Since here in Argentina, I have enjoyed swimming. I have dove in the water almost every day and focused entirely on swimming when in the water. Before arriving in Mendoza, back in the US, I had trouble with swimming. Physically, it hurt me. Mentally, I was not into it. So, it has been quite a relief to swim here and actually take pleasure in a sport that has literally consumed my life.
Usually, when I’m not in the mood to swim, I simply don’t swim. I believe it is important for everyone to do things that they really have the urge to do…that they truly like doing. Therefore, on days when I am not in the mood to swim, I don’t. I believe it is the body giving a subliminal message to the mind. Today, I had the urge to swim…and swim a lot. So, when I dove in the water I was surprised to experience this overwhelming feeling of awfulness. It was not that I physically felt terribly, although my shoulder did hurt slightly more than it has the past few weeks. I felt mentally exhausted. And, the worst of it all is that I let it get to me.
A little background about swimming here in Mendoza, it is nothing like training in the US. Swimming in the US: when you slack off, everyone looks down upon you. If you miss a 50, you do it at the end of a set/practice. If you don’t make an interval, you move down a lane. If you need to pass someone, you pass them and there is no necessity for them to stop. The middle of the wall is always open in order for swimmers to do flipturns/finish at the wall. No one stops at the wall until the yardage is completed. And, most importantly, there is always at least a 5-second pause between each person leaving the wall. Well, think the complete opposite—it is acceptable to slack off, if you miss yardage it never gets completed, you never move lanes, when you pass someone they stop right in the middle of the lane/wall, the middle of the wall is NEVER open, (with respect to the previous statement) almost no one finishes the indicated yardage, and people push off the wall literally 2 seconds (or less) after each preceding swimmer—and it is exactly what occurs here. Therefore, it is only understandable that I can be swim-practice-normalcy-homesick once in a while.
Anyway, today I let these little deviances during swim practice get to me, but I had no understanding as to why. I have been used to this by now. I am used to the old man who, yes maybe he was a big time open-water swimmer in his time about 40 years ago, swims in lane 3 and goes at my grandmother’s pace—she doesn’t swim. But today, the fact that he stopped at the wall at the 150 for a 200 killed me. No idea why. I began to cry. No idea why. What was my issue today?
I get out of practice and I began to think—what was the deal? I realized exactly what was troubling me. It had nothing to do with swimming, although swimming is a part of it. It had everything to do with the fact that after next Tuesday, I will no longer have a home in the Princeton-area in New Jersey. I will no longer be a “Jersey Girl.”
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