Regatta

Trembling, I hear the groups of schools including my own cheer their hearts out for the current race.

I do not join.

I pick my calluses, evidence of the several weeks of brutal pain and training I have endured. Some are split open, an angry red while others reflect my face, stone-faced and solemn. Tapping my knees in a jittery motion I'm faced with the cruel epiphany that I need to justify my sacrifices. My failing of my exams needs to be justified in front of my parents today. It has to be justified in this four-minute race or everything will have been for nothing. A race practiced several weeks on end. A race that drew blood, sweat and tears. All my training needs to flow into just four-minutes of pain I need to condition my mind to fight through whatever obstacles it conjures to hold me back. I seek comfort in trying to relish the result of my preliminary races. But in my heart, I know my opponents did not give it their all instead chose a studious and practical approach looking to figure out my tactics that I wish I had the experience to come up with. 

Sweat trickles down my face in irregular patterns. A half-hearted job at cooling me under the sun's onslaught. Checking my boat settings, I steal a glance at my competition and immediately wish I hadn't. They are way more ready for this than I am. Their faces mirror the stone-faced facade I tried to preserve however, real with a light of reassurance and experience in their eyes fueled by a rush of electrical excitement. Their savoring this, their bred for this, damn it. Coach often loved to relay that "when you doubt your power you often give power to your doubt." This quote pops in my head and only serves to make me feel more horrendous at the fact that I'm failing at something so easy. Why? Why do I feel so nervous at a race that I have done in practice at least a hundred times. The answer hits me then like a stab in the back from a friend you trusted. This is all real! The results matter now. They'll give you hell if you come last. Your course and technique actually matter now. This realization makes me stumble, to seek someone out to hear my cries of doubt. Nobody will understand, they wouldn't even care their too busy focusing on the other races that matter too care. I believe the voice, after all it's the only one that listened to me. I swallow the negative thoughts and bile back down like pills. A temporary positive escapism but it will come back. 

  I don't hear. It is as if someone has cut the neurons connecting that field to me. Wordlessly I carry my boat by myself and flip it. An act that would give me punishment as it's usually carried out by two people, but I need time to myself. I shove myself out. Another highly risky act, I'm ten minutes early I slip past myself and win the bet I made with myself earlier. Nobody is there to cheer for me as my boat goes past. Each stroke I take feels sloppy, rushed or unfinished. I curse every misfortune racking up an interesting conversation I will have with God when I die. A voice rattles off all my mistakes in my strokes. Morphing into my crewmate's pessimistic voices. It isn't till I reach the starting point do I realize that I never made those mistakes and that my strokes got better with each meter however, their natural reaction which is to criticize feeds into the voice in my head.

After ten minutes (four minutes wasted at the fact i couldn't align my boat with the others) The boats were all ready. All aligned and ready to race. My stomach was in turmoil. The fact that I didn't eat piques my curiosity to what I will throw up. my brain is pumping out so much negativity I can't even decipher each individual thought rather a blob of pessimism like a guillotine waiting to cut me through if I fail. I knew pushing my negative thoughts down would haunt me later. The call is given and my last though is "I'm going to fail."