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“Who am I taking on the row?”
by Courtney
“What are you taking on the row?” they ask me.
I rephrase the question: “Who am I taking on the row?”
The “what” is undoubtedly, incredibly important. It is the dehydrated meals, wool socks, spare water maker filters, an extra set of oars. It includes the extra batteries, 3 buckets, 2 hats - one with a large brim - and a long handled spoon. But the “who”! That’s a brilliant question to ponder…
Bruce Springsteen - nothing more needs to be said! The music of my life.
Margaret Atwood. Mary Oliver. Joyce Carol Oats. Maya Angelou.
Tom Waits, Bob Dylan, kd Lang, Beyonce.
Shakespeare. Marie de France.
Leo Leoni and stories of Frederick the mouse gathering sounds and scents from the changing seasons to fuel stories during the long winter.
Tales of Odyseus and his adventures at sea, determined to get back to Ithaca. Julie of the Wolves and her resilience and knowledge of how to survive unsheltered in Alaska. The nuns of The Matrix and their refusal of the patriarchy.
Who am I taking across the ocean with me is the question I ponder these days.
Leonard Cohen for when things seem impossible. Simon and Garfunkle for when I am nostalgic.
The soundtracks to Hamilton, My Fair Lady, Hair and Cabaret (only the first acts), Chicago, Newsies, and the Book of Mormon when I need to sing at the top of my lungs.
Moana goes too.
And Glennon Doyle and We Can Do Hard Things.
And Francois Rabbath. And Ella and Billie. And the Beatles.
And Taylor, Ariana, Chappell, Harry, and another Billie.
Who would you take across an ocean?
December 10, 2024
Finding Home on Emma
by Taylan
There are very few endeavors in the world that take two years of preparation before even starting training. But that’s the reality for many ocean rowing teams. Summer of 2022 was when I first decided to take on the Pacific and start preparations, and we didn’t have our first training row until summer of 2024. Leading up to our first training camp, there were numerous moments where the reality of what we’re taking on began to sink in – deciding a team name, finalizing teammates, officially entering the race, and putting a deposit down on a boat – but nothing felt as real as the moment we stepped onto our beloved boat, Emma, together as a team for the first time.
Before that first trip, we spent countless hours on land learning everything we could about navigation, tying knots, race rules, sea survival, and so much more, as well as bonding as a team and figuring out team dynamics. But actually being out on the water, navigating the coastal waters around Salem, made everything come alive in a way that no amount of planning could. Our first training trip was a mix of on water and land training with our coach, Duncan. We took everything off of Emma to learn about every nook and cranny of the boat and all her kit and equipment. On water, our longest day took us up to Gloucester, and we began to learn the watersway around Salem so we’re prepared to take on the next training row on our own (well, mostly on our own - Duncan and our other coach, Aaron, are always behind the scenes in the UK to support us as we passage plan and execute the row).
About a month and a half after that first trip, Courtney, Julie, and I set off for our first training trip on our own. Our time learning with Duncan was incredibly valuable, but it was time to put our skills and knowledge to the test. I was nervous. Would I remember everything? Would I know what to do if something went wrong? Do we have all the skills we need as a team to do this alone?
A couple hours into our first overnight row, Courtney and Julie began to get seasick. Both wanted to push through and keep rowing through the night like we planned. There was part of me that wanted to make the executive decision as skipper to anchor for the night while their stomachs calmed – health and safety comes first, and it was hard for me to see them so miserable. But I trust my teammates, and I trust that they know their limits so we kept going. And I’m so glad we did because I discovered that rowing at night is truly magical, and I was honestly disappointed when Julie came out to relieve me from my night shift.
I learned a lot on both training trips. During the first trip what I learned was mostly technical - hard skills that we’ll need on the ocean. On the second trip, what I learned was mostly about myself and my team. I learned that I need to be okay with some degree of misery, because rowing across an ocean is not all sunshine and rainbows. Which, as someone who tries to lean into positivity and find the silver lining, learning to be okay with things that are miserable at times is hard.
Being on Emma feels like home. I love having the singular focus of training, and water is my happy place. We leave for our next training camp in just a couple of days, and I am beyond excited to continue learning and growing - individually and as a team.
October 13, 2024
Befriending Emma
by Julie
After several months of unexpected shipping delays, Emma arrived in Boston a… bit of a mess. After finishing her Atlantic crossing with Salty Science in early February, she was inspected, sealed up, put in a shipping crate, and sent north on a cargo ship. Emma’s insides would not see the light of day again until May, and when the light finally did shine upon her, it revealed mold. And lots of it! To be clear, we don’t blame Emma (or anyone). You would be moldy, too, if you stayed soggy for five months! Luckily, I love to clean, and now that Emma is safe in her new home in Massachusetts, I certainly have my work cut out for me.
I have always been the type of person who needs a clean, organized space to function. A messy room can make my chest tighten and make my head feel like it contains a cloud of cartoon squiggles! As a child, long before I knew this about myself, I would come home from trips away and feel instantly overwhelmed by the messy room I had left behind. Unable to figure out where to begin, I could only find peace by starting from scratch: I would take every item not in its place, wipe down every shelf, and finally put everything back, one item at a time. Admittedly, it is an extreme method of cleaning! But it worked then, and I find it works now with Emma too.
The first thing I did after Emma got comfy in the backyard was open her cabins and take out every loose item. She was sooooo stinky inside! Next, I removed the tied, taped, and glued down items, and scraped off all the methods of “sticky” used to attach things to her cabin walls. We are Emma’s fifth team, so she has seen a lot of double-sided tape and velcro in her years. Finally, after several days of this, the actual cleaning could start! Dish soap, Simple Green, and tea tree oil are all helping bring her back to life. And although I haven’t yet gotten to the stage of putting everything back in place, I can already feel that familiar sense of peace washing over me.
I can’t lie– it has been a lot to manage! Each task seems to unearth three more, and with our first training coming up in a few weeks, there are moments when it seems there is no way Emma will be ready. But it is certainly satisfying work, and as I’ve been going through all of Emma's storage areas, cleaning her corners, and assessing her gear, I’ve realized there is an unexpected bonus, too: I am getting to know her.
Before Emma arrived, I had only seen photos and videos of ocean rowing boats. Even with a person in the image, it can be challenging to understand the dimensions and scale. I must have said, "Wow" and, “Holy crap,” at least a hundred times the first day I saw Emma and brought her home. The first time I climbed onto her trailer, I thought I would break her! Now, after a few dozen trips up and down her deck and over the sides of the trailer, I am better at navigating around her. I can (almost) climb in and out of the cabins smoothly, and I know to turn on the cabin lights instead of working in the dark. I learned the hard way how dirty she gets if I don't put her cover on while she is parked in the yard, and I also learned how to clean her out; I've filled her deck with water, and seen how all the sections connect so everything can drain off her sides. I knew Emma was crafted to survive being swamped by waves, but it was another thing entirely to see this happen in real life!
Emma is now ours, and alongside her cleaning process, I am beginning to make small repairs and upgrades-- including the opportunity to have her reflect some Oar the Rainbow style! She needs new docking fenders, so I get to pick the colors of the fenders! We need new paracord to tie up a host of items on board. Again, I get to pick the colors! It’s small- picking colors- but it is another thing that helps me connect with Emma and make her ours.
I didn't anticipate this would be the outcome, but cleaning and organizing Emma has become a nice, long, getting-to-know-you process. It is only when I pause to remember that none of my teammates have had these experiences yet that I realize how special this preparation time is. (Courtney has even expressed some jealousy that I know Emma in a way she doesn’t yet!) I am starting to feel more comfortable with her. There is a growing familiarity. It feels like I am making a new friend. I didn’t expect this, but I feel grateful for it.
June 24, 2024
Ocean Rowing, Mental Health, & Neurodivergence
by Taylan
When people ask me why I decided to row across an ocean, my list of reasons seems to grow and evolve each time I answer. It’s hard to articulate the multi-faceted reasons why I’m choosing to take on one of the most time-consuming, expensive, and physically and mentally challenging adventures I could take on. I’m rowing an ocean because I want to be representation for trans athletes, because I want to challenge myself physically, and simply because I want to. But perhaps the most significant reason is that as a neurodivergent person and someone who has struggled with mental illness for most of my life, I want to prove to myself that I can. I want to prove that I am more than my diagnoses, and that although there are plenty of things I struggle to do, there are plenty of things I excel at. And I want rowing an ocean to be one of them.
Although navigating my mental illness and neurodivergence is one of the reasons why I’m doing this in the first place, it has also made an already hard endeavor even harder. As someone with ADHD, PTSD, depression, and anxiety, it can be difficult to find the executive function, motivation, and brain space to do everything I need to do on a continuously growing to-do list. Organizing an ocean's worth of tasks and training-- on top of being a full-time PhD student-- has been the ultimate experiential learning process for figuring out how to prioritize (and sometimes triage), and I'm learning as I go what does and doesn't work to manage my self care and mental health in a sustainable way. I’m learning to ask my friends, family, and community for help. I’m learning to let go of perfectionism and allow myself to be okay with “good enough”. I’m learning to create processes that work for my squirrel brain that always wants to work on the Shiny Task that gives me a dopamine hit, instead of the much more important but mundane tasks. I’m also learning to be gentle with myself on the days that I don’t want to get out of bed, and using self-compassion and support from my teammates and loved ones to get myself back on track.
No matter how much I learn and figure out about my brain and mental health, the exhaustion and sacrifices still feel never-ending. In the past when I’ve done things that have required this level of sacrifice, it has always been at the expense of my well-being and mental health. What’s different with this endeavor is that they’re sacrifices that support my well-being because I’m putting myself and my goals first. Yes, it is a lot, and one could argue that I’m doing too much. But everything I’m doing is lifegiving in its own way. The sacrifices I'm making to prioritize this row are adding to my well-being, rather than taking away from it like they have in the past.
Navigating the world with mental health diagnoses is always challenging, and navigating the preparation required to row across an ocean is downright grueling. There are times I feel like I'm doing really well, and there are just as many times I feel like I'm failing. But I keep trudging along, taking things one day, one step, one stroke, at a time.
April 22, 2024
Safety at Sea
by Courtney
Last weekend our team came together in Annapolis, MD to attend a two-day training seminar on Safety at Sea. Held at the United States Naval Academy and presented by The Marine Traders Association of Maryland, the weekend goal was to instill in us one simple but profound message to the attending coastal and offshore boaters:
You can’t buy safety. Practice, practice, practice.
The seminar was divided into multiple sessions each day, and every session began with a discussion of a case study of a recorded disaster at sea and how the actions the crew took- or did not take- affected the outcome of the situation. In one early session, a presenter caught my attention with his explanation of the “cascade to sinking” of some of the vessels. The cascade is akin to dominoes– one thing happens, and then another, and another. Boats rarely just sink; there are numerous points in a disaster where the crew must make critical decisions to ensure the integrity of the boat. However, those decisions are often required when the crew are tired, cold, hungry, wet, or scared, which doesn't necessarily lead to smart decisions. And how do we combat that poor decision pattern? We practice.
We start by practicing now when we are safe and close to land. Right now we can each practice:
–Clipping on to our safety tethers before we step out of the cabin onto the deck.
–Tying knots and knowing when to use them. We are primarily learning a bowline, round turn with 2 half hitches, constrictor, figure 8, clove hitch, and alpine loop.?
–Learning how to communicate via VHF to report an emergency or even just to confirm that the HUGE container ship a few miles off our bow does in fact see us!
–Studying how and when to light flares, and which flares to use.
–Donning an immersion suit (a giant, rubbery gumby suit) in 2 minutes or less (hint: sit down and get your feet all the way in first).
When we have mastered these things, we add a layer of challenge to simulate conditions at sea. We get wet first and then try to don our immersion suits. We turn off the lights. We have someone set an alarm at some point in the middle of the night and when the alarm goes off, get out of bed, jump in the shower clothed, jump out, and get into the immersion suit. The drill should take no more than 4 minutes…3 would be better.
Over and over, the presenters drove home the point of being as prepared as possible. Do you know how to use the fire extinguisher? Do you know which one to use and when? Do you…do I know how to inflate my life preserver? Where the whistle on it is? Where the light is? How to tighten the crotch strap? Can I pull myself into a life raft? Can I pull someone else in?
And don’t get me started with Damage Control! It’s not a joke when we say we are to channel McGyver. We will only have a set number of tools and resources. How can we stop the leak? How do we re-attach whatever came undone? Can we fix a broken rudder? A broken oarlock? How about a stuck seat or a clogged water maker? Practice. Practice. Practice. It is almost inevitable that something will break at sea that we didn’t get to practice fixing during training, but the mere act of practicing how to fix things and thinking outside of the box will serve us well.
My favorite session of the seminar might have been the medical part. The doctor who presented was very matter-of-fact, and quite funny given the subject matter! He suggested that if you know you get seasick, test different medicines before you get on the water. Scopolamine can be great for mitigating some of the symptoms of seasickness, but it also makes some people hallucinate. That would be good to know BEFORE being at sea! He also suggested we practice using a skin stapler on a pig’s foot or something with similar firmness, and that we practice all different wound closures using dermabond, steristrips, and even duct tape!
Know about and understand cold water shock. Know that a person, upon being plunged into cold water, will draw a huge breath in - a breath that can cause someone to take in a big gulp of water. Practice being calm. Practice breathing. Keep your head back. Know a body will lose heat 25x faster from cold water than from cold air. I practice this in my backyard in a large tub of cold water. This kind of practice rots. It truly does. But I do it anyway
Train for everything. Anticipate the unexpected. And when it comes, remember there’s always a second to take a second and think about what you practiced. It could make all the difference.
April. 15, 2024
Breathe
by Courtney
Meditation and mantras. 4-7-8, and 4-2, and 4-4-4-4 breathing. Stillness and stretching. Silence and song. There are so many ways to center ourselves and prepare our minds for the challenges ahead.
My go-to is my breath. Feeling overwhelmed? Breathe Courtney. Feeling tired? Breathe. Feeling excited and powerful? Breath. Breathe. Breathe! Breathing gets me back into me - into the sensations my body is experiencing, into the here and now. It is like a super power - slowing down time so I can recoup and assess what is truly going on around me. The more I practice breathing exercises, the quicker I am able to enter a state of clarity when my environment gets challenging.
In conjunction with my breath, I think about my movements. Inhale on the recovery, exhale on the exertion. Inhale when the seat of my rowing machine rolls to the front, exhale as I push off the footplate and drive my body back. Inhale as I bring my oars behind me and drop them into the water, exhale as I push them through the water and lever the boat forward. I breathe and visualize this movement hundreds of times in a practice session. On the ocean I will go through it over 1,000,000 times.
As I breathe through these movements, I also visualize them. How the blade (the spoon-looking part) enters the water. What it looks like for the blade to hold water against it as I drive my legs, propelling the boat forward. How my arms, body, and legs take turns bearing the brunt of the work over the course of the stroke. Arms, body, legs on the recovery portion rolling forward, legs, body, arms on the drive backward. After years of rowing, this simple mantra continues to help me settle into the work at hand, over and over and over again. Arms, body, legs. Legs, body, arms.
I find myself visualizing aspects of the Race all the time. Monstrous waves which I can yet barely fully imagine, and how I can respond to them. Dark skies with more stars than I have ever seen leading me through the blackness. Coming into Hanalei Bay with the crowd cheering and my loved ones just…right…here!
Jan. 24, 2024
Ocean Rowing 101
by Courtney
To ensure all participants understand the challenges and training required for rowing an ocean, our race mandates all participants complete a series of preparatory courses. This month, the four of us took our first eight hour course, designed by World's Toughest Row themselves. The course covered a lot— everything from early preparation, to nutrition, injuries and salt sores, emergencies, and how to prepare for returning home after the race.
In the future we will also be taking specific courses for Safety at Sea (including first aid at sea and sea survival), Navigation Techniques, CA Boating Safety, and VHF radio usage, but this first course was very broad to start. It was massively informative, massively eye opening, and massively motivating! Amongst the four of us, we took approximately 40 cumulative pages of notes!
I think we might all have felt a bit overwhelmed while taking those notes, but now that we are a few weeks out from the course the information is starting to settle. In general, those eight hours offered an outline of how we should consider planning the next 18 months, giving us a solid idea of what we need to learn and do, and by when. Unfortunately, having seen the pictures, we also know now what salt sores on one’s backside can really look like if you are not very careful with planning and hygiene. And once you see that, you really can’t un-see it. Our goal is to never see that in person… ever!
Here are some interesting tidbits, pulled from my course notes:
The World’s Toughest Row boasts a 98% team completion rate.
Rowers get a check-in call in a dedicated time window from the race Safety Team EVERY day they are on the water. We will be asked if we are okay, what the weather is like, and whether we have anything to report.
Fundraising for this endeavor and our charities never ends! It starts with the idea to row an ocean and it continues even after arrival in Hawaii.
Get on our boat as often as possible before the race- even if the boat is not in the water! Just be on it. Take everything apart and put it all back together. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat!
The Rannoch 45 (our boat) self rights without ballast but the hatches MUST stay closed. Emergency water stored in compartments along the center-line of the boat helps stabilize the boat.
There is nothing out in the open ocean, but the boat is small so you have no privacy at all - it’s a weird juxtaposition.
The US Coast Guard is awesome and is tremendously helpful!
And, one of my favorites at the moment, we should make it absolutely normal to set our alarms for 2:00 am and just row on the rowing machine for 2 hours. So, the next day a conversation with a friend can be, “So, what did you do last night? Oh, you went to a movie and then slept soundly. Great. I slept on my deck under a table to simulate being in close quarters and then I got up in the middle of the night, put a headlamp on, and erged for 2 hours. Oh, and it rained. It was great!”
The fact that I am smiling after writing that last sentence tells you a lot about me - about how dedicated I am to our goal of pushing ourselves and of doing good by our charity partners, Athlete Ally and Doctors Without Borders.
Dec. 21, 2023
Intentions, Life, and Teammates
by Courtney
Oar the Rainbow finally got a chance to meet in person this past weekend. Four people with a shared interest to try something few people try, or even contemplate, to do. Four people who want to row 2,800 miles across the Pacific Ocean. There were smiles and hugs and a general feeling of getting to know you, intermingled with a deeper sense of "I am about to spend 35-40+ days with you on a small boat and we are basically putting our lives in each others' hands."
I was a bit nervous at first. That first day of school feeling - Will they like me? Can I bring enough to the table to assure them I am up for this challenge? Are we really doing this? The question of whether I trust them did not enter my mind. I do trust them. Completely. I decided that the day we all agreed to be a team. I can question my own preparation and process, and I can question theirs, but I do not question my intention to give all I can to this endeavor, nor do I question theirs - and it was very good to be in the same room as them and feel that intention directly.
For the last 6 months, since I joined Oar the Rainbow, everything in my life has been processed through the lens of being an ocean rower. There have been many days I felt like I was giving enough to the team, to my training, to our goals. And there have also been many days I just had to keep my head above water to handle my own life and I felt like Oar the Rainbow was given short shrift. My teammates took it all in stride and gave me time when I needed it, as did I for them.
So much of life happens when preparing for an ocean row, but preparing for an ocean row demands you pay attention to every single day and how you handle what is thrown at you. It demands that you breathe and forces you to keep moving. For how you deal with stress on land will be tried and tested to the max out on the ocean. The ocean will be sure of that.
Ultimately, the four of us are doing what we all do. We are all rowing across our own oceans every single day; sometimes the water is calm and the sun is bright, and sometimes the waves tower above us and all we can do is stay the course and continue on best we can until we get to port. And, even when we get to port, we know we can't stay there. We will venture out again.
We, as Oar the Rainbow, are just going to do this in crap weather, with ginormous waves, and with freeze dried foods to sustain us. But. The stars. The sunsets. The chance to see a whale! The opportunity to be more. The possibilities that come with staying the course. Ocean rowing is not for the faint of heart, but neither is living with intention. I can't see living any other way - and I am so glad to be living with intention with Oar the Rainbow!
Oct. 23, 2023
How It Starts
by Courtney
In all the time I’ve been telling people about Oar the Rainbow’s quest to row 2,800 miles across the mid-Pacific Ocean, never once have I been asked, “How’s creating the team website going?” Or, “What’s the best option to get an ocean rowing boat from Antigua to Boston?” I haven’t even been asked, “Do you think taking the required safety courses as a package would be more cost effective than taking them individually?” More often than not the questions are about the HUGE waves we will encounter, the intense sleep deprivation we will suffer, or the outrageous night skies we will get to gaze upon. And that makes total sense — it’s the ocean part of this journey is exciting; that’s what people want to know more about!
Although the things we are doing these days might not be as sexy, they are the foundation of our row. They are the things we are slowly, oh so slowly, beginning to learn about and acquire to make this journey a reality. In the last several months our team crafted a mission statement and bylaws, and we are now a registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization. We have selected charities to support (Athlete Ally and Doctors Without Borders), and have a website, a bank account, and sponsorship information we will soon put into circulation. We have raised funds for and put a deposit down on our boat, Emma, who will be delivered to us next spring in Boston after she races across the Atlantic. And let’s not forget that after 6+ months we finally recruited our final teammate, and that we are the first official entrants in the 2025 World’s Toughest Row!
We have weekly meetings and daily check-in to accomplish all these things, as well as to learn how each of us work and communicate— critically important to do before we’re in the middle of the ocean! We will meet for the first time in person next month in Boston at the Head of the Charles regatta. We are brainstorming ways to expand our audience, we are practicing tying knots, and we are running, rowing, riding, cold water training, lifting heavy things, and looking forward to the day we are sleep deprived… but sleep deprived together under a sky full of stars.
Sept. 18, 2023