Fear of Drowning

I guess you could call me a late bloomer, although I prefer to think of myself as someone unencumbered by traditional schedules. I didn’t get around to graduating from college until I was in my 40s. Last year, I started graduate school at age 56. Still, it surprised me the other day when, after a lifetime of shamefully explaining to people that I can’t swim, I discovered that I can!

And I owe it all to my Aqua Jogger. Mind you, learning to swim was not my intention. The Aqua Jogger is intended to be an exercise aide, and is not even recommended as a floatation device. I bought the thing so I could exercise in the pool, which I still do.

The surprise benefit was that I found myself wandering into the deep end of the pool (water over my head!) for the first time in my life. Prior to the Aqua Jogger, I was always stuck in the shallow end, staring wistfully at my friends and family splashing happily in the deep water. I would stand there watching eighteen month-old babies with water wings flapping and kicking over to the party where I was not allowed. So close, and yet so far.

I’ve been blaming my fear of water on my mother all my life. She was a raging aquaphobe. She never owned a bathing suit, and I never saw her in a pool or any other body of water deeper than a bathtub. But I’ve always known the "I learned this from my mother" excuse was a weak theory. My brother and sister both swim. Therefore, I must be a wuss - an opinion of myself reinforced by my brother-in-law, who finds the sight of me in the pool in my Aqua Jogger the funniest thing he’s ever seen. It’s like I’m Martin Short in his SNL synchronized swimming routine where he wears a life preserver.

But the big news is that last week, with my husband standing very close by with his arms outstretched for me to swim to him like the parent of a toddler, I did. Without my Aqua Jogger. I only swim 5 or 6 feet so far, and I don’t put my face in the water - nobody’s going to mistake me for Esther Williams. But I am swimming. And it makes me wonder what else I might be able to do that I’ve spent my whole life avoiding.