swim.

this is an essay my dear friend, daryk childs, wrote. i couldn't help but share the pure genius of this entire project. each letter, word, and phrase were filled with wit and tact, and it is about a subject very dear to my heart (obviously). enjoy! p.s. each word is true. i am a witness, here and now.

Most people aren’t entirely familiar with who and what swimmers are. Maybe that is the glory of it all; taking first in state, or even qualifying for state, and not being announced over the schools intercom system, while the poor sets of teams who couldn’t even place in Region do get recognition. Yes—that is part of our sports greatness—a championship that can be held in a swimmers own heart, for him and his team only, to be recognized by no one.

            Obviously we can’t pinpoint the success of swimming by the team earned and individually earned achievements; no… but we can attempt to categorize it with its’ work ethic. Sure, as a child plays sports such as basketball and baseball they can feel great about practicing a few times per week. After all, recreation sports can’t do anything but practice two-three times a week. But as more hours are assigned into your schedule, the more you progress.

As a child, practicing daily was nice for the majority of the team, we could wake up early in the morning before school and not have to worry about showering! The thought was relaxing. When we eventually had practices after school for two+ hours each and every day we would never have to figure out what to do if we actually had free time instead of practice time. What a relief that lack of brain power was for our agony filled mind. As we grew older and our practice schedules became much more invigorating, life only got easier. Instead of having practices before school for a year, and later having daily practices afterschool for two years; we all moved up to a more prestigious swim team who practiced with consistency both before AND after school, as well as Saturdays. I mean, instead of waking up to do yard work for an hour or two on Saturday morning; we could now go to the pool even earlier in the day to swim, run, and weight train for 3+ hours instead. Oh the many lawns I saved myself from mowing… yet this isn’t all. Imagine if those 6 hours per day we spent training each day during the school year had not been so time laboring. We would have to worry about the nuisance that a social life brings to everyone wrapped up in it. A social life? Yes those are unheard of for us. Those who don’t have to worry about the 5am-6pm schedule in-turn have to worry about what they are going to do with their time, who they are going to hang out with, and all the drama caught up with the social aspect of a high school career. I am so happy I have never had to worry about this.

My peers have always praised summer for its late nights and extremely late mornings. I pity them and recognize that they have it all wrong. Summer is—in reality—the opportunity to sleep into 6am rather than 4:30am, and the opportunity to go to bed before the sun has even set. Summer has an untold story, and unfortunately the other side of life will never get to know of the early mornings and early nights side of the latter.  

Now wait; before anyone gets upset, I DO recognize that sports—such as football—have two a day practices once in a while during their short reigning season. I celebrate your opportunity to practice as we do. But obviously you don’t get to do it all year round. You’re truly missing out.

Arguments can be arisen that each and everyone’s sport is better. Cheerleaders have argued that they flip more times in a day than most humans do in their entire lifetime; luckily for them they don’t have to bear the burden of that truth. They do maybe 50 flips a day consisting of handsprings and what not. Yet in an average practice session we flip around 200-300 times in order to swim from wall to wall. Us swimmers can take that false argument from you, cheerleaders, don’t worry about it.

The supposed marching band—who claim themselves as a sport—argue that no way does anyone have a larger lung capacity than the instrumentalists who have to continually blow and make sounds into their metal piece of art. They can rest assured that we swimmers can also take their false assumption out of their hands because rather than breathing in and out to blow an instrument, we can’t breathe at all. We need to hold our breath every stroke, every single underwater that takes us across the lengths of the pool; just to make it through practice. Don’t worry; you guys don’t have to worry about the publicity of that truth anymore. We will take it from you as well.

 I’ve heard baseball and football players claim that they run more than anyone excluding cross country. I mean, those short bursts of ladders and sprints must add up eventually¸ right? But it was nice of you to consider cross country in your [false premise], yet naturally you forgot to remember that swimmers run on average three miles per practice, sometimes more; both long distance—like cross country—along with ladders and sprints, like the rest of the painless world. You say you didn’t know we run? Oh yes, swimmers do both water and dryland exercises.  Understandably it probably takes more effort to focus on getting one foot in front of the other, rather than having to do the same but also having water talent to deal with as well.

I recognize the difficulties in the popular “athletic” activities. I don’t think I—personally—would ever be able to deal with the crowds of unaware fans; I mean, if I ever had someone who spectated my meet and wasn’t related to any of the people swimming, I don’t know what I’d do with that kind of fame. Nor could I ever imagine what I would do with 32 extra hours a week of pure free time. Sure a social life could be contributed to the list of options, but imagine what we would have to deal with; drama, love affairs, who hates who, and so on. I respect those who use their time for such a laboring activity.

Maybe one day, though, other fitness fellows will recognize that we doexpound our every effort into making ourselves better, contrary to popular belief. But just imagine if we wasted all of that literally precious energy trying to let the whole world know that WE are best, that WE are superior, that WE do what others can’t; because we do practice what others could never handle or dream of, and we are the most superior. Although it is true—all of these things—letting people know it would be exhausting! Arguing with the close-minded about who is the best. I could never imagine having to do that AND practice eleven times a week, the fatigue of such a task would be overwhelming! I wouldn’t be able to wake up if the weekend ever came. I’d be so tired from convincing people that I am the greatest. So rather I am just going to let people stagger around life without the truth of which sport is truly best. Because I am too busy working for what is best.