Swimming to Antarctica_ Tales of a Long-Distance Swimmer - Lynne Cox [113]
Outside his tent on the beach, I hollered his name. He didn’t answer, and I hoped he’d be out. It would be better to just go back to Dennis’s home and sleep. It would be better to just hide from the world for a while. Then Larry unzipped the green tent flap, stuck one old shoe out, and then another, and unfolded himself outside the tent. He stuck his head out, grinned, and shouted over the roaring wind and surf, “Good morning, Lynne. Ah, look up there!” He pointed.
The wind was tearing the gray clouds apart, and an enormous pin-wheel of light was spotlighting the sea.
“If you hurry, you can swim in that trail of light,” Larry exclaimed. “The sunshine will warm your back.”
I felt that day that Larry was truly a godsend. Bent completely in half against the wind, fighting to move forward and hold his balance, Larry walked on an incline, keeping pace beside me as I swam. Every ten steps or so, he would turn, wipe the wind, spray, and salt from his face, cup his hands around his eyes, and search the sea for me.
The water was turbid brown and churning with heavy sediment and glacier silt as fine as baby powder. It was a tough workout. At times, the sand sprayed across the water and stung my face. And that made me think of how hard it was for Larry out there, just walking along beside me. It was a lot easier for me then, knowing both that he was with me and that my job was much easier than his was.
At the end of a two-hour training session, Larry wrapped a towel over my shoulders and said in my ear, “That was a brutal workout. You did a fine job.”
“I almost didn’t make it, Larry. Thanks so much for walking with me.”
He smiled. “I used to run track. And for many years I was a track coach in Oregon. I found that sometimes it helps just to have someone with you. Sometimes just going through the motions helps you get where you need to go. See you tomorrow morning,” he said.
“Don’t leave yet, please, Larry. Part of my support crew arrived last night. They’ve been setting up some research equipment on the beach. See? Over there.”
Maria Sullivan, my friend who had injured her back, Dr. Nyboer Jr., and Dr. Nyboer Sr. were setting up a table with Dr. Nyboer Sr.’s medical equipment: an impedance machine, an experimental device that was supposed to measure changes in blood flow within the body. There was also an infrared device to measure heat-flow changes. They expected to see enormous changes in blood flow and heat flow due to my immersion in cold water.
For more than an hour the doctors tried to get some measurements, and I lay on the table freezing. They tinkered with the equipment, but they kept getting false readings. Maria Sullivan finally figured out what was causing the problem: gold dust.
Sullivan had noticed that when I’d climbed out of the water, my face, arms, and legs had sparkled. A fine layer of gold dust had adhered to my skin, and the gold had caused the electrical current within the impedance machine to short-circuit. When we brushed off the dust with a towel, the machine finally worked, and the doctors were able to successfully run the experiments.
Dr. Nyboer Sr. immediately confirmed that my response to the cold was perfect. I was able to shut down blood flow to my extremities and maintain that closure, which enabled my body to keep the blood around my core warm.
Three hours after my workout, I finally returned to Dennis Campion’s home. He informed me that word had come from the U.S. Navy: they could not provide support for the swim. They didn’t have any vessels in the area, and they didn’t feel it was their job anyway. They suggested that we contact the coast guard, who had a new state-of-the-art cutter anchored directly off Nome.
Getting on the phone, I called Bruce Evans and asked if he would have Senator Murkowski call the director of