Learning To Swim

How is it possible that a 65 year old woman, who’s been living one block from the Bay of La Paz for fourteen years, and who has owned a boat most of her married life, is a terrible swimmer?  Last year I decided to learn to swim – properly.

I still remember the frigid Atlantic.  But the huge waves never kept my friends and me out of the water. Our lips turned blue, our teeth chattered and our mothers waved their arms and I imaged them saying, “If you kids don’t get out of that water right this minute, we’ll leave you at home the next time we come to the beach!”  But kids are deaf when they’re having fun.  Plus, we weren’t within grabbing distance.  With the exception of Shirley Winters, I never saw any woman go into the water deeper than her ankles.  They’d stand in the shallow water with blood red toe nails twinkling like minnows.    Talking and watching.  Guarding their children from disaster.  Could they swim?  Or save us?  I never thought to ask but now I believe they served as sentries; their job was to warn:  “Don’t go any deeper…look at the wave behind you….are you cold?  Okay, five more minutes”…and, ”Don’t think I’m going to take care of you if you catch pneumonia”. We ignored them. Only the aroma of almost burned hot dogs enticed us back onto dry land.

But Shirley was different.  She had no children to guard.  She’d walk right into that icy water, cut through a wave and bob up on the other side of it.  She’s swim fast and far. I watched and worried.  Who could save Shirley?  I would.  But first I needed to learn to swim. One day I asked her, “Shirley, how long can you hold your breath?”  She answered, “Judy, Lesson one:  take a deep breath, relax, and put you face into the water…I’ll hold you”.   Lesson two: Floating face down.  Lesson three:  Kicking. But a chubby Greek girl’s genes aren’t made for kicking.  My Mediterranean butt made it impossible to keep my legs from sinking.  Shirley would yell, “Kick.  Kick”.  But my kicks never produced a splash.  Lesson four:  Moving arms.  Lesson Five:  Putting It All Together -  Floating face down, (for now forget about your sinking legs) move your arms like this and turn your head from side to side.” I got dizzy. Shirley sighed.  Then she smiled.  “Judy, turn onto your back, relax and kick”.  It worked.  My toes splashed water onto my chest.  I was moving.  Later, she said, “Now move your arms like windmills going backwards”.  I was swimming.  And for fifty four years I swam that way.  But swimming on my back presented several problems.  I’d often smash my head into the end of the pool because I had no way to judge how close I was to the edge.  Also, because my right arm is stronger than the left, I swam in circles.

Last year I decided to learn to swim properly.  I bought goggles. I observed Marilyn.  She takes long slow strokes and makes tiny splashes with her feet, keeps her face in the water for four strokes, gently turns her head to the right, takes a breath, then returns her face to the water.  Back and forth for thirty minutes without stopping.  She isn’t breathless when she leaves the water.  I tried to copy.  I was aerobic within 5 seconds.  I swallowed salt.  They say the Sea of Cortez is so salty it’s like a natural floatation device but Marilyn suggested a pool might be safer.   I drank chlorine.  But I tried over and over. 

I’ll be sixty six in September.  I’ve learned that swimming, like learning a second language, comes easier before the age of ten. I now accept tools that make life easier.  So, if you see an older woman swimming face down at Costa Baja’s pool, if  her legs are dragging the bottom, if she’s wearing a mask, a snorkel and a yellow life preserver…and if she’s swimming in circles, don’t call the life guard; it’s just me.