3 Otters & The Cold Rush

Saturday morning brought perfect swim conditions. Sunny skies and flat water. DT, Joseph and I opted for a "sight seeing swim" northbound from Madison Beach. We swam along the shoreline, under the 520 bridge, and across toward Husky Stadium.

Our turnaround point was a log platform DT knew about. We stopped there and just enjoyed the morning for a quiet while, but not before we laughed ourselves silly trying to climb up onto the slippery, rolling logs and trying to unseat one another. Drivers on the bridge could easily have mistaken us for three playful otters, instead of a trio of forty-somethings: an attorney, an accountant, and a girl who sells produce for a living.

Ran 25 minutes on the treadmill last night; my knee hurt badly until it warmed up then just thrummed along with a dull ache.

This morning we swam out to Denny Blaine -- my first time swimming the longer distance route this summer. We added a touch-and-go stop at the Cove on the return trip to get us into a more protected lie as the water was getting choppy and the boat traffic was getting thicker.

I came out of the water surprisingly cold; I waited for a few friends with my wetsuit off in the shallow end for about 10 minutes and I think it did me in. Even the heater in the car, a snuggle in bed with Mike and a hot shower have not done the trick. I'm on my second cup of coffee. I'm in fleece sweats, a long underwear top with a t-shirt over it and my penguin slippers. I've been out of the water for two hours and am still chilly and chattery. I think this is what Connor calls "the Cold Rush."

Looking forward to racing at Sasamat Wed! Hopefully I'll be warm by then!

Remembering Michael

I think the last time I thought a lot about him, I was still a P.Y.T.

I have over 500 songs loaded on my iPod, but not a single one of them is his.

As we arrived at the beach Friday morning, someone said, "Welcome to the Michael Jackson Tribute Swim."

This remark brought about a full range of reactions...people who were already tired of hearing about recent events, people whose strongest feelings about him had to do with court cases and a little boy being dangled over a balcony...while others hummed Billie Jean under their breaths and moon walked in their flip flops.

We reminisced about how old we were the first time we saw the Thriller Video. I remember being a 7th grade baby sitter, sneaking a forbidden glimpse at this new phenomenon called MTV...and being just that. Utterly Thrilled.

Like most of the good things in my life, my memories of Michael are connected to the water. Summer afternoons canoeing on Serene Lake with my best friend Tara were not complete without Thriller on the tape player that summer we were 14. What a simple, happy time that was.

I don't think I can say anything that hasn't already been said about Michael. But here is how I will remember him.

http://www.mtv.com/videos/michael-jackson/206759/man-in-the-mirror.jhtml

4 the Record

1. Road my Le Mond to work last Thur. Loved being back in the "commuter culture" though I felt awfully slow. I need to get in biker shape! My knee hurt pretty badly about 2 miles into the return trip home. Maybe my shoes/pedals are canting funny and need a tune up. Also had a (very loud!) flat on 40th Ave NE and had to walk the last few blocks home.

2. Saturday I swam at Colman pool and felt hemmed in by the lane lines. Lake swimming spoils me for just about everything -- even the outdoor, 50-meter, saltwater happiness that is the Saturday GLAD workout doesn't measure up. I left my usual lane which was crowded to join Tim who is the zennest swimmer I know. We grooved and were happy.

3. Ran 2 miles on the treadmill yesterday. After about three minutes a hot, syruppy pain exploded on the outside of my kneecap and flowed over and under it. I kept running anyway.

4. Today, as always, the Boys of Summer waited for me at the 9 minute dock. When I arrived, they were talking about the eagle that nearly buzzed Tim and Rick and me in that same spot last week. Then somone noticed that on the other side of the cable crossing, two huge eagles were sitting on somone's dock, each perched on a post and looking hungry. The unspoken thought in everyone's mind was...I don't want to go first...what if the birds think I'm a tasty morsel? As the slowest, it was my job to lead out. And I'm happy to report I held my position at the top of the food chain, but the back of the pod.

Asthmatic Amnesia

Seems weird to start a year planning to complete an Ironman and find yourself in June hoping to finish the Danskin.

Today I made a big step toward my more modest but still meaningful goal. I rode my bike outside for the first time since January. I rode for 41 minutes. 7 of them were spent climbing the long but shallow hill of 40th Ave NE. My knee was tender. I decided not to ice it afterward, thinking I'd rather not mask the ugliness if there is any. So far, it's OK.

I was surprised how bad my lungs felt. Obviously I'm not in cycling shape. I'm a recent respiratory infection survivor. Despite being fairly fit thanks to so much swimming, my lungs hated the ride more than my legs or even my hind end which hadn't come into contact with anything so painfully pointy as my sleek Selle saddle in many months.

It struck me as I arrived home that I'd neglected to take my asthma medication. Somewhere in the course of the last 6 months I forgot I even have it.

That and the noticeable reduction in stinky laundry have been a pair of silver linings.

Tomorrow brings the open water again. I've been listening to the Indigo Girls a lot this week and love these reminiscent lyrics:

I ran for miles through the suburbs of the seventies,
Pollen dust and Pixie sticks,
kissing in the deep end
Of swimming pools before I knew what's in there.

We come into this life waterlogged and tender.

More later on that.

Mermacious Marketing

Meet Chrissa. She is the American Doll Girl of the Year for 2009. The victim of a brilliant marketing concept, shamelessly priced at $95 (with a storybook about her, but without her swim team gear which will run eager-to-please parents another 24 smackers), I love and hate what she represents.

Dolls are made for cuddling (said the girl who still sleeps with a teddy bear named Tena which she received for Christmas sometime in the 1970s). We of the pre-Cabbage Patch generation get this. To spend nearly $100 in today's economy for a doll that you can't even really snuggle with is ridiculous and sad. She's made of hard plastic in some far away country; her carbon toeprint is astonishing and she's not even 10 years old yet.

That said, I think about this. Good for the American Doll people for issuing a special little girl in a swimcap (dispelling the myth that nobody is pretty wearing one). For girls of the next generation to think swimming is cool is worth a great deal. To have girls swimming laps and loving lakes, and realizing that having bigger shoulders than the boys means more than looking sexy in spaghetti straps, well, that's something.

Paradoxically, Chrissa makes me think of Livia. My friend Livia is over 85 years old. She of the Raggedy Ann generation swims 30 minutes of breastroke each and every morning, then retires to the sauna to visit with her friends before starting her day. Livia, who is originally from Latvia and experienced World War II like no one else I have ever talked to, is the heart of the 6 am hour at Green lake pool. We love her and are ever inspired by her.

While Chrissa and Livia may never meet, I believe that in their hearts, they are the same. Chrissa, and the girls who adopt her, could well be the Livias of the future. I hope so.

(S)he Remembers Being Small. Playing Under the Table and Dreaming.

This morning dawned Seattle perfect, all gray and green.

Despite the cold, I drove to the beach with the top down on my car listening to the new DMB. Despite the fact it was 6:20 on a Sunday morning, I played it loud.

I have not bought a Dave Matthews CD since Under the Table and Dreaming captured my imagination in the early 1990s. Shortly afterward came Crash and suddenly Mr. and Mrs. Suburbia were trekking to the Gorge Amphitheater in their freaking Subarus with their picnic baskets and wine coolers to hear them play...and the magic was gone.

The sad passing of saxophonist LeRoi Moore last summer got me thinking about the old sounds, and this morning I was so happy to discover that now, 10 months later, the reminiscent chords are captured on Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King in their full and beautiful glory. Moore played on some but not all of the album.

I arrived at the beach feeling Seattl-y and spiritually sated. Nice swim with Brendan, Connor, Jan and Liz to pair of pink buoys at the tennis club. In theme with the Seattle groove, we went to Starbucks after. Here is what you missed:

Tatyana -- heading on a long run
Jan -- cute new haircut and planning on a long bike ride
Liz -- going to watch the Furry 5 K at Seward Park in recognition of a canine charity she supports
Tim -- business is good in Paris and London
Connor -- expecting his second child later this summer
DT -- traveling to Dallas instead of Baltimore these days
Brendan -- planning to swim from Magnuson Park to Mercer Island in August, sans wetsuit
Joseph -- blew off coffee and was missed

Beach Party and Precious Rituals

Yesterday I swam in Lake Washington for the first time this year. The promise of a beautiful morning brought out so many swimmers, it was more like a party than a workout. My open water swim friends live in many different Seattle neighborhoods; often we don't see one another between early autumn and when the lake warms up in June. Friday brought a lovely reunion with many.

Robin, Tatyana, Ruth, Matt and I swam out to the Tennis Club buoys, while the others swam on on the Cove. Our swim was only 20 minutes each way, but a good first outing. I am still battling my tiny (but ever-improving) lung capacity, but felt especially strong on the home bound leg.

I love everything about the lake swim mornings. The body glide application, zipping your friends into their wetsuits and being zipped into yours, having unapologetic bedhead and loving everyone else's, the key-hiding rituals, the tentative steps off the beach and into the water, the colorful cap counting and buddying up...all the little things that happen before we even submerge are precious to me.

And the aftermath. The deck changes on the sidewalk while talking to your friends who are just as naked as you are under their towels and nobody cares, the speedy Starbucks drive by for a tall drip with room for cream, the funny looks from the non-swimmers (why is that girl so wet?) and the fast commute home for a hot shower and wetsuit rinse before starting the work day.

Bring on the summer. I'm going back in tomorrow.

Popsicle Stick #45

Gracious. No excuse for the radio silence from my side of the net. Oh yeah. Since I last saw you, I traveled to California and Canada, suffered for ten days from an insufferable respiratory infection, withdrew from the Ironman, and captured the summer's first hardware.

Let's skip to the good stuff.

Last weekend Bob, Liz and I left north Seattle at the precious hour of 4 am, pointing the car toward Forest Grove, Oregon, home of the Hagg Lake Open Water Races. I think only swimmers can be happy road trippers at that hour, and certainly we were.

Hagg Lake is hosted by the Gecko Tri Club, which did a great job of putting together the event, which included 800 M, 2 K and 4 K races. It was a perfect day -- warm, sunny skies, comfortable lake temperature and upbeat vibe.

I had hoped to swim all three races, but was still recovering from the creeping crud (above). So I decided to enter the 2 K, thinking it might be fun but not fatal. My goal was to break 30 minutes. The first 10 of them were pretty tough...my lungs were weak from being so sick and my body just wasn't used to moving fast. After rounding the second buoy, though, I started to feel good...overtaking a few folks and getting into rhythm. When I came out of the water at :27.40 I was surprised. I was handed a popsicle stick with "#45" on it. That meant I was 45th out of the water...OH NO...was I really that far behind everyone? I looked over my shoulder and saw that at least some of "everyone" was still in the water. Lots of them, in fact. In the end, being 45th overall translated to 10th among women and second for women over 40. Not bad for a first outing.

The best part was being greeted by Kim, Scott, Jake and Matthew in the finish chute.

Tomorrow morning, a big group of open water swim friends are braving Lake Washington off Madison Park. The King County Web site says the water temperature is 69 degrees. It's been a warm couple of weeks, but I'll have to swim it to believe it. I can't wait!