Katrina's thoughts whilst swimming.

I've enjoyed, and been good at, swimming for most of my life.  Until the age of 16 I trained several times a week and competed at swimming galas.  I even represented Zambia three times at national swimming meets (yeh...don't get too wowed... not many people swim in Zambia!!).  A lot of people find swimming up and down boring, but I think there's something kind of therapeutic about it, and for me it's a form of exercise I can do steadily for a long period of time (unlike running!).  I'm not gonna lie though, more than swimming up and down, I love to play in water.  It's the only place I feel graceful.  Once I'm IN the water, I forget that I'm basically half naked and stop caring about the wobbly bits.  Most of my favourite memories revolve around being in water - playing stuck in the mud all afternoon on weekends at school in Zambia in the outdoor pool, swimming amongst fish in Lake Malawi and Lake Tanganyika, spending hours in the sea at West Wittering, surfing in Cornwall, playing in rivers in Brazil and in Bolivia.

Over the past ten years or so I've swam nowhere near as much, sadly.  Going to the pool on your own isn't quite the same as being part of a team training together.  I've not got the motivation to maintain my speed.  Study and employment kinda took over exercise, which has generally only expressed itself in cycling and attempts at dancing.  Which are two things I also love, so it's not all bad news, but whenever I do swim I realise how much I miss it.

So.  What I'm getting to is, I went swimming yesterday.  At the gym.  And these are the thoughts that flow through my mind whilst I'm in the water.  Because I know you're desperate to find out.  Yeh, OK slightly random blogpost, but I cannot write about the other things going on in our lives right now because they are too big and too sad and there are no words.  So you get swimming instead.  Lucky you!

Monday was the WRONG day to come...stupid website not telling me about the 'aqua-robics class' taking place at 6 o' clock, leaving only one lane for swimming...oh and great there's the slowest, most awkward looking breast-stroker plodding along in the this one lane (although all respect to her, she just kept going and going and going!)...ew the water is pretty cloudy today - won't think about that too much and it's kinda a relief because it means whoever's swimming behind me can't see every detail of my rear... doh my goggles are leaking... why after 26 years have I still not figured how to wear goggles properly?!...but my eyes sting without them...is that because people have been pee-ing in the water?  please can everyone just get out the pool and leave me in peace, I came here to escape from everything and get some quiet...so I'll just swim underwater and pretend no one else is around...I am a fish!  I can swim a whole length underwater if I swim real slow...oops and then nearly crash into the guy who never realised I was there...I don't think I'll risk backstroke today as even though I love it, I still cannot swim straight...and my breaststroke still sucks after all these years...so front crawl it is and I'll imagine I am still a fast swimmer even thought I know that's not the case...my technique's not bad...make it streamlined like a ferrari said Murray my swimming teacher when I was 10...although I probably am the fastest swimmer in the pool right now and I will keep on going until the others give up and go home...ooh awkward tumble turn from the guy in front...maybe I'll become a swimming teacher one day...let's see if I can still do a turn...ah YESS, sweet, hope the whole world didn't see my butt peep out the water...there's three lanes now but some people don't seem to have read the signs properly, I see frustrated swimmers caught behind that same lady who's in the medium speed instead of the slow lane...always the case...time for another length underwater...not sure I can get away with practicing my dolphin dives though...not today anyways...