Swimming with shackles off

I love swimming. I love it a lot. Tonight I swam 1143 meters (1250 yards), my longest swim yet in this whole training season. It was glorious. Mostly. Things that are not glorious about swimming: the bugs, leaves, blades of glass, wads of hair, and other filthy things in the water. My gym's pool is not fundamentally disgusting; I think it's just the result of the sheer quantity of people in the pool, many of whom are small children. I try to look past the dirty bits and just breathe.

Like no other form of exercise for me, swimming allows me to totally free my mind, as En Vogue would want me to do. I just tune out the whole blur of life. I count my laps and listen to the air bubbles made when I breathe. It sounds kind of like the ocean in my ears, like I'm listening to a conch shell, because the cap fits tightly over my ears and adds to the whole drown out the rest of humanity sensation. I just go to my happy place. It's so anonymous -- with your face in the water and your hair in a cap and goggles over your eyes, it's like no one knows it's you. You're just there all alone in the water. It is such a comfortable and comforting solitude.

Today, a good friend of mine introduced me to the Martha Beck concept of "shackles on" vs. "shackles off." I am not sure who Martha Beck is, exactly, but I really like this concept upon first glance. I am going to look more into it because I am intrigued, and I like that it seems to involve gut-checking and, more importantly, gut-trusting. That is so important and so hard sometimes. Anyway, swimming = totally shackles off for me, and I am thankful for it.

It's a good thing I love it so much, otherwise peeling off my bathing suit and seeing a clump of hair that does not belong to me plastered against my bosom might send me keeling over in a dead faint. I tell myself it's all chlorinated and to calm down. Really, swimming calms me down so much intrinsically that these things do not bother me. It's like an OCD miracle.

I also had my best bike ride yet yesterday morning. 10 miles in the scorching 10 a.m. sun. I know it does not sound like the sun would be scorching at 10 a.m., but it was. I rode with a distinct lack of the fear that has plagued me on earlier rides. I was basically like, "Out of my way, joggers in the wrong lane! Coming through!" I am turning and slowing down with more skill and confidence. I am certainly no speedster, but it's so beautiful along the route, and I am starting to let it inspire me instead of worrying every minute that I am going to be colliding with certain death.

I guess that's about it for tonight. I watched In Bruges again and loved it all over again. I am enjoying Dragon Spear. I loved The Wednesday Wars and reviewed it over at Melissa's site, Kidliterate. My brain is shutting down now. Good night.