Fighting For Friendship

One of the best things about male to male relationships that I've experienced is our ability to fight into friendship.

In 2019, I embarked with three other men to compete in the Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge. A 3,000 mile transatlantic ocean row, to provide data for research into PTSD treatments for veterans. That was our mission. While each crewmember holds a special place in my heart, my friendship with Luke is far and away the most treasured piece of that row.

During our training, Luke and I seemed to hit it off extremely well for the first few weeks, but then my temper got the best of me and I had it out with a different crew member. The relationship went downhill fast. My friendship with Luke also suffered. The reason for this? We had different expectations on what kind of example we were setting. I’d be remiss if I thought I understood everyone else’s motivations behind the row, but mine were very solemn. As a suicide survivor, the research we were taking part in and the public image we portrayed were very important and I felt the entire journey needed to be treated as such. At the time, I felt like the reverence for what we were doing was lacking. And my temper got the best of me.

Fast forward to our arrival on La Gomera, things were tense as our boat didn't arrive on time and we were hard pressed to get our inspections done so we had approval to put the boat in the water. Communication and planning was not the strongest element in our crew, of which I of course have to take my share of the responsibility for. Not much had really changed since the altercation during training. We’d just brushed over it and sort of swept it under the rug. None of us were doing it right in my humble opinion. Maybe the others thought we were and that I was the sour apple. With the days and events flying by it’s difficult to really say what exactly caused everything. But at the heart I think our egos and undefined expectations got in the way of something that should have been fun. My friendship with Luke soured again. However we got the boat in the water and managed to get underway. Now it was the four of us and an open ocean, all to ourselves.

Luke and I got into several heated arguments, trading insults and putdowns, so much so that I just wanted to leave, but I didn't want to wait for a boat, I just wanted to be done with it, I wanted off the boat. I was tired of fighting, I was tired of the drama. What became of that attitude was Luke and I didn't row together for at least two weeks or longer. We couldn’t stand each other. Every word seemed to drip with animosity. But I was here and I didn’t want to die, so I stuck it out.

To pretend we each didn't have our part to play in that madness would be disingenuous. We were all assholes to each other. Each in our own way. This once in a lifetime opportunity felt like the biggest waste of time. Something good and noble yet here we all were pissing it away recklessly. It was frustrating to say the least.

One night, Luke and I had returned to rowing with each other, and surprise surprise, we started arguing again. This time, we really let each other have it. We were cruel, stubborn and downright evil to each other. I don’t remember exactly what was said, all I know is that it was the most evil shit I’d ever said to someone to their face with intent to not just hurt, but destroy. Trading cheap shots after cheap shots, hitting at family, friends, loved ones. Neither of us cared about the destruction that we attempted to bring to the other. We said everything we could say to hurt the other, showing no mercy. I’d thrown down my oars in frustration, refused to row so I could focus on the most creative and hurtful things I could think of.

Until one of us I can't remember who...I wish I could take credit for it, but I don't remember clearly, it might've been me, it might've been Luke, one of us just stopped. Why was I even doing this? We had let our worst demons get the better of us and in that moment when one of us stopped, I think there was a great feeling of shame that was shared between the two of us. Is this what we were to be? These horrible, cutting, evil individuals, with no remorse? We both apologized to each other. We committed to being better communicators and not letting our anger or frustration get the best of us.

It wasn't easy. I know I pissed Luke off and he pissed me off, but we begrudgingly demanded better of ourselves. We started communicating better, slowly, and not altogether perfectly, but even a one percent improvement was something, as long as it could be sustained.

As we got closer to Antigua, the race committee and our Fight Oar Die (usvetrow.org) support staff, began calling us on the satellite phone, which in and of itself was a problem. We had to stop rowing to talk on the phone, because the connectors that would have allowed us to talk in our cabins had corroded due to the salinity.

They wanted us to make up two hours of time so that we would arrive at the perfect time to have hundreds of people see us arrive. When the fastest you go is maybe 3.5 knots, making up two hours is nigh impossible. You are at the mercy of the sea and your body after 45 days is absolutely demolished. I started the race at a strong and thick 205 lbs., but now after roughly 45 days at sea, I was down to under 170 lbs. We weren't generating as much force as we had been on day one and the 2 hours on, 2 hours off, hadn't left much in the way of rest for our bodies or minds.

But they persisted, asking us if there was any way we could make up that time. We tried several measures, rowing three up at a time, whereas we'd been rowing a pair at a time. We hoped that the third guy would help give us maybe an extra half a knot, something...anything to make up the time. It didn't work. At best we kept our pace and at worst we'd gotten a little slower. We tried several other solutions such as 10 minutes on 10 minutes off, no rest. Each time, we’d waste time rearranging the deck to facilitate whatever new idea we had. Each one proved fruitless, and ultimately put us further behind the time frame we were shooting for. We weren't fighting anymore though. That one percent gain in communication and understanding had grown. To what percentage I don't know, but I knew we were finally functioning as a team.

The last day of the race, Luke said he wanted to try something else to make up the time. He wanted to cut the last 5 minute break off of our shifts. I thought it wouldn’t make that much of a difference and I was exhausted at all of our failed attempts. I told him I wasn't going to do it. I didn't care. We could see Antigua and all that mattered to me was that we got in. The discontent started welling up again as I neared the end of my shift.

As I spent my time in the cabin, I found myself thinking. What Luke had asked wasn't actually a big deal. It wouldn't take us rearranging our deck space or moving things around, taking time off the oars. It was actually rather simple. Furthermore, Luke wanted to break the record for Spindrift boats crossing the Atlantic. It was important to him. I suddenly found myself thinking, if it's important to my teammate, it should be important to me. We had come all this way and I was going to be a jerk about 5-10 minutes of effort?

Emerging from my cabin at the end of my off shift, I was determined. I had this feeling that I was going to give every last bit of what I had left in the tank on these last two shifts. I had decided to get with the program and go with his plan. No more rest at the end of a shift. I also told him that I planned on setting a blistering pace One that we hadn't done the entirety of the race. I don’t think we’d even hit that pace in training. I got situated, turned on the music, cranked it loud and set to work.

Mind you, I had also just drank the first coffee I'd had in 50 days and I was amped. An unfortunate and hilarious side effect of that was that I could not stop blowing out mad farts, directly in Luke and Carl's faces each time I pulled on the oars.

But...we were moving. On Evan's last shift they'd made tremendous headway. I was determined to beat it. This was the second to last shift I'd row and I wanted to leave nothing in the tank.

6.88 nautical miles and a noxious cloud of farts later, Luke surmised that he'd awoken a monster in me. I went into the cabin and started pounding water, knowing that soon, we'd make landfall. But...6.88 nautical miles wasn't good enough. I wanted more.

The last shift came and I told Carl and Luke…”I want 7 nm”. That was ridiculous. That'd be maxing out what we'd done fresh, on still water during our training, for only an hour. Yet now we’d be doing it for two straight hours. But Luke was right, there was a monster that'd awoke. I wanted 7 nautical miles and I wasn't going to settle for less.

As Evan came out to row us across the finish line and my final two hours on the oars came to an end, I heard the most joyous sound.

"7.15 nautical miles," Luke said.

I collapsed in joy. I was so happy. I didn't care about the record anymore. I didn't care about anything except that I'd made what was important to my teammate, important to me and then gave it my all. That was enough for me.

Today Luke and I share a bond that I'm not entirely sure even he or I fully understand. To have hated each other with extreme prejudice, then to forgive and make amends, and then to sacrifice for one another because something was merely deemed important to the other...

Maybe I'm a hopeless romantic, finding poetry and meaning in the most menial of tasks or actions, but to me...the journey I shared with Luke was something more important than the row itself. It was a journey into the depths of human emotive capabilities, to have such visceral hate turn into such a powerful friendship...That is truly something spectacular to behold.

I write all of this and share all of this to tell you that maybe, what's standing in the way of a good relationship with someone is that you or they, it's a two way street, are unwilling to find the things they value as valuable. We can't control others and I'm sure there are people who no matter how hard you try to apply this lesson to, it won't matter. Not everyone is the same, but...I encourage you, make the priorities of your friends and even some enemies your priority. Make important in your own life they things they value and maybe, just maybe, you'll have a similar transformative experience.

It's not a perfect system and you'll definitely have people who take advantage of your actions, but at the end of the day, aren't you glad you're a person who braves that chance? Aren't you glad that you have the strength to set down your ego and your pride and do something because it's important to someone else? One of the most important things to me in this life is for people to know that I care about them, their wants, their desires, their dreams and aspirations. Surely, I want them to reciprocate, but someone has to be the first. Someone has to set an example, and I hope that you all see the value in being the first person to do so.