swimming

Can I tell you how glad I am we decided to join a pool this summer? Odd that I'm saying so now, because it's only been warm enough to swim outside for, oh, four or five days here (another cool, wet spring up north). It's expensive initially to pay the family membership, but that fee pays for unlimited access when the pool is open, plus lessons for the kids. We've been to the pool every evening since Thursday (getting the most for our money dontcha know), and having Stuart there means I can go swim laps while he supervises the kiddies in the wading pool.

See, swimming is the only sport I'm remotely good at, except maybe running. I've never competed in either sport unless you count the half summer I was on a swim team, but I won't count that because I wasn't good enough to be competitive. Alas, I was the one everyone had to wait on to finish the race long after everyone else was done. I was the one for whom the only appropriate end-of-season trophy was Most Improved because they gave trophies to everyone and the best you could say about me was that I had gone from sucking horribly to average suckage. I was the one to whom people said "You're so graceful in the water!" because any other comment would have been mean or an obvious lie.

As for running? Well, in my school years I considered myself far too nerdy/artsy to join a sports team. It's possible I might have been a fair-to-middlin' cross country runner, but I never even tried. Eh, it's all in the past.

Still, I'm a decent swimmer, and swimming is something I genuinely enjoy. I also think it's extremely important for kids to be comfortable in and around water from a young age, so we're doing the pool thing this year. I feel like a tiny bit of a yuppie having a pool membership, rather than just going to the public pool like any good working class citizen, but there are definite pros to membership:

1. Lessons are included.
2. You can go to the pool any time you want, and it's already paid for. When you have a 3.5 and a 1.5yo, there's always the possibility that your stay at the pool will last anywhere between 20 minutes and 2 hours, so it's nice if you don't have to pay every time you enter.
3. Adult swim time. Loving. It. I swam 200 meters yesterday, which is a lot considering the last time I'd gone swimming before that was when I was pregnant with Anya and therefore carrying an extra 40 lbs or so and utterly miserable. Today I went 500 meters! My goal is to get to a mile by the end of the summer.
4. I know kids in the neighborhood of the pool we've joined, so I've got several babysitters lined up already for the July session of swimming lessons. BOO-yah!

As for the kids...well...Daniel loves the pool so far. He plays with the toys and the other kids in the wading pool, and he likes to "practice" swimming with me in the big pool, which mostly consists of me holding him in the water and telling him to kick. We've got a swim vest for him, which is a little bit like the pool equivalent of wearing a helmet to school, but whatever. He's 3 and doesn't care. Anya, on the other hand, lurks by the steps to the wading pool and refuses to go in. She points to a particular toy, the same one every time (a plastic yellow watering can), flaps her arms like a little bird, and whines when it doesn't magically fly into her hands. It's taking her some getting used to, I guess, but she'll come around. She's going to have lessons next month whether she likes it or not.

One thing I like about swimming is that it is the only thing I do better than Stuart. He's moderately athletic; he bikes, runs (when his knees don't bother him), plays tennis, and he can throw a frisbee fairly well. I can't do anything that involves any sort of aim or coordination without making an utter fool of myself. But I can swim a darn sight better than he can, all because I had lessons every summer as a kid and he didn't, and I might as well take advantage of that.

The only bad part is all the extra shaving I have to do. Sigh.

Comments

Tooz said…
I'm glad you're back in the pool. So is Ann (or at least she could be)--she and Daniel belong to a fitness facility across the street from their apartment. The healthiest my kids ever were were the summers when they swam on the local swim team, and no, none of them were competitive.
Jessi said…
I still say that set construction should count as a sport...

I really want to get my girls swim lessons, but we haven't yet reached the point where I don't have to shove my big behind into a swim suit and get in with them. Brynna can go it alone post September, so we'll see about fall lessons.
ann said…
You're like me. (Sorry.) But I am learning to play tennis. My first hand/eye-coordination sport. I have been playing for a week and had a lesson last night. It's really fun. I figured old people play tennis, so I could at least try it. I am surprised at how much I like it.

As for big butts, I wear shorts over my suit, almost always. Feels a little more modest to me, too. Imagine if you get a wedgie at the pool?

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