Mad Mandarine #3
I've never been a good swimmer. I learned all the strokes- freestyle was okay, breaststroke wasn't, butterfly was essentially an exercise in drowning myself and I would zig-zag back and forth between the lane ropes anytime I tried backstroke, effectively swimming twice the length of the pool with each lap. I still loved the water, though. Not so much the chlorine scented, calm waters of the swimming pool, but the richer, stronger water of Lake Michigan. In Lake Michigan, I felt as though I was actually communicating with something. Nothing really dangerous swims in Lake Michigan, no sharks, no stingrays, no shrieking eels, so I could just float contentedly without any concerns.
So every summer when we visited my aunt and uncle I would run out to the lake and spend hours there. In retrospect I'm surprised that even in the dead heat of summer I didn't die of hypothermia. Only as an adult have I realized how cold the lake is.
It got to the point that my parents really didn't worry about me. I was only about 30 yards from the cottage, I knew how to swim and the area was fairly isolated. The neighbors all knew each other and all kept an eye on the kids. In spite of my attempts to seclude myself in the water, the beach was rarely deserted.
To this day, I'm not certain what happened. I know that I went out deeper than I usually did, but I don't remember much more than that.
What do I remember?
I remember the sudden tug downwards, the rushing water. I remember fighting, screaming, sucking in half a lungful of water. I remember not knowing which way was up. I remember the panic, if only in bits and pieces. My memories of the entire event are now like a shattered pieces of stained glass. I have a couple of large, crystal clear and vivid pieces that don't seem to connect to the others in any meaningful ways. I'm sure there is a whole picture, somewhere in my mind, but quite frankly I suspect it forms a Hieronymus Bosch nightmare, not a pastoral scene.
I remember the grip of the neighbor Mr. Simmons, clutching at my waist length hair, the only part of me he could grip. I remember the rough boards of the old fishing boat against my knees as I coughed up lungs full of water. Most of all, I remember cold knowledge of how nature could turn against me. I remember the fear. And I remember the seduction of such power- my parent's have never understood why I continually wander alone in the wilderness- it's not because I want to relive my near-drowning. Far from it. I just want to know that the power and magic of the moment was real, and not created by an oxygen-starved mind. I have never found that power again, not in all the years that have passed. I've probably ignored it. It's so far outside my control perhaps I don't want it to interrupt my type-A lifestyle. I'm not certain.
I now know what to do if I'm caught by an undertow. I know to swim with the current and then perpendicular. I know not to panic.
But if it happens again, I also know that I probably won't be able to help myself, and this time there probably won't be a rescue. I will panic, and maybe in panic I will lose the barriers that I have thrown up in my adulthood. My childhood was full of magic. Now I just search for it. I can't find it.
So every summer when we visited my aunt and uncle I would run out to the lake and spend hours there. In retrospect I'm surprised that even in the dead heat of summer I didn't die of hypothermia. Only as an adult have I realized how cold the lake is.
It got to the point that my parents really didn't worry about me. I was only about 30 yards from the cottage, I knew how to swim and the area was fairly isolated. The neighbors all knew each other and all kept an eye on the kids. In spite of my attempts to seclude myself in the water, the beach was rarely deserted.
To this day, I'm not certain what happened. I know that I went out deeper than I usually did, but I don't remember much more than that.
What do I remember?
I remember the sudden tug downwards, the rushing water. I remember fighting, screaming, sucking in half a lungful of water. I remember not knowing which way was up. I remember the panic, if only in bits and pieces. My memories of the entire event are now like a shattered pieces of stained glass. I have a couple of large, crystal clear and vivid pieces that don't seem to connect to the others in any meaningful ways. I'm sure there is a whole picture, somewhere in my mind, but quite frankly I suspect it forms a Hieronymus Bosch nightmare, not a pastoral scene.
I remember the grip of the neighbor Mr. Simmons, clutching at my waist length hair, the only part of me he could grip. I remember the rough boards of the old fishing boat against my knees as I coughed up lungs full of water. Most of all, I remember cold knowledge of how nature could turn against me. I remember the fear. And I remember the seduction of such power- my parent's have never understood why I continually wander alone in the wilderness- it's not because I want to relive my near-drowning. Far from it. I just want to know that the power and magic of the moment was real, and not created by an oxygen-starved mind. I have never found that power again, not in all the years that have passed. I've probably ignored it. It's so far outside my control perhaps I don't want it to interrupt my type-A lifestyle. I'm not certain.
I now know what to do if I'm caught by an undertow. I know to swim with the current and then perpendicular. I know not to panic.
But if it happens again, I also know that I probably won't be able to help myself, and this time there probably won't be a rescue. I will panic, and maybe in panic I will lose the barriers that I have thrown up in my adulthood. My childhood was full of magic. Now I just search for it. I can't find it.
posted by Anonymous at 2:59 PM
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