Underwater!

Posted on July 15, 2008 by Terry L. Holt

In the short list of things I do well that doesn’t include making coffee so strong that it can change your gender, I would list the following:

Diagram sentences
Independent eyebrow movement
Procrastinate
Write
Swim

Now, you probably knew the first four of those, if you know me at all. But I don’t get to show off my swimming ability very often. I swim like wow. Porpoises? Jealous. I was better as a child, where as a youngster I blasted through the YMCA levels to “shark” and then “junior lifeguard” before age 9, and won most of the swimming competitions I entered. Except butterfly stroke. And, well, that’s just the stupidest fucking stroke anyway. What’s intuitive or natural about flailing yourself around in the water in that manner? Showy.

I digress.

So, anyway, I swim. And I have these kids that have been afraid of swimming, not wanting to get their faces wet. And I have been the queen of patience. Until today.

I asked the 6 year old, I BEGGED her to let me throw her across the lake today.

I told her what would happen, that she would go under, but that she could hold her breath and close her eyes. At first, she ran (rather slowly, as we were both IN the lake, rather easy to catch up to …) from me. But, perhaps sensing how eager I was to get this milestone out of the way and go on to the business of teaching her to swim, to fulfill the promise of her genetics, she aquiesced!

I flung her.

She weighs 48 pounds and is 48 inches tall. I am surprisingly strong. She went pretty far. I was eager! And she went underwater. Hold on. Must place more emphasis.

MY CHILD WENT UNDERWATER, FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER.

And came up blowing and snorting, happy with herself. She spent the next hour voluntarily dunking her whole body underwater, then flinging herself up into the air in triumph!

So, today, I celebrate the first step of Kelsey’s new swimming frontier! Way to go, K!

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  • grammie

    Y’all should have been there the first time Terry’s dad threw her across
    the lake, or Sacco River as the case may be. Tara went first and reacted
    sort of like Kelsey, sort of may be a little bit of an exageration though. but Terry was captured then tossed over the shoulder of a very tall dad. It was a put your foot in dad’s hands, do a one, two, three and then fly up and over lordeal in those days, the ’70′s. I failed to mention the water temperature of the fast moving Sacco River in North Conway, NH, is probably approaching 50 in early summer. The result was not so magical as the Kelsey success story, mother fetched the near-drowned five year old in quite a state. I don’t think the dripping, goosebumped victim of a child talked to her really very loving dad for a day or so.

  • Michelle

    Two great stories! Learning to swim is such a rite of passage. Going against one of the most basic instincts…breathing air…to plunge into the liquid world. There is a metaphor in there somewhere, I think.

    My experience was more like Terry’s. A timid child, I was deathly afraid of the water and overly dependent of my swimmies. One summer day at a neighbor’s pool, my father finally had enough (beer?) and took off my swimmies and flung me into the deep end to a family friend who was supposed to catch me. Ahem…yeah, he didn’t. Sinking….5 year old little girl….sinking….hello? After throwing up all over the dear neighbor’s deck, I didn’t speak to my Dad for a good long time either.