Ladies,
Well, I guess I can say that four years of my
life are officially over. Four years of
commitment, love, sweat, sore muscles, sunrises, snowstorms, van rides,
laughing fits, failures, successes, and all of the moments that took us from
one to another. It seems impossible, that the center of my life for the last
four years—the UVM Crew Team—will no longer be what gets me out of bed in the
morning.
Looking back at my freshman self,
it’s hard to believe that that was me. So much has changed in this short time;
I’ve changed so much. I remember coming to practice on the first day and seeing
the varsity girls—Kate Evans, Katie Hughes, Julia Williams, Gretchen Loft,
Sarah Badley, Maddie Shellgren, Annie Bednar—and thinking holy shit. I was super intimidated by these ripped, beautiful,
smart, sassy ladies, and wanted nothing more than to become one of them. I’ve spent the last four years, on and off the water, trying to live up to the incredible
example and standard that my mentors and teammates have set for me.
 | |
| The outstanding UVM Crew of 2010 |
If there is one lesson that I learned
from my time on the team, and that I want to leave you with, it is this: You
are strong, and capable of so much more than you know. The way to discover your
true potential as a person is to be part of a group of similarly dedicated and
motivated women, and to fight tooth and nail to reach your own definition of
success. I’ll never forget the morning in mid-September my sophomore year, when
the four let Alex take their seats for the men’s team to use, and Rick went on
a 15 minute screaming rampage. As a new member of the varsity crew I had no
idea how to take such an event. After we got off the water, our senior
reality-check, Em West called us all together to explain one thing: yes, Rick
is here to make us strong athletes and rowers, but his true reason for coaching
is that he wants us to be strong women. He was yelling not because his water time got cut
into, but because he was so pained by the idea that the women’s team would simply
give up what was theirs to an unquestioned male authority.
We all row for our own reasons, but
at the end of the day, we have to row for each other, and for ourselves. We
have to believe in and value our own potential enough to work for every inch of
the success we are capable of. What I find most beautiful about the sport of rowing, and particularly about the teams and boats I've been a part of over the last four years, is the combination of strength and love necessary to move a boat. Rowing is a grueling sport. Success is impossible without a huge amount of work, pain, frustration, and toil. But the only way to truly maximize that work is to do it for something greater than yourself.
 | |
| Movin' Boats |
In the final sprint of my last collegiate race, my coxswain Christa called the last five strokes for the seniors. I have never felt a boat pick up under me in that way, or felt such a real, visceral surge of love, commitment, and connection. I finished the race collapsed over my oar, unable to breathe, tears in my eyes, laughing. All of the physical work we had committed to over the last year culminated in a moment of pure dedication to one another. To row is to work. To work is to love. Love moves boats.
 |
| Boat huddle before my last race |
So I guess the last thing to say is
thank you. Thank you Maddie, Erin, Caitlin, and Sarah for somehow thinking that
I was a cool freshman and inspiring me to live up to your expectations. Thank
you Em West, Annie, and Kyle for setting an incredible example of leadership,
dedication, and unadulterated hard work, and for all that you did to foster me
as a rower and a person. Thank you Julia, Katie, Kate, Rachel and G$ for being
teammates and friends, for getting through hell and (extremely) high water,
always together. Thank you Rick, for forcing me to be stronger and work harder
than I ever knew I could.
 |
| Some seriously high water... |
Thank you for more sunrises than I
can count. Thank you for warming me up in the car with dance parties on the way
back to campus. Thank you for a senior Charles that I will remember for the
rest of my life.
Thank you for every terrible winter erg piece in the Christie
dungeon. Thank you for the best spring break of my life; bear shirts, boon
beats, clotheslines and all.
 | |
| Team Spirit Animal - take a guess |
Thank you Alex, Amanda, Michaela, Christa, Tara,
Frances and Liz for reminding me everyday why I came back to the team this year, when I could have simply walked away. Thank you to my incredible
freshmen for continually raising the bar on the erg, in the boat, and as a
team. Thank you to Michaela for being my best friend through four of the
craziest years of my life, and for going stroke for stroke with me the whole
way. Thank you Gretchen, for being my other, more logistically inclined half,
and for surviving all of this despite ourselves. Thank you Doug for believing
in me as a rower and as a person, and for making it possible for us to create the unparalleled sense of support, positivity, and possibility that the team has had this year.
I am so proud of you all, so proud to
call you my teammates and family. I hope that you will continue to build on
this incredible foundation that we’ve created this year, and keep getting
stronger, faster, and braver, on and off the water.
All my love from bow,
Emma
 |
| This is a view I'll miss photo cred to GPow |
No comments:
Post a Comment