The Daring Feet

Alison was worried about my length. She said I wasn’t going in straight. She claimed I was pushing too early. Alison is my rowing coach, obviously. This week she was trying to hone my technique to a peak of perfection. Or ‘not to be quite so crap’, as she put it, in her cheerful northern way. So kind. So motivational.

We were out in gorgeous weather, as September had done its usual English thing of bringing out the sun the moment the schools go back. It beat down from a cloudless sky, the water was placid, and the boat raced across the surface, which I think is always better than the alternative. Bubbles projected from the side, as I sought floating nirvana. Concentrating furiously, I extended forwards to get more length to my stroke, only slightly conscious that the last Alison, a chap called Peter, had told me not to do that very thing. So no confusion there.

There’s plenty to think about to start with, so contradictory advice does not really help. I sometimes think it’s best just to give up and stop trying, and let whatever will happen, happen. ‘Thinking too precisely on the event’, like Hamlet, is not necessarily optimised to deliver sporting results. When I was training to be a ski instructor, one of my trainers said “I could see you thinking, all the way down that last run”. Well, yes, I explained, I’m trying to remember everything. “Don’t”, he replied, “just ski fast. Let it happen. It will all come together”. Which indeed, it did. After I crashed a lot.

The rowing equivalent of ‘just skiing fast’ is an outing in a ‘fine single’, which means a boat so unstable it jerks wildly from side to side at the very moment you want it to glide effortlessly. Pam, a previous Alison, enjoyed putting me in fine singles. I am pretty sure this was because she was a sadist. She definitely liked seeing me soaked from head to toe in pungent river water, anyway. When I remonstrated, she said “we’ll keep putting you out in a fine single until you learn how to stop capsizing”. There is an entire self-help book to be written on this: ‘Beat the Wobble - achieving success through unbalanced failure’.

It could all be so much simpler, if only my two favourite sports were susceptible to the nouvelle vague of aspiration, that thing favoured by all the young people; manifesting. It’s genius. If you want something, you don’t actually do anything to make it happen. You just ‘manifest’ it. I’m no expert, but I think this means sitting and thinking about it. Or dreaming, to be more accurate. Then, apparently,  you will achieve whatever important thing it is that you have set your heart on; a million followers on Instagram, perhaps, or something less important, like world peace.

So I tried manifesting not capsizing in a fine single.

It didn’t go well.

Perhaps I was not manifesty enough. Or, more likely, too aware of irony. Or does it just need more practice; many many manifests?

It’s a shame, though. Life would be so much easier with more manifestationness. (I’m pretty sure that’s the word). Wouldn’t it be fabulous if all desire, all ambition, whatever notion you have suddenly come up with, could be cudgelled into being, simply by sitting with your eyes closed and thinking about it? All those years I spent studying, for example. Pointless. Too slow. Too much like hard work. Just manifest exam success. Bingo; results through internal indolence. Learning to drive? Easy; manifest not bumping into things, failing to cause death and destruction. I’m sure the driving test examiner will understand. Falling in love with someone wonderful? Piece of cake; just let your imagination flow. It will all fall into place. Bye bye Tinder, hello Ponder.

But this week I learned of a further spin on ‘the power of positive thinking’, or utter bollocks, as they call it on Tyneside. A nice person came to my wellness retreat to talk about the exciting plans they had for their next visit. The cottages and hot tubs, the sauna and huggable trees, all met with favour, and then they (I didn’t check pronouns, but I’m pretty sure they were a they) asked about fire walking.

I immediately assumed this was a question about smoke alarms, but apparently not; they were expressing a desire to burn part of my field, in order to perambulate thereupon. Each to their own, I thought, and agreed they could use the place I light bonfires, so their scorched earth policy would not be too damaging. Though first, I asked about insurance.

And then they said, “we do it naked”.

A pause ensued, as I bent down to pick my chin up from the floor. They explained that fire walking per se is insufficiently challenging, so to up the ante, they take down their smalls. As I was trying a) not to snigger and b) to avoid imagining what it must look like, they explained it is ‘empowering’. I could feel that word coming a mile off.   

I demurred, worried that local people from the nearby village, innocently walking their dogs, might have to cover Fido’s eyes to protect him from the sight, lest he become barking mad. Like the naked fire walkers. It is a truth universally acknowledged that the only people who take their clothes off in public are the ones who really shouldn’t. (Have you ever seen a nudist beach?). So the fire walking, the hot feet feat, will proceed at the appointed hour, albeit fully clothed. And hopefully with no 1970s trousers. Flares would be linguistically apposite, but somewhat dangerous. Safer to wear the bottom of their trousers rolled, like Alfie Prufrock.

Later, I talked to a friend who is more alternative than me, and asked the question I was too scared to ask. Do they have a bucket of ice-cold water standing by, to douse their smouldering feet? Ah no, she said. They just repeat to themselves ‘I am walking over cool green grass’ a hundred times before starting off on their coal stroll. Apparently this does the trick; the brain is utterly convinced, pain receptors take the night off, and the fire walk turns out to be good for the soul, without harming the sole.

This was all going through my mind when Alison criticised my length this morning. And then I realised the answer. No need to work hard, train, struggle or capsize. Henceforth, when I get in a boat I shall repeatedly intone ‘I am an Olympic rower’. This simple incantation will bamboozle my brain and instantly transform my skills, taking me squarely to great lengths. 

Then, when I get out of the water, burning with the sweet green grass of success, I’ll repeat my next mantra: ‘I am a handsome billionaire’.

I’ll let you know how it goes.