I'm not a swimmer, I've never strapped on a suit constraining my body in such a way that is only comparable to some sort of sick vice grip, I haven't approached nor gripped the block on 'Swimmers Take Your Mark,' but I do consider myself somewhat knowledgeable of the sport and definitely find joy in being surrounded by swimmers. The entire duration of my four-year undergrad career has been surrounded by collegiate swimmers due to an extensive relationship with a collegiate swimmer, three years of swimming roommates and the fact that my best friends happened to be swimmers. Although I've never entered a pool in streamline, I have been surrounded by the culture. I've been introduced to the Saturday-nights-we-rage-because-Sunday-mornings-we-don't-have-practice mentality, and I've learned the hard way that non-swimmers cannot keep up with swimmers when it comes to "recreational" weekend activities. Because of this extensive cultural background of "the swimmer" I have both great knowledge, and education that the following statement is indeed, unequivocally true:
Swimmers are of a different breed of human.
I've seen firsthand how unforgiving the sport can be, I've learned about gripping the water, the importance of the stroke, start, turn and finish. I've seen DQ's due to one miscalculation, like a kick exceeding the swimmer's allowed 15-meters underwater. I've seen bad starts, false starts, and the tears and anger that follow. I've seen how a coach can make or break a swimmer. I've done and folded laundry, cleaned and cooked for swimmers because of their intense schedule. I've sat in on SwimSwam interviews, I've lived with an Aruban Olympian. I've babysat an Olympian's children and some of my closest friendships are with athletes who have swam on the National Team and have trained with outstanding programs like SwimMac Carolina. The 10-degrees of separation rule, when it comes to high caliber swimmers, is narrowed to two or five degrees of separation. This constant exposure has ignited my interest to learn more about the sport, and the athletes that make up the sport.
Anthony Ervin isn't necessarily a household name at this point, especially for non-swimmers. Ervin, however, evokes the above statement in every sense. The american sprinter holds both a gold medal in the 50-meter freestyle, and a silver medal in the 4x100 freestyle relay, both of which he earned in 2000 at the Sydney Olympic Games. But what sets Ervin apart from the rest, aside from his tattooed arms and body, is that Ervin punched his ticket to the Olympic games again 12 years later, and then again most recently for the 2016 Olympic Games taking place in early August. Ervin has been a swimmer that I've always enjoyed keeping up with since I was first introduced to his career in 2012, while watching the London Olympics with my then-swimmer boyfriend who was enticed by Ervin's "bad boy" persona. I've always been drawn to people who seemed like they were more than "what met the eye" or more than their "cover," so as the years went on and I was able to follow Ervin's career on my own accord, I could tell he wasn't like the rest, he pushed the envelope, he talked about the importance of education for today's youth instead of his talent during media interviews after winning races, he wasn't the stereotypical jock-head, athlete persona I so hated. And, so, I firmly believed that this claimed "comeback" that the media was stating wasn't a "comeback" at all (which Ervin stated constantly that it wasn't a comeback), and there was a story behind this career that was worth learning about.
"Even say that competition is to athletes what creativity is to artists: without it they're stagnant"
-- Constantine Markides
As I ordered Ervin's "Chasing Waters: Elegy of an Olympian" novel last week from Barnes and Nobel which was fueled by a need for escape from the reality of inevitable change and the emotional roller coaster that is graduating and getting you're first adult job, and the announcement of Ervin becoming one of the team captains of the United States Olympic Swimming Team, I was expecting you're average athlete memoir. I was so immensely surprised in the affect it had on me, not as a familiar figure to swimming, but to myself and my life just as a human being. Ervin's novel is not what I would classify as an athlete's memoir at all -- it's a raw, vulnerable and inspiring piece on a growing man and person. The book is co-authored by Constantine Markides. The two men make a match made in literature heaven. Markides in his own right is an abundantly talented writer (see his piece on Ervin in Rolling Stone and is an ex-swimmer himself).
"Who's to say those aren't a cry for attention too? Maybe I've also inflicted pain on myself to stand out and be noticed"
-- Anthony Ervin on his tattooed arms
As I opened Ervin's novel expecting a "I've always been a natural born talent of the sport and I've always loved it here's my nutritional plan and exercise regiment" bullsh*t that is so evidently present in athlete memoirs, I instead open the first pages to a Homer quote from "The Odyssey," as five pages turned to 10 and 10 to 100 and 100 to 200, and then finished the book in two short days, I found myself relating to it on such a deeper level that made it impossible to put down. My notebook was scribbled with notes and quotes, and my book was highlighted with what seemed like every other line of text.
"Jedi band of brothers. Fuck Yeah." -- Anthony Ervin
Ervin and Markides so beautifully tell a story that no other athlete tends to share. The novel is more than a 267-page insight into Ervin's mind, Markides memorie, and Anthony's life. The book is so eloquently and elegantly written that it is more comparable to that of a poet than an author of an athlete's memoir. The writing leaves you enticed and digging deep into yourself, relating in such a way that you cannot put the book down. Ervin's raw insight on how the pool, and sport that was once filled with opportunity, interest and passion is the environment that became a prison and a pool of doubt and deeper mental struggle. This is a tale that you don't necessarily hear from high caliber athletes. You never hear the sport that has brought them success was at one point in time their near-death, life sucker. Ervin brings about how at the height of his success, at the peak of "having life by the balls" was the time when he was having the most struggle with who he was as a person. Ervin's insight into his struggle with who he was as a person and struggling with the stereotypes and identifiers that were strapped to him and his insights into his moments of great clarity of who he is as a person, and what he wanted is what as I was reading resonated with the most. The quotes at the beginning of each novel that were of such wide variety; Dostoyevsky to Alice in Chains, Sophocles to Korean Zen Chants, AC/DC to Groucho Marx, Shakespeare's Henry V to Danzig, along with appendixes that included a comic book strip into Ervin's psyche, and two historical pieces on family lineages, that left me in such awe of this complex rock n roller, english buff, video gaming, educator, who just happened to also be an Olympic Swimmer with Tourette syndrome as well. The book left me with more insight of how to be a better educator and coach in my career, along with accepting myself as a complex person who has more to give than her identifiers and stereotypes, than of the Olympic career at hand: which is what sets this elegy apart from the rest.
"Winners gain glory. Losers gain perspective" -- Constantine Markides
After finishing the novel, as a non-swimmer, the book is just as inspirational. For me the book is inspirational as an educator, a teacher, and a coach, not as a past swim enthusiast. Although I've never meant Anthony Ervin, except for a brief passing on a staircase at the 2015 Men's Swimming and Diving NCAA Championships in which he was dressed as a Bear to support the Cal men's swim team and I didn't learn until much later that the "Bears" that I had almost gotten trampled by were Olympians, I hope one day I'll be able to have the chance to discuss literature, music, education, Star Wars and wisdom of life with him, because shit is he a pretty interesting and philosophical guy. Regardless I can promise you that the last line of the novel, "ever restless, ever turbulent, ever unconstrained" will be hung on my classroom wall this year.
"The flora glows with an inner incandescence: there are no reds or blues or yellows or greens; there is vermillion and sapphire and topaz and emerald" -- Anthony Ervin
It's refreshing and inspiring to hear Ervin's raw repertoire of finding himself as a person and of a growing human, one of which is a battle that is not entirely spoke about in such a vulnerable state as Ervin and Markides have done. This "comeback" that the media was stating isn't a comeback at all. It's a rejuvenation of passion and love for a sport, it's the beauty of getting to watch an athlete fall back in love all over again, but in a such different way than he did 16 years ago.
