You want to to what?

1993

“Mommy, what does that sign say?”

 We were driving down the road.  I looked over and answered, “Swim team try-outs”. She wanted to know what that meant. I expect I gave her a more accurate account of “try-outs” than “swim team”.  I was an artsy geek as a child who had gone to plenty of auditions for plays, but I did not know the first thing about swim teams. I learned to swim in Lake Erie, riding waves and balancing on inner tubes…the schools in my town did not have pools.

“I want to do that”. She was five.

 I was completely surprised.  I replied, “Honey, I think you already need to know how to swim to go to a try-out”.   She told me she could swim. To her credit we had taken her to lessons at the YMCA, but I had never seen her swim more than a couple feet, from my arms to the side of the pool. We raise our kids to be confident & independent though.  She was adamant that she wanted to do this. She was stubborn too. The easiest solution would be to take her to try-outs and let her see for herself that she needed some more lessons before she could be on a team.

On try-out day there were dozens of kids and complete bedlam. It was outside, May in Ohio,  cold and dreary… It was 8:00 on a week night, which  was nearly bedtime for her.  Never-the-less, when her turn came she jumped into the pool and swam 25 yards to the other side without stopping. My husband and I looked at each other with our jaws agape. Thus began 17 years following a sport I would come to love like no other. So much for the “easy” solution.