Eric once you are on the wire you'll find that things happen much slower with more time to react. You can see your sails easily, see puffs coming, your leveridge is in the right place. I was like you hiking out then a rush to recover when things started to happen. I put my mast up on the beach tied one side to the wheel of my trailer as a counter balance then got in my harness and worked on it for ages,jumping in and out, walking for and aft standing on the rear then it clicked I was comfortable, I havn't looked back. Things you find out are where the harness really ends up when your on it so you start it in the right position when you put it on, all of a sudden its easy to hook up and off. Then your mind will let you comfortably get on the wire. As for the righting pole it really has to be on the main beam, I made my own so that I can right my 18ft stingray singlehanded they do work and a larger diameter pole is good because I just interconnect my fingers on top of the pole lean right back and up she comes you can hang that way a long time until she swings into the wind ,I don't swim my bows around, I get onto the boat walk to the back, swing the pole out position the knot lean out until boat comes up, let go of pole which auto retracts the correct way, get back on lean over front, release knot so that pole fully retracts, back into race. The centremount swingout on shockcord with a stopper knot such as the Rick White one, is simple really quick and uncomplicated.
regards