Reflections on the Sixth Week of Summer – A Long Wet Mile

    After writing “Do something special to celebrate yourself” in hundreds of birthday cards to friends and relatives, I planned something special for my own sixty-ninth. I could swim a mile.

    I’d been contemplating swimming a mile for two years and eight months–ever since I walked into the Meadville YMCA pool for the first time and read the sign painted in black on the white tile wall.

88 lengths = 1 mile

I swam four lengths before the Deep Water Fitness class that first day and told myself I could work up to swimming a mile . . . maybe.

    Stroke by stroke and length by length over two long years, I’d finally reached three quarters of a mile. Since January, I only slipped back to a half mile once–the day my fingertips touched the deep end wall, and I turned exuberantly to backstroke another length. A wave of dizziness crashed through my head. Vertigo. I grabbed the wall until the swirling pool slowed and the band of pressure encircling my head eased. I stopped at a half mile that day so I wouldn’t vomit in the water.

    Never, after any of the other eighty-three swims in 2017, did I leave the pool saying, “I could have swum another twenty-two lengths.” Was I stuck at three-quarters mile?

    Marathon runners don’t practice the whole distance before a race. Maybe I’d built enough stamina to swim longer. Testing myself would be something special for my birthday Monday.

    But between 1:00 and 2:00 a.m. Monday morning, quarter inch red spots woke me for the second night in a row. Were spiders feasting on me during the night? No webs hung near the bed, but I sprinkled diatomaceous earth in the narrow gap between the box spring and wall. I didn’t mind smothering the spots in Cortizone cream for a week, but losing sleep over the rash was unacceptable. I fought the urge to gouge the itchy monsters out with a dandelion weeder and called for an appointment with Cynthia, the physician assistant at Sheakleyville Health Center.

    “Could you make it at eleven?” the receptionist said.

    Eleven? How long could it take to look at spots? I’d still have time to swim if the appointment took twenty minutes or less.

    “Thanks. I’ll be there.”

    Long black hair falling onto her white doctor coat, Cynthia studied the red spots on my arms and neck for less than a minute. “Have you been outside recently?”

    Lots–photographing roof walkers, cutting ferns and garden phlox for flower pounding, harvesting blueberries and purple beans.

    “Yes.”

    “You’re reacting to something in nature. It’s similar to a poison ivy reaction. I’ll have the nurse give you a steroid shot. Call me if you’re not better by the end of the week.”

    Cynthia also listened to my breathing, gave instructions for mixing an oatmeal bath to relieve the itching, and responded to my lap swimming plan. “That’s great. Chlorine helps itching.”

    Ten minutes with Cynthia. But I didn’t just see Cynthia.

    I had to check in, sign the copay credit card receipt, slip out of my shoes to step on the scale, take yoga breaths through vital sign checks, revise my medicine and vitamin list with a nurse who two-finger typed, relax my deltoids for the steroid shot, and stand in line to check out. The four person line didn’t move.

    If I waited, I wouldn’t have time to swim.

    The nurse had said, “You’re free to go,” after she put a bandage on my upper arm, so I stepped out of line, jogged to the car, and zoomed north on Route 19.

    I reached the pool at 12:15. Not great. Only forty-five minutes left of the two hour lap swim. My husband Spence’s admonition, “expectation is disappointment,” floated through my mind when I dove under the lane rope to position myself for breaststroke. I needed fifty minutes to swim the sixty-six lengths for three fourths of a mile. I pulled my arms in an arc, frog kicked, and blew out air. Bubbles drifted up. My goal of swimming a mile sunk.

    Tuesday, still in birthday celebrating mode, I arrived at the pool at 11:12. Only two men arrived earlier–Mike, the Mennonite who swims side stroke without kicking to strengthen his shoulders after surgery, and Brad, an asthmatic who swims to make breathing more comfortable and has a bucket list of pools where he plans to swim.

    I walked behind them through the middle section to the end lane.

    To keep track of the lengths, I chanted. Beginning of beginning. I kicked and stroked the first eight lengths–two breaststroke, two sidestroke, two more breaststroke, and two backstroke.

    Panting, I switched the chant. Middle of beginning. Mob. I swam and visualized mobs at political rallies, fashion shows, sandy beaches, and pastry shops. Every muscle in my shoulders, arms, and legs complained.

    Would I make three quarters of a mile?

    Habit propelled me. I pulled and kicked for another set of eight.

    Brad left and walked directly to the men’s locker room. Good–he didn’t need his inhaler after swimming today.

    I took his lane in the middle and pushed my feet against the wall for the “end of beginning” set of eight. With only two of us in the pool, I didn’t hold my elbows against my side and backstroke with my forearms to avoid poking passing swimmers. I spread my arms wide and zipped through the water. My breathing slowed. My muscles eased.

    When I finished “middle of middle,” forty lengths, Mike climbed the steps, picked up his duffel bag, and walked to the men’s locker room door.

    I had the pool to myself.

    Chanting “end of middle,” I slipped through the silky cool water for another eight lengths.

    Swimming a mile would be easier without waves from other swimmers.

    But vertigo could attack. Your knee could swell and ache.

    Alice and Jackie arrived. Alice, who’s recovering from heart surgery and swims with her legs two feet lower than her arms, took the end lane. Jackie, a diabetic who usually swims a mile and a half a day, sat on a noodle in the first lane and gently swung the foot she’d injured last week.

    I chanted “beginning of end” for the seventh set of eight, rolled with the swells, and did some math. After I finished my regular sixty-six lengths, I’d only need six more for five sixths of a mile. That, combined with the two thirds I’d swum Monday, would average out to three quarters of a mile each day. If I swam twenty-two more lengths, I’d make a mile.

    And you’d be too tired to drive home.

    Jackie chatted with the life guard, Alice swam freestyle, and I pushed through “middle of end” and “end of end” to finish nine sets of eight for the five sixths of a mile.

    I stood in the shallow end after that seventy-second length. Though my heart pounded, I breathed normally and nothing ached. Without checking to see if my knee had swollen, I pushed my feet against the wall, pulled my arms in an arc, and frog kicked. I could always stop at seventy-seven lengths for seven eighths of a mile.

    Pull. Kick. Breathe. “Tenth set of eight.”

    Pull. Kick. Breathe. “Eleventh set of eight.”

    I MADE IT!

    I held onto the wall at the shallow end of the pool, glanced at the clock, and reached my left then right leg back for stretches.

    Jackie swung her feet, the lifeguard chatted with Jackie, and Alice swam as if nothing special had happened,

    I stretched my right arm across my upper chest and called to Jackie. “I did it.”

    Jackie turned to me. “What did you do?”

    “I swam a mile. For the first time.”

    “Good for you.” Jackie beamed. “That’s great.”

    “It took me an hour and ten minutes.”

    “You made good time,” Jackie said. “It takes me an hour to swim a mile.”

    “Well done,” the life guard said, “That’s almost as fast as I swim. I come in at just under an hour.”

    From behind me Alice called, “Congratulations.”

    Smiling from ear to ear, I climbed the steps to the locker room.

    Getting ready for Deep Water Fitness class, women undressed by the benches.

    “I did it,” I told the other Janet that swims at the YMCA. “I swam a mile today.”

    She stopped with her sock half way off. “Did balloons rise up into the air?”

    Chest filled with the air from those rising balloons, I drove home and told Spence.

    “That’s fine,” he said. “But don’t do it again for awhile. You might hurt yourself.”