ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — "All gone, b’ys?”
“All gone?”
“Spin the wheel!”
And with those orders, so springs the optimism and anticipation of anxious patrons of the ancient city garden party. Of winning an enormous plush toy, perhaps. Or a Star Wars light sabre, or a bit of cash.
Hope rests on the standstill of the whirr of the wheel, and the number on which it stops.
“Tirty-eight!” shouts one of the townie-accented keepers of this particular carnival booth, donning the familiar apron stuffed with bills and tickets for future sale.
“Winning number is tirty-eight.”
Dozens of similar spin-wheel booths ring the shores of Quidi Vidi Lake, along with dunk tanks, ring toss and other games of chance where, for the bargain price of 50 cents or a loonie, you, too, can win a cowboy hat, and support dozens of charities whose funding for the next 12 months depends greatly on these Regatta wheels.
Tomorrow, the calendar tells us, is the first Wednesday of August, which to townies can only mean the Regatta.
Except for this year.
The COVID-19 pandemic wiped out this year’s Royal St. John’s Regatta, the first time in 80 years that the 201-year-old city staple has been cancelled.
The last time it happened, it took a World War to put off the races.
“To be out on the pond for a spin, to hear the oarlocks click, to have six guys catching the water together, to have everyone in sync … there’s a peacefulness to it. It’s almost like therapy. It’s something we miss.” — James Cadigan
With apologies to Simon and Garfunkel, only the sound of silence will echo up from the east end of the city Wednesday. No strains of the accordion and fiddle, no pleas for the purchase of spin-the-wheel tickets.
No gunfire at the Quidi Vidi start/finish line.
No scent of french fries in the fat of the deep fryer wafting through the air.
There will be no scurrying about the Boathouse area by the rowers and coxswains, stopwatches in hand, comparing times and privately pleading for a “good pond” from the rowing gods.
There will be no meeting of familiar faces near the bandstand Wednesday.
For this, as much as anything, has long been a tradition on the day of the “Races,” when many patrons make a point of gathering again for the first time in almost a year, catching up on all the goings on from where they left off last August.
On Wednesday there will be no repeat performances from a couple of dominating rowing teams last summer, such as the Fine Strokes Plaster and Painting Ltd. men’s crew, which peeled off a 9:04.71 in the last race of the day for the championship.
And the Hyflodraulic women’s team, whose 5:02.23 clocking in the last women’s race was four seconds quicker than any other crew.
Yes, it’s been a weird summer, especially for someone like James Cadigan, the stroke oar for the Fine Strokes crowd last year.
For Cadigan, and many others from his native Outer Cove, the Regatta has been all-consuming each and every summer for the past dozen years, at least.
The 2019 championship was Cadigan’s 11th of his career, the most of any rower to dash up and down the waters of Quidi Vidi.
So this summer has been a “total shift away from the norm,” for athletes like Cadigan. In his case, that shift was aided by a golf membership, to take his mind off rowing, if nothing else.
The Cadigan’s Fine Strokes crew was actually of two minds returning this year, pandemic or no pandemic.
The rowers have young families. The thoughts of another winter spent on the rowing machines (the dreaded ergometres) in the basement of the Outer Cove town hall — the “dungeon” — was maybe too much to bear.
And then January rolled around, “and we started chatting,” he said.
“There was some talk of coming back,” Cadigan said. “We all love rowing, right?”
Then March arrived, and pretty much everything was shut down.
“We love the Regatta,” he said. “It’s part of who we are. We’re always hungry to race.
“To be out on the pond for a spin, to hear the oarlocks click, to have six guys catching the water together, to have everyone in sync … there’s a peacefulness to it.
“It’s almost like therapy. It’s something we miss.”
Depending on the weather, the golf courses in and around the city will probably be very busy.
Cadigan may be at Bally Haly, where he’s a member and has managed to get his game down to anywhere between 80 and 90 per round.
But his heart will be at Quidi Vidi.
And here’s betting many others — pardon the pun — will be in the same boat.
Twitter: @telyrobinshort
