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Flipping flipping
by Simon
Ok. So I capsized on Thursday morning. At a dock. Trying to get out of my dentist's sit-on-top kayak, which surprised me by being much harder to get out of than a sit-in. Yes, my dentist lets me use his dock and his kayaks.
Life vest, years of swimming- it all counted for nothing after I fell in. The shock of the cold coupled with the exhaustion I was already feeling from paddling for over an hour rendered me pretty much mentally paralyzed and very physically unsure. I felt like the lifejacket was not keeping me afloat enough, and that it was preventing me from swimming well, never mind that I didn't really try swimming. I even momentarily thought that maybe I should take the lifejacket off to swim better, but quickly thought better of it. I tried pulling myself up onto the dock, but soon discovered that this was wholly different from pushing oneself up from out of a pool. Among the myriad thoughts racing though my head was the notion that if I tried again and gave it my all and still failed to pull myself up onto the dock, my arms would be completely spent and then I'd really be in trouble. Although it didn't make me shiver, the water was cold, I didn't see much of a way for me to get up, and my inner actuary was giving me a 50/50. I started crawling around the edge of the dock to investigate some metal bars on the back side that looked possibly promising.
After being in the water for about 3 minutes, my dentist, about to leave for work, looked outside his window and saw his kayak floating away. He came out, stood over me as I was clutching the dock edge for dear life, and asked me if I was OK. Not having all my wits about me at the moment, I thought he'd walk away if I said yes. So I said "evidently not!" He figured out a way to get me out of the water. I sure didn't figure anything out. I couldn't figure out how to grow my own fingernails at that point.
After getting out, I took his other kayak out to retrieve the first one. As I was approaching the dock, he said "you know, if you had been out there 3 more minutes, you would have started becoming hypothermic. That's 50 degree water." I told him the water didn't feel so cold. He responded that it didn't feel cold because I was becoming numb. I was pretty cool up till then, but this little tidbit left me unsettled. A dentist knows his numb. I suddenly became a little more aware of the soaked long-sleeved thermal stuck to my cold torso.
I was sore as hell the next day, but it's the ego that needs healing. I don't like needing help. To me, kayaking is in part a celebration of self-sufficiency. I am extremely grateful that my dentist saved me, but I really wanted to find out if I could pull myself up by those metal bars I was just about to check out. Oh well. I'm taking a kayaking safety class next week. Intentional capsizing galore.
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