Summer Swiimming

I grew up in eastern North Carolina where the summers are hot and muggy. Our favorite way to spend time was at Emma Webb public pool. We could walk from our house. A day of swimming costs 10 cents. We stood in line on the hot cement for a good half hour to enter the front building. The boys went to the left, the girls to the right. Cold showers and swim caps were required. The swim caps were awful looking rubberized caps that gave one the appearance of being bald. When water gathered around the cap, you could not hear your friends, only the sound of "swoosh" as the water sealed the cap.

After a cold shower, the first leap into the water felt warm unless you were scared as I was for the first twelve years of my life. I started at what we lovingly called the "baby end" and walked to the rope. The rope was a stopping point for those who could not swim. It was humiliating to have to stay in the first three fourths of the olympic sized pool. The pool was called "olympic" because supposedly it was built to accommodate the local high school's swim team.

Swim lessons were taught for free for many week long sessions over the summer. They were free. If only they had been magic too. My fear of putting my head under the water was the big draw back. Lessons began with floating on your back. Floating on your stomach was the one that held me captive at stage two. No amount of practicing helped. So, each summer I showed up early and worked hard, hoping this would be the summer that I could cross the line and join my friends in the "deep end."

Finally at the age of twelve, I made up my mind that nothing would hold me back. It was a magical day. I did it! I passed through all twelve stations and passed the almighty swim test, joining my peers in jumping off the high diving board ( one of the last tests). We belly flopped, dove, and struggled to keep our friendships alive while maintaining our dignity. We celebrated with Zero candy bars from refrigerated vending machines. We watched as our soft drink came poured out of the drink machine faucet without a cup and no one to make it right. Ha! We oohed and aahed over the cute lifeguards in their red swim trunks, memorizing their names and nursing our crushes. Billy, Tom, Mike we knew them all and compared them to our t.v. crushes like the singing group, The Monkeys.

I can tell I am old, when I start to think of those as the "good ole days."