On the Water

Today was the first time that NBCR was back on the water for 2013. Tendinitis in my shoulder is keeping me from helping to carry the boat down to the water. I should have brought this problem up last season because I continually aggravated my shoulder carrying the boat. This is part of the learning process here. As an independent studio artist, I'm used to being responsible for doing everything myself. It's a constant effort to remember that I'm not responsible here. I can ask the coaches to decide or help solve a problem. And they will. It's kind of a new experience for me.

Iced

For the past week and a half, I've been afraid that I was going to have to abandon my rowing project. I had finally bought myself an indoor rower (an erg) so that I could train daily without having to go to the gym or get onto the water. No Excuses. It was a big, one-time investment. But it's actually cheaper than a year and a half of gym memberships. However, about a week after getting the machine, I had a problem.

20 years ago, I was diagnosed with bursitis in my right hip. I got a steroid shot and had to give up jogging. Having a doctor tell me that, in fact, I was not as robust as the average person fed into all my gay-boy insecurities. But one moves on. The bursitis has flared up from time to time. But for the past ten years, the flare-ups have been minor. But after using my new erg, the flare-up in my hip was as bad as it has ever been. When it started, it was as if a sword was inserted at my hip and driven down my leg towards my knee.

I immediately started icing the hip twice a day (Ace bandages are a great fashion accessory, no?) and taking naproxin. I limited my walking (bad because the problem coincided with Art Week in New York). I had to miss the most active week for contemporary art. Two weeks later, the popping of my hip and the pain had decreased enough for me to get on the erg for an easy 2000m. It was a moment of truth. If the motion of the erg set my hip off, then the project would be over.

Of course, there was no logic to thinking that the erg had caused the problem. It was the same model as I had used at the gym. The motion is the same as I learned last summer on the water with New Bedford Community Rowing. And I had only used the new erg a few times. Really, I had not increased my rowing activity significantly. But I care deeply about this project; I've invested a year into it; I've got another year and a half to two years before it's completed. And I'm not as robust as the average person. Who wouldn't worry.

The easy work out did not cause any problem. No popping. No pain. So I started to think more logically about what might have caused the problem. And I remembered that on the day the shooting pain started, I'd been having some trouble walking. And, yes, maybe that trouble had been coming on slowly. But walking hasn't been easy for 20 years, so I tend to ignore minor aches.

This winter, when the weather started getting nasty, I had looked around for a pair of boots. I found a pair that my dad had bought a few months before he got sick. He'd never worn them. They fit me. Problem solved. Of course these were $20 boots from Wal-Mart. Great for keeping snow off the feet. Bad for walking all over New York -- or anywhere. One's feet kind of roll side-to-side instead of front to back. The voice of my friend Bob, who is a physical therapist, came back to me, "make sure you keep your feet straight and push off from your second toe."

I put on the boots and walked across the room. It was impossible to push off from the second toe. They rolled such that I was pushing off from the ball of my foot and my whole body was rocking. I had been wearing these as my primary shoes since mid December. They are now in the trash.

I still need to take it easy on the erg until my hip feels stable. But the story isn't over -- though it is for those boots.

The Shortest Voyage

Last Friday, I finished burning text onto the oars that I started making last August. They're beautiful -- and, perhaps, useful. Over the weekend, they got a single coat of varnish. That's not enough for a long voyage. But I had nothing to worry about.

I decided to christen the oars today by attempting to row a racing shell. I tried this once before, with similar results. So I wasn't expecting to get far -- and didn't. About ten seconds into the voyage, it ended. Weather report: the water in New Bedford Harbor is currently 55 degrees. I am glad that I decided to make this attempt today. My original idea was to do it on January 31, the anniversary of Gideon Dexter's death (the event around which this whole project revolves).

I need to thank the four people who helped me today: Cheyenne Bayse, Carolyn Flynn, Sheilagh Flynn, and Calder Reardon. All the boats had been stored for the winter, so preparing for today's row and the safety precautions necessitated by the chilly water were not simple. Of course, I need to thank also New Bedford Community Rowing -- and assure all readers that novice rowers are not encouraged to get into elite boats like this. I was indulged because I wanted to experience exactly how far I have to go in learning and preparing for my row. I only got about 20 feet from the dock. So my question has been answered.

Water Everywhere

Superstorm Sandy has put a pre-mature end to this year's on-water rowing practice. I shot the above video a couple of weeks before the storm hit. And I'd hoped to get out there some more. I only got to row a single twice. The video is of my second time sculling. I'm pretty rough. I don't hold the oars even. I can't feather them. I haven't figured out how to get even power. But it was a beautiful day and I rowed the perimeter of New Bedford Harbor, which took about an hour (rowing inside the hurricane barrier and excluding the superfund, clean-up site).

Last week, I wrote on this blog that I would post photos of my recently completed large drawing. I should have been in New York during Sandy getting the drawing photographed. Instead, I stayed up in Massachusetts to help keep watch on my mom's house.  I did have to get up on a barn roof during the hurricane and staple down a strip of roofing that blew off. But, otherwise, things were pretty light.

At New Bedford Community Rowing, all the boats were taken off their outdoor rack, shrink wrapped, and staked to the ground. Today, I went over to help unwrap some and re-rig them. Unfortunately, the single that I rowed in the video seems to have been taken off site, stowed away for the winter. So I may have to wait until next Spring to work on my technique.

I'll be heading home to Brooklyn Sunday or Monday so that I can vote on Tuesday. And I hope to get my work Photographed soon. I'll also get a chance to help my friends who've been effected by the storm. I fear that at least one of my drawings was destroyed by Sandy*; it was at the gallery where my January show is scheduled. The gallery suffered heavy flooding -- Kind of ironic considering that the two central pieces of that show will (hopefully!) be 1) a drawing of a ship getting subsumed by a storm -- and 2) the pair of wooden oars that I've been working on since August. Oars aren't much use against a storm, especially without a boat.

(* update 11/4/12: the drawing survived!)