Dawn swimming
When I was a kid, I used to go swimming every week at our local swimming baths (as we called it then, rather than ‘swimming pool’). It was a lovely Victorian building1, with the original tiles, a cast iron turnstile that could stop a charging rhino (handy for all those occasions on which a rhino is desperate to get in for a swim without paying), but rather short on modern conveniences like footbaths or a metric length. I loved swimming. I wasn’t fast or particularly stylish, but I could plod up and down for hours very happily. In fact, I spent most of the time swimming underwater, loving the feeling of exploring another world.
I’ve got quite long eyelashes, and the water on my lashes generated rainbows from the lights whenever I blinked. And I must be the only person in the world who actually likes the smell and taste of chlorine. This is a slightly shameful confession, but after I’d been swimming, I used to secretly lick my own arm, because I liked the faint residual taste of chlorine. I don’t do that now, of course…
I have started going swimming recently at the University, though, and I love my dawn swims before work, watching the rainbows burst from the lights.
1 Unfortunately, the baths were demolished many years ago to make way for an office building. â
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Well, I must say you are not the only one who likes the smell of Chlorine. I don't particularly like the taste, but the smell certainly triggers memories whenever I walk by a swimming pool. In fact, in the last few months I've gone back to swimming, after quite a few years of not doing so...----- Ick.
Chlorine was (is?) rank, and I always ended up swallowing gallons of the stuff, principally because I was not only a crap swimmer, but could never hold my breath very well under water. Oh, and I forgot to breathe at the right moment when doing that swimming manoeuvre that involved turning your head left, then right.
It wasn't long before I pulled every stunt in the book to avoid swimming lessons.
by Skytower @ 11/01/2006 12:02 am • Permalink •
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Swimming was a popular past time in the 1950s, outside lavatories were still common, as were no or shared bathrooms in rented accommodation. Long before the appearance of a certain booted bear, we used to swim at Porchester Hall Baths in the Paddington area of London; the "Baths" referred to the many cubicles housing individual baths at 1/- a time. Swimming combine fun excercise and ablution at one and the same time! My Father, to keep us quiet, told us he'd pay 1d (Less than half a New Penny) for every length we could swim without stopping, before disappearing to the pub. By the time he returned, I had swum 72 of the 25 yard lengths, 1800 metres in new money, quite a distance for a 9 year old. Of course, I failed to realise that this made me a "Professional" sporstman, so I then innocently spent the following 10 years illegaly taking part in amateur sport!
by Jonathan Briggs @ 11/01/2006 10:01 pm • Permalink •
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When are we going to read the bit about Dawn and what she did when she went swimming? Perhaps we are in the world of "Beep - syntax error". I trust your Dissertation was written with more regard for the correct usage of the English language!*
by Jonathan Briggs @ 11/01/2006 10:02 pm • Permalink •
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JJC: It's quite a memory trigger isn't it?
Skytower: Well, maybe not in such big doses...
Jonathan Briggs: Thank you, Mr. Pedant.
Actually, the title was for the REM fans, after their song 'Nightswimming'. I used to do sponsored swims for the Heart Foundation, which were either 2 miles or 1 mile (I can't remember which). That was quite a few lengths for a young kid.
by bsag @ 12/01/2006 7:01 pm • Permalink •
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