Boating was never an activity I enjoyed growing up. Coming from a family of avid water sport enthusiasts, I was at a loss. I could count that every Saturday after church, my parents would load my siblings and I up in our truck and head to spend the rest of the day at the lake.
Many of my weekends were spent sitting in a boat watching my friends and family have fun waterskiing, wakeboarding, and surfing. My parents realized that I would never partake in their water sport activities gave me a very important job - the flag bearer. Whenever someone fell, I got the honor of holding up a flag for what seemed like an eternity.
One day I decided that I had enough of watching others and listening to them beg me to try something. If I was going to continue spending my weekends on the lake, I figured I might as well learn how to do something whether or not I was interested. My family gladly suggested wakeboarding as “it really isn’t that hard to stand up.” After agreeing, I hesitantly I Slid into the water and watched as the rope tightened, ready to pop right up in the water. To my dismay, the opposite happened, and I watched as the line tore from my hands. After a few more tries of trying to get up and making no progress, I decided to switch to water skiing.
Round 2. I sat in the water, shivering, dreading my impending pain. One time after another, I watched as the rope was once again ripped out of my hands. With my friends and family cheering from the boat as I made more and more progress each time, I was determined to keep trying. After a few more times of
disappointment, I stood up for a few
seconds of glory. My next few tries were successful, and I felt as though I was getting the hang of it. As I started to go in and out of the wake, tragedy struck as my waterski caught an edge, and I face-planted into the water. After my epic wipeout followed by moans from the boat and my excruciating pain, I decided I was done for the day, maybe forever.
While I will probably never love watersports and boating, it gave me some unforgettable experiences that my friends, family, and I can still laugh about years later. Water skiing allowed me to get out of my comfort zone. It turned out that watersports weren’t as horrible as I previously thought and that perhaps by continuing to try new things, one day, I could have the opportunity of finding an activity that I loved.
- Hailey Rice
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