Going swimming was another way of saying our family was going to the base pool to waste away an afternoon and cool off. Dad would chase us across the deep end, and the whole family would play games, it was a scene from a feel-good country song, and I loved every minute of it. We'd stay in the pool for hours, because anything with my dad ended up being fun and I really enjoyed swimming.
My family became good friends with the lifeguards because we were self-proclaimed pool rats. My family would buy the lifeguards pizza, and they allowed us to hang out in the office and play games during their breaks. I loved just being at the pool.
One random day, Dad and I raced trying different "real" swimming strokes. He would pull my ankle so I couldn't win, and so I would jump on his back. After we finished racing, one of the guards said that I "had a good feel for the water" and should join the swim team. My parents laughed and said, "What's a swim team? That's a real thing?"
The guards explained the pool ran a summer league team, and I suggested we try it out. We were a family of classic sports like baseball, football, and basketball, all of which I was terrible at because of my hand-eye coordination, so the idea of swim was like some new place none of us had ever been. The guards also coached the team and explained the team had only been practicing for about a week, assuring us that we'd be fine to join.
So I tried "swimming" for a team. I was horrible. As I look back now, I was easily the worst on the team. Which included the four-year-olds that swam exactly how you picture a four-year-old swimming.
My first season of swimming was all I could muster. Despite being the worst, I still made good progress and I loved it. The more I improved, the greater my resolve to get better. Another parent mentioned I could do swim year-round, another startling discovery that we had no clue was a real thing pretty much everywhere.
Mom found a local club team and I was told to come for a try-out, where I swam with kids 4 years younger than me. I made the team and officially became a year-round swimmer. That first year, I met some of my best life-long friends, all from this sport.
As I started competing at swim meets and practicing six times a week, I knew I found "my thing." I wanted to be the best, so I would try anything that I thought would make me better. Some things were a super bad idea, like drinking Red Bull and an Energy GU before every race at the age of 11.
With all the experience of a two-month veteran swimmer, I knew I loved this sport and I "officially" decided I will attend a Division-1 University where I'd swim on a scholarship. Keep in mind, I was still horrible and would have been lucky to join a club swimming team for any university (which is voluntary).
I had no perspective on how bad I was. I was a bit braggadocious in my mediocrity, telling others of my minute plus times in a 50 meter butterfly, with no clue. I thought I was good, but isn't that how young love works? Turns out there were some girls going twice as far in less time than my swims, my future best friend being one of those people. She was either winning or in the top 8 in everything she swam. However, I still thought I' was going to swim Division-1, and I would think, "We are going to swim Division 1 together."
Little 11-year-old me was so confident in this, I made my mom a deal. I made her swear that if I got a good scholarship from a Division-1 program, she had to buy me a car; then I rephrased: a nice car, "not one off a junk lot." So she promised that if I were to accomplish my goal, she would get me whatever nice car I wanted (within reason).
So this was the beginning of my swim love affair. Little did this 11-year-old know all of the challenges I would face, and the people who would doubt me, or tell me I couldn't achieve that goal that year--it was just too big and I should start a little smaller. I never listened.
If my coach balked at my goals or told me they were too big, I would find someone else who could help me. I was driven and naive. The military meant we moved states and club teams often, and along the way,I improved to "not super horrible" for my age. But I still didn't have the "state qualification times," either.
This still wasn't seen as a problem for me. I never considered whatever was going on as a problem, just a current thing that would change.
I look at myself now and wish I had this quality back, the simple mind that no goal was too big and it was really simple to achieve if I just worked a little harder. Where has naivety of my youth gone, and where is the boldness that I see in those around me?