Nyet! Or, all I know about Russia is what I have invented.
I've started swimming again, since my time is now much less structured than it has been in a long time, and I have actual free time! I learned to swim in a functional beach-going kind of way when I was a kid, but I never learned how to swim properly. I hadn't swum in probably 15 years when I decided about 6 years ago that I was going to start swimming laps for exercise. Because I am that kind of person, I went to the library and checked out a how-to book to go with my YMCA membership, and I taught myself how to swim. I am proud of this accomplishment, since it required a kind of persistence that I don't normally demonstrate. I am still a very bad swimmer, but I can swim laps (crawl and breaststroke and an occasional backstroke) comfortably, and I really like it, except for the chlorine. I like that it doesn't hurt, I like the feeling of pushing through the water, and I like the repetition of it.
I like the pool at school, too. It's ancient, and the locker room is fairly unpleasant, but there's something about the pool area that pleases me. The whole space is concrete, and vast and dark and echo-y, and somehow makes me think of a 1960s-era Soviet Olympic training facility.* The pool has a "shallow" end that drops off abruptly halfway across the pool, presumably for diving purposes, and I feel every time I cross the line that I am heading out into the deep ocean.** The YMCA pool where I used to swim never got deeper than 5 feet, so people could do things like water aerobics and water walking, and this deep water thing kind of freaks me out.
They're building a very fancy new recreation center on campus. It'll be open next fall, and I'm sure the pool will be terrific. I look forward to using the new fancy locker room. I will miss my Soviet pool.
* Because I've been to so many of those.
**If the ocean had a concrete bottom, no fish, and toxic levels of chlorine, that is.
I like the pool at school, too. It's ancient, and the locker room is fairly unpleasant, but there's something about the pool area that pleases me. The whole space is concrete, and vast and dark and echo-y, and somehow makes me think of a 1960s-era Soviet Olympic training facility.* The pool has a "shallow" end that drops off abruptly halfway across the pool, presumably for diving purposes, and I feel every time I cross the line that I am heading out into the deep ocean.** The YMCA pool where I used to swim never got deeper than 5 feet, so people could do things like water aerobics and water walking, and this deep water thing kind of freaks me out.
They're building a very fancy new recreation center on campus. It'll be open next fall, and I'm sure the pool will be terrific. I look forward to using the new fancy locker room. I will miss my Soviet pool.
* Because I've been to so many of those.
**If the ocean had a concrete bottom, no fish, and toxic levels of chlorine, that is.
Comments
S Dnem Rozhdeniya, Sara!!!