Not Quite Drowning

I went swimming this morning. No, this isn't going to turn into one of those public journals: I got up, washed my hair and did two loads of laundry. I went grocery shopping and ran to the bank. I clipped my toenails and then polished them, Revlon Punchy Pink No. 38 Super Glossy. Forget it. But I did go swimming this morning.

I am not a swimmer. I usually manage to stay afloat and I do get from one end of the pool to the other somehow, but it isn't pretty. It isn't fast or efficient, either. I have never gone more than two laps without stopping to gasp for air at the side of the pool for a minute or two before trying again. I often do a lap of just kicking with the purple foam floating board in between what I call swimming just to give myself a break. I can spend over an hour on the elliptical machine, I can ice skate, bike or walk for lengthy periods, I can even jump rope at a constant pace for half an hour, but swimming uses mystery muscles that must be lodged in between the ones I usually use, muscles that groan to life when submersed in water, archaic and out of shape amidst overused neighbors. When in water, I am truly like a fish out of it.

Maybe I exaggerate, but I do have troubles. I bought a pair of swimming goggles so that I can now open my eyes under water and follow the blue tile line on the pool floor from one end to the other. I don't crash into the lane markers or walls of the pool anymore. At least not as often as I used to. I am fairly blind without my glasses so I bring my bright green water bottle with me and set it right in the center of my lane on the deck at the shallow end where it lights up in the sunlight from the south-facing windows of the pool room like a beacon to guide me home. My niece Haley, who is on the swim team, told me to bring water with me so I could replenish lost fluids during my water workout. I find it gives me something sort of meaningful to do after each lap as well, instead of just standing there in the shallow end, panting. There are blue squares stuck to the ceiling down the center of the first lane, another way I have found to swim relatively straight during the back stroke, a stroke which I feel much more confident doing as I don't have to put my face into the water, at least not on purpose. I missed ramming the back of my skull into the wall by inches this morning, slapping my hand back over my head into it instead as I backstroked a bit too far past that last blue square above. That frightened me. I can just imagine the water turning red with my blood as I grab the back of my head and faint dead away. How embarrassing that would be.

Other swimmers next to me were doing their laps seemingly without effort, their non-stop lap after lap after lap and perfectly executed flip turns mocking me as I clung to the wall and caught my breath. I guess it's worth it, waking up these dormant muscles and being buoyant for a while every week or so. The soak in the whirlpool afterwards is certainly nice.

I got in the water and did one lap for Georgianna, who got a job and can no longer join me for a swim. She was an encouragement to me in the beginning, coasting effortlessly up and down the lane 50 or 60 times without any need to stop, except to help me kick properly or make sure I was okay as I sputtered like an old jalopy to one of my rest stops. I then did 29 more laps, just over half a mile according to the chart by the whirlpool tub. This distance is a record for me. It took me 50 minutes. In a lounge chair next to the whirlpool lay a man in a dry swimsuit, his paunch slowly rising and falling as he snoozed. That's probably good for the muscles, too. I think I'll try that myself next time.