Swimming Lessons

Learning to swim was miserable. All I remember is my eyes burning and snot all over my face. I can’t even tell you at what age I learned to swim, but I remember the experience vividly. Each Tuesday my mother drove corralled me from the backyard, fed me supper and then drove me to the pool. I stared up at the stars with disgust from the backseat of my mom’s car. I didn’t like doing things late at night when I was young, but she insisted.

I hesitantly pulled my shirt over my head and kicked off my flip-flops. It was always ten or fifteen degrees too cold. I plopped into the frigid water alongside three strangers of the same age. I had a death grip on the wall. I had to be pried off when it was time to tread water. I learned quickly though, and before I knew it I had graduated to the deep end. It didn’t have any effect other than psychological intimidation. I couldn’t touch in the shallow end, so why did it matter if I was in deeper water? It didn’t. Perhaps the swim across the pool and under the rope separating the deep end from the shallow end was what intimidated me the most. Once in the deep end I coughed up the water that had made its way into my mouth on my swim over. The instructor grabbed me underneath my arms and placed me in the middle of the deep end. She told me I had to tread for thirty seconds. I didn’t take my eye off the massive clock hanging at the other end. As if watching the clock wasn’t enough, I counted to thirty in my head. Time was creeping along. I was so desperate to get out of the pool I must have counted to thirty twice.

Treading was the most difficult thing to learn. It was also the most exhausting. After that came the doggy paddle and then freestyle and backstroke. It all came easy to me except for backstroke. I couldn’t wrap my mind around the concept of breath control. I would inhale and exhale sporadically causing my body to sink and then float and sink again. I wound up with a nose full of water and snot covering my upper lip.

It’s strange how things like swimming or riding a bike stay with us throughout our entire life. I can’t think of the last time I swam, and by that I mean more than stood in the shallow end or paddled my way over to the other side. Somehow I still remember it all. Maybe there’s a lesson to be learned here. It’s important to put in the time and struggle to learn necessary skills. Eventually these skills become second nature and it’s difficult to imagine them every posing a challenge.