One of my first memories of being in the water is my dad teaching me how to swim. There was a communal pool in our apartment complex in Avalon Cove. One summer, when I was 5, or maybe 6, he took me to the deep end. I had bright orange bands cuffing my upper arms and shuffled my way along the side to where it marked 6ft. An inch above my father’s head, if he stood flat on his feet.
I don’t remember the next part perfectly. Sometimes in the memory I have the bands on. He tells me to leave the side and I kick my feet frantically, thinking I’ll sink, and through unnecessarily fast pedalling, I stay afloat. It is a miracle to me, that through effort, my chin mostly stays above the water.
Other times, the armbands have come off. I kick off from the side and immediately sink. Panic, or survival, some innate human knowledge, drives my legs to kick. I stutter up to the surface and my dad’s hands are under my armpits, face solidly above water, spluttering.
I used to teach children how to swim. When learning how to make effort, they would sink, then panic or instinct or both would drive them back up again. Their little mouths would sputter, and their eyes would widen, maybe with fear, maybe with amazement. An acknowledgment that they were still alive, that they had learned something new about themselves, their small bodies and what they could do.
I want to know what my body has left to learn. I can walk, run, squat, lift weights, kick, swing, swim. I wonder what the echo of my belled foot against the ground would do. How the sound might travel up my ankle, calf, thigh. The ringing of 50 brass bells in my chest cavity. The two-piece band of my heart and my foot, chiming in time.
I want to know what my body would do next to someone else’s. What my eyes could do if they tried. What my hands could do when inspired.
My body is in control of my mind right now. When I was seventeen I had discipline. I am twenty seven and barely have the discipline to keep myself alive. To make good meals, to sleep on time, to put warm clothes on, to read something, to write. My hormones slide up and down an invisible scale and my emotions sing themselves out of my mouth, which is an obedient player to an autonomic conductor.
I sit up in my sleep. I forget to breathe. My heart slaps my ribs and my legs tingle when I sit. The join of my shoulder crunches as the ball moves within its socket. I feel dried up. The gears grind as I neglect to grease them, the doors groan and creak. I could dry out into dust if I just stopped moving.