My ode to water

After going to the gym yesterday and running 1.5 miles and biking 8 miles, I realized that I wish I had forgone the boring treadmill and bike and had swum laps instead. I think I get a better workout quicker on the treadmill and bike, but I miss swimming a lot. Last semester I took a swimming class and I loved being back in a disciplined swimming environment. It wasn’t hard, considering it was a beginning class and I swam team when I was a kid, but it was nice to have a time that was set aside for swimming.
Growing up in a desert, I grew up in a place where nearly everyone had a pool in their backyard. In the summer, I lived in the pool, because it was too hot to do anything else. Actually, that’s not true, there are plenty of people who did not swim nearly as much as me, including my sister. I lived in the water. As I got older and quit team, in the summer, I would still wake up in the morning and swim some laps as the sun rose above our rooftop. I would then wrap myself in a fluffy towel, grab my book, and read in our hammock. I’d invariably fall asleep and wake up as the people in my family started shuffling around doing their morning routines.
The point is that I really miss having a convenient outdoor pool in which to go swimming. A pool whose main purpose is not a meat market for desperate BYU males, who get excited at the idea of seeing the thighs and shoulders of the usually covered BYU girls. Bleh. I want to go swimming and lay in the sun reading a good book without the annoying interruption of silly giggling.
My favorite part of those early morning swim sessions is the silence. I could actually hear the water as it slipped down my limbs and my strokes would begin to match the rhythm of my heart. As my body warmed with the exertion, I could feel every movement and wave of water against my body and I would find that perfect balance of push and glide that would send me sailing through the water. No, not ‘through’, because that implies resistance, but when I find that balance it is almost as if the water lifts and propels me forward. However, that balance did not last long because soon my arms and legs tired and I would have to breathe at almost every stroke, but it is for those moments that I woke up to swim in the morning hours with none to disturb me. I felt at home in the water’s embrace. Now I think I’ll go swimming.