Well, there's a little more to this story that I still want to tell. And so after our dinner in the tiny little camper in the pouring down rain, I asked Ron to help me load my kayak back on my car the next day after my last morning paddle.
He readily agreed and so I set out on lake after breakfast the next day. It felt so good to push off from the shore and dig my paddles into the water as I scooped out each stroke.
"Stroke! Stroke! Stroke!" then "Weigh Enough!" rang out in my memory as I recalled sitting in a shell on University Lake in the predawn hours with the other members of my rowing team at UNC Chapel Hill. These past few days of paddling my plastic kayak had woken up something in me that made me feel powerful and strong and free as I glided across the lake, keeping watch for large birds along the shore.
And so I quickly slipped out of sight and paddled around the bend into the open water of Jordan Lake when I suddenly felt something go "pop!" in my back. As a wave of pain washed over me, I realized that I had ruptured the weakened disc in my spine and as my back grew ever tenser I thought about what I might do.
I could either coast into the closest shore, but then would have to walk back along the campground roads for who knows how long, else I could turn around and try to return to the place where I had put in. And as the pain began to lessen, I turned my boat around, paddling lightly, and maneuvered us both carefully back to shore.
And boy was I glad to see the shore!
(See my little place back there in the woods?!)
He readily agreed and so I set out on lake after breakfast the next day. It felt so good to push off from the shore and dig my paddles into the water as I scooped out each stroke.
"Stroke! Stroke! Stroke!" then "Weigh Enough!" rang out in my memory as I recalled sitting in a shell on University Lake in the predawn hours with the other members of my rowing team at UNC Chapel Hill. These past few days of paddling my plastic kayak had woken up something in me that made me feel powerful and strong and free as I glided across the lake, keeping watch for large birds along the shore.
And so I quickly slipped out of sight and paddled around the bend into the open water of Jordan Lake when I suddenly felt something go "pop!" in my back. As a wave of pain washed over me, I realized that I had ruptured the weakened disc in my spine and as my back grew ever tenser I thought about what I might do.I could either coast into the closest shore, but then would have to walk back along the campground roads for who knows how long, else I could turn around and try to return to the place where I had put in. And as the pain began to lessen, I turned my boat around, paddling lightly, and maneuvered us both carefully back to shore.
(See my little place back there in the woods?!)
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