This summer has been an eye opening experience as the nearest pool is over an hour away. The public beach looks common enough with all the regular rocks and plenty of shells, not to mention the shiny amethyst littering the shore. How far will I swim today? Hard to say, considering the buoy's are about here to there, perhaps seventy-five yards or so, depending on my stride this day. Walking that is, as the sun-baked sand wiggles through my toes, with a slight breeze flowing through my hair, yes, I decide on 75 strides.
With mirrored goggles firmly in place, and as a proud owner of the newest fins available, I waddle to the water. The cool cresting waves crash over my ankles as I submerge deeper into the clear blue abyss. "It's now or never", I think as I slink into the crystal drink. My dry hair slips into the new environment, waving like the seaweed below.
Using my fins I dolphin through a school of rainbow trout as they allow me to join the lesson of the day. As I flow through some slippery seaweed, I pause momentarily, looking back at the beautiful rainbow reflecting off the sides of the fish. The sun streams through the bluish-green water in glorious beams, as my hair waves with the weeds, and a euphoric feeling overcomes me.
In the background I hear a high-pitched buzzing as a boat skims over the water, completely oblivious to my underwater bliss. Running short on breath I notice a sunken dock, and in my mind I can momentarily see the glory days of the past, floating high and dry.
Pushing off the slippery sunken dock I dolphin to my destination, and take a deep breath upon breaking the surface. The time for training begins, and I start like so many times before. The waves rule the surface as I attempt to negotiate through them, the water is alive and does not want to be calmly contained. We begin to have an understanding as I rock and roll through the unpredictable bouncing. Staying true to form but being open to flow at any given moment, that seems to be the trick to open water swimming.
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nice post jonathan.
last week i saw some small fish in a lake i frequent. lake minnewaska.
this shouldn't sound like anything to write home about, but.....this lake has been considered "dead" (too acidic for fish) for generations. in the 20-something years i have been swimming there i have never seen anything other than frogs, snakes, salamanders, etc in the lake. even the park naturalists don't seem to know anything about what species, or how they got there.
every day is unique outside the box (pool).
nice post jonathan.
last week i saw some small fish in a lake i frequent. lake minnewaska.
this shouldn't sound like anything to write home about, but.....this lake has been considered "dead" (too acidic for fish) for generations. in the 20-something years i have been swimming there i have never seen anything other than frogs, snakes, salamanders, etc in the lake. even the park naturalists don't seem to know anything about what species, or how they got there.
every day is unique outside the box (pool).
