The View from Portland

So up until very recently my 'about me' section may have contained a little blurb about me being a sweep rower all the way. Or something to that affect. Who needs to get bogged down in details? The point is, a person can change and I think I have changed my mind about sculling.

I had not been blindly avoiding sculling. I tried it. Once. The guys on our team have a yearly boys weekend north of Seattle, taking as many small boats with us as we can. We eat, we fart, we row. A couple years ago was the last time I was able to make it and because nobody was interested in rigging a pair and I had no interest in tipping a single in the middle of February, I rowed in doubles for the weekend. Calmer water was never seen. The weather, although chilly, was great for a full day of rowing. I, however, was having a hard time finding the enjoyment in spending the weekend off balance and ripping up my hands with new blisters and scrapes as I learned to row with two blades instead of one.

Flash forward to last week when I biked down to the boathouse on Wednesday morning all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed to row with the recreational rowers, only to find that I was the only one. Not to mention, my back-up plan to help with the learn to row classes was nixed because there were actually enough volunteers for once! My choices were: bike back home and skip working out, bike to gym and lift in rowing trou, or drag out the erg. None of those included bringing a boat onto the water on a BEAUTIFUL morning. I chose to erg. <_< I always thought necessity was the mother of invention, but apparently she's the mother of mind-openness, or mind changing or something like that, too. I biked down again on Friday for the learn to scull/recreational sculling day.

I was lucky to be put in a double with an experienced sculler who I am actually well matched with. He had planned to row on his own, but noticed the group needed an extra body and graciously decided to help out. I won't go into all of the details because ::yawn:: we've all rowed before. But I will say that even though my first weekend of sculling wasn't much fun for me, I was able to build upon it with my second time out. We were rowing together and it was feeling really stable! The experience definitely gave me the courage to keep with it and the promise that sculling a single is a goal within close reach. Soon, I won't HAVE to depend on other rowers to be at the boat house. Although, I think I will still prefer to row with others rather than myself. Who knows, maybe that will change as well.

The good news is: I don't have to quit my job! I thought I might have to because the heartless giant retailer that I work for refused to allow me to take the weekend off for Northwest Regional Championships at the end of June. They said I hadn't submitted my request outside of the three month window of opportunity, so I was their lowest priority for finding coverage. Even if I was at the top of their list, they said, nobody wanted to cover that weekend anyway. Well screw the scheduler and his big scheduly date book!! I hired a new employee and I'm making her work that weekend! Sucker!!

Now I don't have to let my coach and entire team down as I would have if I broke the news about not being able to make it to Seattle. The weight has been lifted! PHEW! That would have really sucked to put in all of this training for nothing.

We have had a set line-up in the boat for a while now and we are finally starting to gel into a similar rowing style. We still have those days when it seems like nobody's head is in the boat. But, we are seeing with more frequency what it is like when we focus that unbridled energy into glidey magical run. Man, I love moving a boat like that! I want some shiny gold this year. I can taste it!

Anyone else headed up to the Northwest Regionals this year? I am a little bummed that it is up in the Seattle area. I haven't had much fun driving up there in the past. The traffic is so much worse than in Portland and I don't have one of those fancy GPS things to help me with directions. Getting lost gets old quick. I miss having Regionals down here in Vancouver, WA when it only takes me 45 minutes to get there! I don't believe I have ever rowed at this year's venue, so I am looking forward to seeing what it's like. Just wish it was closer. Hope to see some of you up there! Let me know if you're going.

As close as guys can get on a crew team, it is still hard to be The Gay Guy. I have never been one to make guy friends easily. The Fag Hags and I always seem to find each other first. My husband, on the other hand, has what we refer to as Fag Stags - a hoard of straight male friends who love him and look up to him. Rowing is where I made my first real platonic bonds with men. However, the first go around I was closeted and felt like I was always waiting for the other shoe to drop. There was always the fear of being found out. This time around, in Master's Rowing, the Gay is out on the table. Some bonds are there, but they feel loose, ephemeral. We don't eat and sleep and do double workouts together in my Master's club. We have lives and jobs and families. A post-erg trip to the pub is the best off-water bonding we get. Hey, that's pretty good. But sometimes I catch myself wondering, where are my gays at? Where is my Fag Stag, even?

Last weekend, my husband and I went to a barbecue with his Stags. The food was simple and manly, there was skeet shooting (which I totally rocked, by the way - I should train for the biathlon), and there was even naked hot-tubbing and saunas. A dozen straight, twenty-something dudes getting naked and talking about their feelings and relationships and their journeys in life...and of course farting and teasing and being wise-asses. It was so intensely satisfying and also alien and rare at the same time. The young guys on my team are so Type A, that they don't even make time for experiences like this. They are working non-stop.

This post seems schizo because my brain wants two things, but is lumping them together as one. First, I would love to have another openly gay rower on my team in hopes that we would bond more closely than I have been able to with my current teammates. Secondly, I want to bond more closely with the guys, period! Somehow I imagine bonding with a fellow fag will be easier, but I know that's not necessarily the case. This is just my idea of Utopia, I guess. Not something I'm stressing about, but something that's been prominent in my mind lately.

Anyone else have similar experiences with their teams? Any thoughts?