I’m not always great with follow through. I have great
intentions, but then they get overwhelmed by all the other things that could
and should be done. Right now my best intentions are probably hiding behind a
pile of dirty laundry. And a pile of clean laundry I just need to fold. And
some important but boring-looking mail I haven’t opened. Buried under a whole
heck of a lot of guilt. I want to be a better person, but stuff keeps getting
in the way.
Do some laundry.
One of the only ways for me to get my actions to meet my
intentions is to just go, to not think and to not stop. The moment I decide I
want to do a good thing I have to start
doing that good thing. Like Dory,
I have to just keep swimming. Sometimes that means literally keep swimming,
like the time I signed up to be the swimmer for a sprint-triathlon team. Cindy, Erin and I signed up as a team to compete in
the Wonder Woman Quarter-Tri (Selina
and Liz signed up as individuals, maybe
because they were more athletic but also probably because they are hella
competitive). I can swim just fine. What I had no experience doing was swimming
quickly, swimming with 50 other women starting in the same heat, or swimming in
deep, open water. It’s okay though, those things don’t matter if you sign up
before you think about how terrifying those things are.
Because those things are
terrifying, or at least they are to me. Being timed is a lot of pressure on
someone who a) isn’t athletic and b) doesn’t want to let down their athletic
teammates. Being in a crowd isn’t scary, but being around a bunch of energy gel-fueled
women who were basically punching their way through water makes me nervous. And
swimming? I love swimming. What I don’t love is water that I can’t see the
bottom of. Even in our cold little lakes in Washington, I’m serious in my
belief that someone at some time may have released an alligator
turtle, alligator
gar or straight-up alligator
into the water and it grew into a huge, cranky reptile that’s waiting for some
idiot in a swim cap to blunder along so it can eat off her legs. Also, touching
seaweed with your toes is gross.
Lake monsters are all over the US.
This baby gonna get ate.
I practiced swimming the half-mile distance in an indoor
pool, only sometimes having to share my lane. Oh, and I stood at the edge of
the lake while Liz and Selina practiced swimming in open water. So on race day,
it’s safe to say I was not at all prepared to swim a half mile in open, cold,
lake water, surrounded by the piranha-like frenzy of a bunch of swimmin’ women.
From the moment the horn sounded, all I could think was “I’m
going to drown.” That’s not hyperbole: I honestly thought dying was a real
possibility. The shock of the water was nothing compared to the shock of being accidentally
hit and kicked dozens of times as swimmers moved around and over me. I couldn’t
see through the bodies and choppy water well enough to swim in a line. I couldn’t
breathe, from the water churned up into my face and from the shallow, panicky
breaths I was taking. There were rescue boats stationed around our route, and I
desperately wanted to dog-paddle over to one and have them lift me out of the melee.
The only reason I didn’t was because of my team waiting on me. I had to finish
the swim before Cindy could start the bike race and Erin could start the 5k
run. My tapping-out would forfeit our whole team, and I didn’t want to have to
tell them that I was too scared to do my part of the race.
Is there a swimming equivalent of limping? Because that’s
what I did, in a big, terrifying triangle of lake. I took breaks from my jerky,
panicky crawl stroke to turn over and do a jerky, panicky backstroke because it
was easier to breathe that way, and less scary to look at the sky. It took
forever. It took forever and a half.
I think I was the third to last person in my heat to finish.
I know there was a much older lady serenely and slowly paddling her way around
the lake, and we traded positions a lot. The moment I my feet could touch the
bottom of the lake again, I scrambled to stand up and slog my way to the shore.
I was exhausted, out of breath, shaky. It sucked. It sucked a lot. But I got to
the hand-off area so my team could continue.
That’s how I feel about current events, really. Right now, a
lot of things suck. Policies and words have come through that scare me, that make
me shake. That leave me gasping for breath, worried I’m going to get sucked
under by a black wave. Again, that’s not hyperbole: I’m afraid of the ways in
which access to health care, women’s rights, a healthy planet to live on, and
so many other things are poised to change. People might drown in it.
I can’t change that scary, on a large scale. I can’t drain
the lake free of monsters, I can’t escape the crush of bodies all struggling to
stay afloat next to me. I can’t do big things. But I can make little changes. I
can donate money and time and thoughts and support. I can love and I can stay
vocal and I can find small ways to make others happy. I can follow through when I say I will help, I will campaign, I will make a difference. That help doesn't end with a single phone call or a protest march or a Facebook post. Those help, but they're not the finish line. I can keep swimming. That’s
not much, maybe, but it’s what I can do. It’s what I will do.
Friends worth swimming for.
Bonus: they're worth climbing for, too.
