The water’s fine, for fun, Zen and safety
Two-thirds of Asian Americans don’t know how to swim, nor do 70 percent of African Americans and 60 percent of Latinos, compared with 40 percent of whites.
The first time I learned how to swim, it must have been in our neighborhood pool, under the guidance of my father, but his instructions were limited, and I developed a flailing freestyle stroke. Although my parents grew up on a subtropical island of Taiwan, they’d never been strong swimmers. While my siblings and I splashed in the shallows or played in the hot tub, my father slowly did the breaststroke around the perimeter of the trapezoidal pool.
Some friends joined local swim teams, spending their summers at practices and meets, but I never felt comfortable enough to try; it wasn’t what my family did. Even now, two-thirds of Asian Americans don’t know how to swim, nor do 70 percent of African Americans and 60 percent of Latinos, compared with 40 percent of whites, according to USA Swimming, the national governing body for the sport. Barriers include fear and lack of role models and access to facilities. Consider how segregation laws kept African Americans out of public pools. The consequences of that legacy are deadly, with black children much more likely to drown than their white peers.
Memorial Day is the unofficial start of summer vacation season, and I’ve been thinking about how all children should have the opportunity to learn how to swim. The Make a Splash program partners with swim providers across the country, promoting water safety education and providing scholarships for children’s lessons.
Our family already has been splashing at that same neighborhood pool since it opened for the season this month. The twins’ love of swimming began in the womb, when I swam laps nearly every day while pregnant, my huge belly buoyant in the water. Before they could walk, we enrolled the twins in classes where they dipped their faces in the water, blew bubbles and giggled as we sang to them. Eventually, with floats secured around their chests, they paddled around the pool and also continued with their lessons. Each summer, they make more progress, and I can’t help but feel proud, knowing how hard they’ve practiced their skills.
Gege somersaults like a seal underwater, diving after the weighted squids, rings and other pool toys, while Didi shouts with joy as he leaps off the edge. It makes me think of the adventures I had here as a kid, when, like them, I pressed my fingers against the spout in the hot tub to make the water spurt. In middle school, a friend and I made mischief by sending a school of Goldfish crackers through the tube that connects the pool and hot tub. We cleaned it up, but I’ll never forget the sight of the Goldfish set free, like some madcap modern art installation.
I never had formal swimming lessons until I was in my 20s, after I injured myself running, an egg-size lump appearing on top of my foot. I turned to low-impact cycling and swimming. Lacking a swim cap and goggles, I climbed out red-eyed and exhausted after only a few laps. And so I signed up for lessons at the YMCA, learning how to stretch my arms and rotate my body efficiently and smoothly, kickkick-kicking. I haven’t stopped since. For me, swimming is the best way to take a break from my jumbled thoughts. Before kids, when I had more time to myself, I used to practice yoga, but try as I might, I was never good at playing dead. At the end of the class, when you’re supposed to fall into corpse pose, in a state of total blank relaxation, my mind never settled. I was always thinking about what I had to do next.
Swimming seals me off from distractions, with no access to the Internet, no sound but for my breathing and the splash of water, nothing to see but the bottom of the pool and the glint of sunshine. It’s when I’m away from my computer that my subconscious bubbles up, helping me untangle narrative dilemmas.
Along with the pool, our family seeks out streams and lakes. Last year, we hiked down the narrow, dusty trail to Natural Bridges in Calaveras County, sweating in the kind of heat that makes you wonder how prospectors and pioneers survived it a century ago. As we started on the switchbacks, we could hear the flowing water, tantalizingly out of sight, until at last we arrived at the mouth of a cavern where we inflated a raft and paddled under amazing stalactites.
This summer promises even more adventures, in waters swollen with snowmelt. You jump into the icy, refreshing waters, your heart pounding from the shock, every hair on your body standing on end. You stumble out and lay against the granite like a lizard soaking in the heat, bees buzzing around you, until you can resist no longer, and — with a “1-2-3!” — you brace yourself and jump back in.