Drowning
My parents divorced when I was just a few months old, and I spent a few weeks every summer with my dad and stepmother. They lived out aways from town, and in the sweltering Texas heat I would wake up - go to vacation Bible school (even though my parents didn't go to church they thought it important that the fear of God was instilled in me along with some silly songs, juice and cookies and a collection of crafts made from macaroni and popsicle sticks). After Bible school got out, we would pack up the car and drive... past open fields and rounding a bend my parent's bank on the left hand side (the "Cow Pasture Bank" - I couldn't make this up if I tried), and then past the dusty rodeo grounds. Coming around the bend next to a defunct miniature golf course was the YMCA swimming pool.
The scent of clorine heavy in the air, I was holding on to the side of the pool in the 3 ft. shallow area. The instructor told us to put our faces in the water and practice blowing bubbles. Face down, I blew bubbles in succession - small ones that felt like feathers crossing my lips and larger ones that popped audibly at the surface. Then, my lungs depleted of air, I inhaled. As water started filling my lungs I choked. They pulled me up over the edge and bent me over as I coughed the water out of my lungs. Shaking, they wrapped me in my towel, and made me sit at the edge of the pool.
By the end of the week, my skin smattered with freckles, they couldn't get me out of the water. I loved the feeling of buoyancy. I loved everything about being there -the feel of the rough concrete and the smooth tile of the pool on my feet, the smell of the copious amounts of sunscreen my stepmother smothered on me, the way the water felt so cool in the heat.
Going over family pictures this past holiday - I noticed how many were of me in or near the water. Barely walking and chewing on the handle of a sand pail on the side of the lake; strutting in a new red yellow and blue ruffled bikini at about age 5 (my father was NOT happy with that purchase) that my grandmother bought me at the upscale children's store on the square; peeking my head above water in a plastic children's pool beneath my grandmother's pear trees...
I became quite a skilled swimmer with time. Excellent off the high dive, I could walk across the entire pool in a perfect handstand. Since my mother and I lived in apartments much of my childhood, I had ready access to the pool, and spent almost every waking minute there.
However, in the midst of this love has always been an irrational fear of drowning. I have never lost that moment of fear when I could feel the water filling my lungs.
When I was about nine my dad was transferred to California. I spent the entire summer there, and my little sister and I made giant sand castles. Rocky crags jutted out from the waves. She was too little to go out, but Dad and I swam all day. My stepmother was pregnant, and stayed watching Daph on the beach. We were out pretty far when suddenly the tide changed. At first I thought I had my leg caught in a kelp bed, but I got sucked under quickly - and the rush of the water knocked the wind out of me. When I finally surfaced, I couldn't see our bright beach towels on the sand. I was bleeding from being dragged over the rocks. Dad swam up and carried me into shore. My stomach was upset from drinking all the ocean water, and the cuts burned from the salt - but I was fine.
In high school a guy I didn't know very well invited me over for a swim. I went - and when he made an advance that I refused, he grabbed me - forcing me underwater... holding me there as I tried not to breathe... with his other hand, he ripped my swimsuit top, and as I fought to get my hand over the edge of the pool to get out he burned me with a cigarette. I still have that little round scar on my right hand. I finally broke free and swam to the end of the pool, got out - grabbed my clothes - still dripping wet - crying I walked home.
In high school and college I dated a man whose family owned nearly two thousand acres deep in the Hill Country. Crystal clear streams sprung up from the limestone, and we would spend hours there fishing and swimming - careful to avoid water mocassins. There was a section of the creek about a football field wide, where the water had carved deep pools in the limestone - the "tubs" as we called them. Our clothes discarded on the mossy rocks, he and I would sit out there with the water running over our bare skin - watching the wildlife and listening to the waterfalls. The woman who lived in the property behind the creek slipped on the rocks and was found - drowned - in only four inches of water. She had just bought a new house in town and filed for divorce. Her husband found her. An accidental death was the coroner's conclusion.
When I moved to Florida my first apartment was a penthouse on the sixteenth floor overlooking the Intercoastal Waterway. From my balcony, I would watch rowing teams, and occasionally a manatee or manta ray swim through the channel. On Independence Day - my three sisters and I spent the entire day in the ocean - playing in the waves. Our skin wrinkled we watched the fireworks explode off the barges. Reluctantly at about ten we finally came on shore for birthday cake. We could have spent their whole vacation in the water.
Snorkeling off Key Largo -the Christ of the Deep covered in fire coral and the choppy water obscured the view of the small sharks circling beneath me. Then - off the coast of St. John, in the crystalline water we watched squid and rays dart beneath us. Snorkeling out to Lemon Cay - a large shark - perhaps eight feet long swam directly beneath me - so close that I could have reached out my arms and touched it. My breath stopped... and I instantly shot my head up, trying to find the shore. The sound of the water breaking made the shark turn, and swimming as hard and as fast as I could, I ran up the beach - collapsing into a heap beneath a sea grape tree.
The shark encounters made me leery of water. I don't go in now, unless it's in a pool. It was I guess those experiences that revived the fear of drowning, I don't know.
Last night, while in my yoga class, we were laying on our backs, the lights darkened, instructed to feel our bodies floating... controlling our breathing I sort of slipped off into a 'zen' state of peace.
I saw myself in a white sundress, the gauzy fabric billowing out in the water, the water caressing my skin. Sunlight filtered slowly through the depths of the water, and I realized I was drowning. I bolted upright in class with a scream caught in the back of my throat. So much for relaxation.
I finally slept last night, but all night I dreamed about water. All night... and this morning I was almost afraid I would wake up with water still lingering in my lungs.
The scent of clorine heavy in the air, I was holding on to the side of the pool in the 3 ft. shallow area. The instructor told us to put our faces in the water and practice blowing bubbles. Face down, I blew bubbles in succession - small ones that felt like feathers crossing my lips and larger ones that popped audibly at the surface. Then, my lungs depleted of air, I inhaled. As water started filling my lungs I choked. They pulled me up over the edge and bent me over as I coughed the water out of my lungs. Shaking, they wrapped me in my towel, and made me sit at the edge of the pool.
By the end of the week, my skin smattered with freckles, they couldn't get me out of the water. I loved the feeling of buoyancy. I loved everything about being there -the feel of the rough concrete and the smooth tile of the pool on my feet, the smell of the copious amounts of sunscreen my stepmother smothered on me, the way the water felt so cool in the heat.
Going over family pictures this past holiday - I noticed how many were of me in or near the water. Barely walking and chewing on the handle of a sand pail on the side of the lake; strutting in a new red yellow and blue ruffled bikini at about age 5 (my father was NOT happy with that purchase) that my grandmother bought me at the upscale children's store on the square; peeking my head above water in a plastic children's pool beneath my grandmother's pear trees...
I became quite a skilled swimmer with time. Excellent off the high dive, I could walk across the entire pool in a perfect handstand. Since my mother and I lived in apartments much of my childhood, I had ready access to the pool, and spent almost every waking minute there.
However, in the midst of this love has always been an irrational fear of drowning. I have never lost that moment of fear when I could feel the water filling my lungs.
When I was about nine my dad was transferred to California. I spent the entire summer there, and my little sister and I made giant sand castles. Rocky crags jutted out from the waves. She was too little to go out, but Dad and I swam all day. My stepmother was pregnant, and stayed watching Daph on the beach. We were out pretty far when suddenly the tide changed. At first I thought I had my leg caught in a kelp bed, but I got sucked under quickly - and the rush of the water knocked the wind out of me. When I finally surfaced, I couldn't see our bright beach towels on the sand. I was bleeding from being dragged over the rocks. Dad swam up and carried me into shore. My stomach was upset from drinking all the ocean water, and the cuts burned from the salt - but I was fine.
In high school a guy I didn't know very well invited me over for a swim. I went - and when he made an advance that I refused, he grabbed me - forcing me underwater... holding me there as I tried not to breathe... with his other hand, he ripped my swimsuit top, and as I fought to get my hand over the edge of the pool to get out he burned me with a cigarette. I still have that little round scar on my right hand. I finally broke free and swam to the end of the pool, got out - grabbed my clothes - still dripping wet - crying I walked home.
In high school and college I dated a man whose family owned nearly two thousand acres deep in the Hill Country. Crystal clear streams sprung up from the limestone, and we would spend hours there fishing and swimming - careful to avoid water mocassins. There was a section of the creek about a football field wide, where the water had carved deep pools in the limestone - the "tubs" as we called them. Our clothes discarded on the mossy rocks, he and I would sit out there with the water running over our bare skin - watching the wildlife and listening to the waterfalls. The woman who lived in the property behind the creek slipped on the rocks and was found - drowned - in only four inches of water. She had just bought a new house in town and filed for divorce. Her husband found her. An accidental death was the coroner's conclusion.
When I moved to Florida my first apartment was a penthouse on the sixteenth floor overlooking the Intercoastal Waterway. From my balcony, I would watch rowing teams, and occasionally a manatee or manta ray swim through the channel. On Independence Day - my three sisters and I spent the entire day in the ocean - playing in the waves. Our skin wrinkled we watched the fireworks explode off the barges. Reluctantly at about ten we finally came on shore for birthday cake. We could have spent their whole vacation in the water.
Snorkeling off Key Largo -the Christ of the Deep covered in fire coral and the choppy water obscured the view of the small sharks circling beneath me. Then - off the coast of St. John, in the crystalline water we watched squid and rays dart beneath us. Snorkeling out to Lemon Cay - a large shark - perhaps eight feet long swam directly beneath me - so close that I could have reached out my arms and touched it. My breath stopped... and I instantly shot my head up, trying to find the shore. The sound of the water breaking made the shark turn, and swimming as hard and as fast as I could, I ran up the beach - collapsing into a heap beneath a sea grape tree.
The shark encounters made me leery of water. I don't go in now, unless it's in a pool. It was I guess those experiences that revived the fear of drowning, I don't know.
Last night, while in my yoga class, we were laying on our backs, the lights darkened, instructed to feel our bodies floating... controlling our breathing I sort of slipped off into a 'zen' state of peace.
I saw myself in a white sundress, the gauzy fabric billowing out in the water, the water caressing my skin. Sunlight filtered slowly through the depths of the water, and I realized I was drowning. I bolted upright in class with a scream caught in the back of my throat. So much for relaxation.
I finally slept last night, but all night I dreamed about water. All night... and this morning I was almost afraid I would wake up with water still lingering in my lungs.
posted by April at 10:31 AM
2 Comments:
If you got laid you might sleep better. I'm just saying.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Post a Comment
<< Home