Keep Swimming

1. How it started is easy enough: I began swimming because I could no longer run.
2. Years of sports, bad bone density, family history of joint issues — all contributing factors to the extreme anxiety growing in a tiny bone in my left foot. It becomes so stressed, it first aches then shoots hard with crippling pain. I can barely walk at times, in a city where you walk everywhere.
3. When I run, I am clear-headed and I am saturated. I think of everything that is overwhelming me, everything I want to overwhelm me, everything I need to work out, everything I don’t want to think about. It is my zen time. Me, street, air, music. I require two things: Breathing, and moving my legs. It is the simplest, purest form of therapy. I sometimes hate it — when I have had too many cigarettes the night before, when I haven’t made time for it, when it’s 6:30 am and my ears freeze — but I always love it.
4. I go swimming at a party on a lake and am shocked at how stroking back and forth between the floating dock and the shore exhausts me. This would be a good workout, I think.
5. Sesmoiditis: An overuse injury involving chronic inflammation of the sesmoid bones and the tendons involved with those bones, caused by increased pressure under the big toe joint. Often caused by dancing, running, or high-impact sports. Often associated with a dull, longstanding pain.
6. Heartache is also a dull,longstanding pain.
7. I try to wear different shoes to work around this pain. I put aside my beloved heels. I buy foam inserts for every shoe. It persists. An article online tells me that if the inflammation gets to a point, the bone can explode. I buy more ice packs and Advil. I feel I cannot give up running if I want to stay sane.
8. Three days before my 25th birthday, I sign up for the Metropolitan Pool, a City Parks facility, because it is only $25 for the year if I am under 25.
9. My podiatrist asks if I’ve stopped running yet. I am getting electropulse treatments, where a thing that looks like a shoulder massager beats electronic healing waves into the ball of my foot. It feels like a jackhammer. My foot doesn’t hurt when I run, only after, I tell him, and no, I have not stopped. He says okay, and I hope I don’t see you again. I am back the next week.
10. I ran through losing my job, three breakups, innumerable friend and family fights. I ran to the beach every Thanksgiving dawn to watch the ocean and find my own gratitude. I ran through Seville, Spain, when I was abroad and alone. I ran through my Brooklyn neighborhood the first day I moved there to see what I now called home. I ran in joy and sorrow, for richer or poorer, in sickness and health.
11. I ran around the track in the basement of the university gym where you were playing basketball with your friends and watched me every lap. Afterwards you would run after me, and make plans to see me naked later.
12. I ran past you the week of graduation when the trees were in full bloom and the grass was unreal green and you did not wave or smile and I cried all the way home.
13. You played water polo. You had the back of a swimmer and a liquid smile that poured into me. You poured into me.
14. At Christmas after I’ve decided I will stop soon, eventually, I take one run. Just one, not even 3 miles through my childhood neighborhood. That afternoon, I walk funny on the hardwood floor and feel a small explosion in the ball of my foot. Or, what feels like one. It is okay. I ice it. But I never run again.
15. I buy a swimcap and goggles and a padlock.
16. The gym is public, the locker room magenta, the pool room covered by a glittering turquoise skylight two stories high. The clientele is old, Jewish, Brooklyn, occasionally my age and tattooed.
17. I try a lap. I am exhausted. I swallow water. I flounder. I am unsure if this is a good idea. I have no choice. I go again.
18. I imagine you would coach me if you still lived here. Tell me how to not flail my legs on a breaststroke. How to take a breath on the left side. Imagine us staying after hours, having sex against the white tile while the muted sparkle makes the water glow green, our bodies lit and glistening.
19. Being with you was like breathing underwater.
20. It takes months but I do not swallow anymore water. I keep my nose and ears clear. My arms reach long in front of me, forward into the lanes, forward into the future. Sometimes I move up from the “medium” lane to the “fast” one. I make friends with the lifeguards. An old woman lends me her soap in the shower. I am a regular, I think.
21. When I feel my back muscles lean and long, foreignly strong and sexy, I think of yours. We would match now. You breach my mind every time I touch the water. But when I go under, I do not think at all.
22. Swimming is not like running. All you can think is what number lap you’re on, how far in front of you is the next person, breathe, stroke, breathe. When thoughts arise they are banished at a kick-turn. I grow to appreciate this place of non-thought.
23. A perfect spring day begs me to run. I lace up my shoes and stand on the stoop for long minutes. I go back inside. The high heels I’ve just been able to wear again thank me. I need them if I’m going to find someone to forget about you.
24. My membership expires in one month. It will cost a lot more money. I will pay it. I will keep swimming.