Stephen Kiesling's blog

About ten days ago my rowing partner Andy and I put our pair (two-person racing shell) on top of his truck and drove to Lake Natoma, near Sacramento, CA, to race at perhaps the best rowing course in the country. Our goal was to practice on a real race course marked with buoys (we have no lanes here in Oregon) and to compete against the Sacramento State Crew. This would be our first race against college kids and we were extremely nervous. Sac State is a Division II college program -- not as fast as Yale or UC Berkeley, let alone the Olympic team, but they are fast and young.

I spent the last few minutes hovered over the white porcelain thrown, losing what little was left of lunch, feeling oddly triumphant. It’s been some time since I stopped mid-workout to throw up. I feared maybe I had learned something. But no! I remain in no danger of enlightenment. I can still fail to warm up properly, still throw my body against the machine at a pace that would have taxed me decades ago, and I can race coughing and sputtering to spew. Progress? Maybe. Spiritual. Who knows?

Writing is an unnatural act. I've been doing it professionally for some twenty-six years, and I still have a hard time facing a blank page, or worse, a blank box on a blog. Too many thoughts scurrying around to focus on any one of them. And no copy editors to clean up the mess. Nevertheless, the Titanic sails again...