Rowing. my day of under currents

This is me. Courtesy of my little sister. This is my "are you kidding me?" face. Today day was one of those days where I wore this face perpetually...

I row. It's a race.
And today I let myself think I was done with it.

Today was the first day of the Scholastic National Regatta. My boat raced in the heats and got fourth so we had to race in the repecharge race instead of moving on straight to semi-finals. We came in fifth at reps when we needed to make third.
The problem with this race was that our lane (lane six), the steak (I doubt that is the correct way to spell that) boat (the mini floating dock that has a person on it to hold the boat in place before the race/helps keep boats in alignment before the race) had sort of deflated and they didn't want to put a person on it for fear that the whole contraption would sink or otherwise fall to pieces endangering the person in charge of being the steak-boat holder.
The problem with this scenario is that you need a stake (I think that way is more correct...not positive) boat for the start when the race isn't going off a floating start or a head race start. So to fix the problem the officials pushed my boat into lane 7....instead of a stake boat there was this little tin can of a boat tied down, that they put the stake-boat holder in...to hold our boat for the start.
To further complicate this whole transaction the wind and current decided to change up on us and push in every which way except for that in the direction of the make shift stake-boat. Eventually after a good few minutes of trial and error our coxswain managed to back us into the lane and get alignment for the start. The officials called a count down start. Generally they just go "ATTENTION....GO" no, today they had to go: "ATTENTION...ALL HANDS ARE DOWN...WE WILL DO A COUNTDOWN START NO HANDS WILL BE ACKNOWLEDGED...5......4..........3.............2.....................1...................................GO"
They literally called this the second we got allignment. Usually they wait and drag out the drama of it all for a good minute before calling the start after all the boats get in position, apparently we wasted their patience and they called the start immediatly while we are still recovering from the nervous energy and anxiouty caused by the dumb move of pushing our boat into lane 7.
Our start was a mess with the adrenaline and our nerves flying everywhere. One girl missed water and the rest of us just tried to follow stroke. We roewed as if the devils own were after us.
We where on it. We rowed so together it was fantastic. The most intoxicating race. One that you love to watch because it is such a fight and you never know who's going to make a move and win. Six tenths of a second. The time difference between us and making it to semi's.

So that was the race that I ended my season with. Or so I thought.
Our team is upset, tired, exhausted, you think of an adjective we feel it in our bones.
We went out to diner at Ruby Tuesday's, fun stuff seeing as since we don't have to row tomorrow we can eat anything we want...then we get some *good* news: we are in the semi-finals.


...


So my season isn't done? Oh.
Does that mean I can't eat my New Orleans Seafood plater?
Wait? I had planned on a nice evening consiting of Ben and Jerry's and a couch...does this mean thats going to be called off???

I had my shrimp, my ice cream, my headache...all I am waiting for now is the nervous breakdown.
This year has shot my system. I can bearly lift my arms I am so tired and sore. I am begining to genuinly hate some people. I have lost the motivation to push onward.
This season was one week, just one week, too long.

Tomorrow we will race yet again and I really at this point don't know what to think. It's as if everything is going wrong and I can't fix any of it.