of getting the boat and oars etc. down to the water). I'm always kind of apprehensive at first, but then I like it once we're out there. Maybe that's okay--a healthy respect for the prospect of tipping over is kind of a good thing, yes?

Wow, that caffeine is hitting me. I feel almost like I'm still in the boat!

And when I was leaving, walking through the parking lot, one of the women in my class stopped me and complimented my rowing! She was saying that I looked really good out there (she was in the boat alongside us), and then said something like "Yeah, I was looking at you and thinking 'I want to be behind her!'" and then we laughed. It was really nice to hear and I'm sure it was genuine.

I hope next week's rows feel that good, and that I don't forget everything by Monday. It kind of picked me up for the day. Sure, I've had some professional setbacks lately, and have been down about those (hey at least I still have a job), but hearing that really made me feel good.

If only I could remember her name.