Under Water
My attempt to hold my own on the varsity swim team
I was 15 when I learned that I couldn’t achieve anything I wanted. It took me a whole decade and a half to realize this because I grew up in this privileged fantasy land where my parents tucked me into bed at night telling me that I could do anything I put my mind to. Glitter emitted from my ears as I drifted off to sleep, my dreams growing bigger and bigger with each “honk-schooooo.”
This didn’t happen every night. Plus, I don’t snore. But you get the drift.
So, when I thought about extracurricular activities to add to my repertoire freshman year of high school, I decided it was time to take my summers swimming at the country club to the next level: varsity swimming.
Country club swimming was doing a quick sprint next to the pals you played sharks and minnows with every afternoon. My parents sipped on cocktails with their friends and pretended they saw my race as I high-fived them before running off to grab a white towel from the lifeguard. Afterward, there was a party with a buffet and a DJ. He always played “Margaritaville.”
High school swimming was jumping in a pool at 5 a.m. practice and going to school with frozen hair. Doing Indian runs through the locker-lined high school hallway. Red swim cap marks, goggle marks, bathing suit marks. Being a slave to the black line four hours a day during Christmas break. Sometimes when I stared at it, it stared back, threatening to chop my limbs off if I didn’t go faster. Or was that my chubby coach? It’s all a heavily-chlorinated blur.
Let’s just say I was in over my head. Literally. Here’s the thing about putting your mind to something: Your body doesn’t always follow. I sucked at swimming. There’s really no other way to put it. I was plain bad.
My splits were nearly 30 seconds slower than the fastest swimmer, and my teammates constantly passed me in the designated slow lane at practice. When I swam backstroke, I choked down gulps of water the whole length of the pool. I could do a few good strokes of butterfly, but then I’d turn into more of a crushed wasp, flapping my wings around in a last attempt at survival. In freestyle, I barely even kicked — my tiny body could not figure out how to move its arms and legs at the same time.
My coach always put me in the breaststroke events. I liked to think it was because he knew that was my favorite. In reality, it was probably because that was the only race I could finish before the next event was supposed to begin. Most races, I made the final stretch to touch the wall and came up for air only to find a swimmer on the block above me, waiting for me to flop onto the ledge of the pool so the whistler-blower could start the next heat.
Hey mom and dad! That’s me, keeping the swim meet behind schedule!
One time, I actually beat someone. I swam 100 yards of breaststroke and promptly hopped out of the water, like I was used to doing, when I realized there was someone finishing the race. My fifth place earned my small, private school team one point, and we ended up unexpectedly beating a large, public school team by one point.
“See?” the peppiest of the swim mom’s said, slapping me on the shoulder. “This is why every single person on the team matters!”
But 99 percent of the time, I didn’t matter. I probably even caused some relays to lose. I did earn a varsity letter, but a fuzzy yellow “B” could not mask my awkward flip turns or my need to breathe every other stroke. I’m just lucky I didn’t drown.
