To Swim
I haven’t gone swimming for 20 years now. I was never a strong swimmer, but I always enjoyed it. As a kid I learned to swim at a lake. To this day I remember the sunfish nipping at my toes as I ascended the ladder by the diving board. I also remember swimming in a lake where my sister lived. Sometimes you’d be in the water and someone would shout “SNAKE!” You’d swim as fast as you could to avoid contact with the copper heads.
Many of my friends had pools and summers were spent poolside and playing in the water. There were always places to swim; lakes, rivers, off boats and rafts. It was endless.
I took up scuba diving in college, yet still enjoyed snorkeling and body surfing when ever I could. I continued swimming when I visited Hawaii when ever I traveled there.
I was once invited to do a dive at night through the ice on the Delaware River to look for eels, but I didn’t go for that one.
It was when I moved out here that I stopped swimming. I did swim once at a spa in Portland, but somehow it just doesn’t dawn on me to go swimming any more. It’s too cold and I’m not that fond of pools… I wonder if I will ever swim again by choice. I don't plan to muck about in the local rivers, nor do I plan any bridge diving. Oh well, at least I have my fond memories of when swimming was good.
posted by The Guy Who Writes This at 6:34 AM
6 Comments:
This must be nostalia-Friday huh?
Hey, you cheated us out of a sick day in August, mister!
I'm going to have to post on this one. Ya' don't have to get into the water if'n you don't wanna. Somehow, I think you already know that.
As you know, I still swim - although not with snapping turtles.
But as I've grown older I've given up diving in and jumping in with abandon. A little more wary, a little more cautious and, yes, a little more boring.
OK, I'll join the party......growing up bro and I practically lived on the beach and swam in the columbia ever day in the summer. Sometimes you had to wade quite a way out, and I always hated it when a bull head would ram into your foot, or you accidentally would step on a baby sand shark and it would wiggle out from under you. Also, we had to look out for jelly fish as it got closer to august.
Other great swimming places I remember were mostly on in the Naselle/Grays River area. Tres cold, but when you are a kid, you can be blue, teeth chattering etc and you will still swear to you mom that you aren't cold and wont come out of the water yet.
Growing up in the OC, when it used to be cool and have more cows on the hills than stucco homes, we lived at the beach (as my dermatologist will tell you). We surfed, body boarded, body surfed and swam, swam, swam. I am a strong swimmer and love it to this day, though I no longer do it as much as I'd like.
Swimming just doesn't seem like a big deal here, especially to anyone over 16 years of age. Maybe it's too cold. Also it seems that there is always activity at the Seaside pool, yet the Astoria pool seems like a ghost town. I think it had more activity when it was out doors at Tapiola.
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