Aiming at nothing .........
Rhiann Marie - Round the World
Stewart Graham
Thu 10 Mar 2011 02:34
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Phuket Wednesday 9th 0834 Local 0134
UTC
The days are going by quickly. The regime is to get
up and do a sequence of exercise aboard, then do the e-mails and other
correspondence while having breakfast. Next it is up the hill to the gym for a
program which is getting slightly more challenging each day followed up by a
swim which is of an increasing number of lengths each day. That is all going
well.
After the gym I stop off at the little cafe at the
marina and have a lunch or in fact two. I also had two full dinners last night
and an extra bowl of rice. My appetite is back with a vengence!
Lunch normally means meeeting the various people
who are doing jobs on Rhiann Marie and chasing them up to finish work or start
additional work and of course getting a chance to chat to several of the
characters found round a long term stay marina like this one. Many people have
commented to me that it is unusual but good to see a boat like Rhiann Marie
being used for what she was built for, clocking up so many world girdling miles,
instead of sitting around a maina semi permanently.
After lunch it's back to the boat do a bit of
a tidy up and get away a few more mails and then the daily two hour lie
down. Initially after my accident I would sometimes drop off to sleep for an
hour or so during this time but now I don't sleep. I just read while trying to
remain prostrate to allow the stuff on the spine to gel.
Each day at some point I also get visitors, morning
afternoon or evening all very interesting people and enjoyable to have aboard
shooting the breeze about our war stories over a cup of tea or a cold drink,
back in the day when I had a back. I might also have lunch or dinner with one or
other of my visitors. Eating out here is cheaper than you can eat in I would
say. A good lunch costs between two and three pounds and a good dinner might be
five pounds. But that's expensive as there are "marina prices". Last night I
spent twelve pounds on dinner but that is because I had two dinners and two very
expensive Cokes!
So the days are slipping by and I really do feel
that despite, or perhaps one would hope because of, the
rigorous exercise regime, the back is
getting a little stronger every day. It would be very easy to stay here
till full recovery of the back takes place. But that would be all too easy, wouldn't it? Certainly those around
the marina are urging me to stay, but then we have met this everywhere we have
sailed through. Those who are on a slower pace or have stopped moving all
together urge us to stay longer. To endorse their choice perhaps?
Every evening is accompanied by a seasonally
uncharacteristic heavy and sometimes spectacular thunder and lightning show and
torrential rain normally passing through once and not lasting more than an hour
or two. I don't mind that, it cools and clears the air. I have spend the evenings after dinner watching a DVD before bed. I
am sleeping fairly well and it is hard to tell now whether the discomfort is
coming from the gym work or from the back injury. I will take a day off it soon
and see whats going on behind the aches.
As recovery takes place my thoughts have from time
to time turned to the long term effects of having a bunch of steelwork in my
back and four vertibrae locked together. It all stays in there so who knows? I
will aim to get fitter and stronger than I was before my accident and also to
carry on living lifes great adventure to the full. I will always try to push and
find my limits. Always competing, always trying to win, to learn ....
While I will always try to stretch my limits I will try not to exceed
them but occasionally, just occasionally in pushing the boundaries
mistakes will be made. But lessons will be learned and new expanded
boundaries and limitations will have been established.
It is important always to have something to aim
for. Aim at nothing and you will hit it
................
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