Back when I was in boarding school, I was required to either play an interscholastic sport or take a PE class every season. I was annoyed at this graduation requirement; I am probably the least athletic person you will ever meet. I hated most, if not all, sports, but still wanted to try something new. Most kids in Hong Kong only played a sport because they were good at it, which was not the case in most schools in the States. Ultimately I decided to take up swimming, for the sole reason that no running was involved.
Photo by Tiffany Ding
I shared a love-hate relationship with swimming beginning the day I walked onto Emma’s stone-covered pool deck for the first time. I did not know what I was walking into—I later learned that my team did not make cuts, but my coach often scared off inexperienced swimmers with long and exhausting set-lists.
The first couple of practices drained the life out of me. My body was constantly in pain and drenched in the scent of chlorine. I contemplated quitting, but as I swam more and more, I began to fall in love with the sport. Despite my inability to swim fast, I never stopped. I finished dead last in half the practices (and that’s a lot of them) and a whole bunch of races. I probably cried. Either way, I still went to practice (with a lot of whining), cheered for my friends and begged my coach to let us play water polo as an ab workout. I trained with the dream of leaving a mark, regardless of how small that mark might be, and ultimately received the Most Improved Award at the end of my second season. My dream felt achievable.
Fall Sports Awards 2015. Photo by Emma Willard School.
It was my dream to make it to sectionals by my senior year. I found my stroke (breaststroke), loved it and did everything I could to perfect it. I went to optional morning practice at 6 a.m. I dragged my friends to open swims on weekends and made them critique my technique. Yet it just wasn’t enough—I was still seven seconds from the cut-off time for sectionals.
Failure hurts. It was a swift rejection, but the pain dwelled, knowing that I disappointed my coaches and my teammates. I cried. I don’t really recall what happened after that, but what I do remember is my coach telling me: “Going to sectionals would have been great, but what really matters is that you gave it your best shot.”
I believe I gave my final race everything I had in me, and that is enough. Even though I never made it to sectionals, my coach and teammates never gave up on me as an athlete. Today, even months after I left Mount Ida, my teammates have become some of my closest friends. As I look at pictures and videos from my three seasons, I saw how much I have grown—both physically (the shoulders and the thighs) and mentally (the “never give up” mindset). My computer wallpaper—a goofy picture of me and my teammates at ring dinner—reminds me of the family I have been blessed with and the small, shy, weak girl I once was; I know I can take on the world with a strong mentality and my friends by my side.
Swimming has taught me more than I ever could have imagined, and has given me some of my best friends. I have not actually gone in a pool since my last practice over a year ago. But when I do, know that I will be kicking butts (literally).
