Still Searching

All alone with no one to push me. Randy has a job.

Monday morning, after a copious amount of coffee drinking and cat petting, I decided to get off my hinder parts and head to the pond. My dilemma had been between pool and pond. Pond won.

The water was a brisk 71 and my running shoes were at home since I had decided to focus only on swimming. I did 3+ laps (2.58 miles) before crawling out the first time for nutrition. Surprisingly, with the wind, I was a bit chilled in the open air while I ate a banana, nibbled on some nabs, and slurped some water. That awful smell of old but still rotting flesh, from a big fish die off a month ago, was semi-nauseating. The commercial fish pond of the Mississippi delta is a bundle of contradictions, a liquid oxymoron. Their beauty and ugliness, their tameness and wildness, their safeness and danger serve to give them a strange attraction to me and maybe one other person on earth. That would be the very tall Randal Beets, adventurer extraordinaire. He is the only person I know whom I can call and say, "Let's go swim a fish pond," and instead of saying, "Are you crazy?" he will simply ask, "What time?"

But I was alone as I sat in my little folding chair and breathed in the fresh air tinged with the odor of decaying flesh. Death and life were everywhere. Pelicans soured high in the sky above while their dead brothers decorated the sides of the ponds. Buzzards circled above and beautful doves darted through the air at amazing speeds as if dodging a hunter's aim. Live fish turned the water, but when I walked I carefully pranced around the ubiquitous bones of dead ones.

I crawled back in for another 3+ laps and climbed out an hour and twenty minutes later with 5.1 miles showing on my Garmin GPS watch. This time I ate a Cliff's Bar and a handful of peanuts because it was past lunch time and my stomach was beginning to feel like it was eating itself. For swim number three, I did two of a planned three laps and got out because of a growing tightness in my shoulders, especially the right one. I did some stretching and was trying to screw up my nerve to get back in the water when I checked my phone and saw an email from my wife. She was at the ER with her mom. Swim over.

For the day I got in 6.6 miles (10,619.4 meters). Not bad, but still not the monster I have been seeking. Although I tired some, I did have some muscular endurance left, but the shoulder tightness was troubling. Maybe I am overly pessimistic about injury. One reason I am primarily a swimmer today instead of a runner is I stay healthy as a swimmer but I'm always injured as a runner. And the only swimming injury I ever had was to the right shoulder in the exact spot I felt the growing tightness. I know if I get hit with that again, it is game up. When I got home, my wife texted me not to come to the hospital so I did a little run, 2.56 miles, and then worked in the yard for a couple of hours. I had little trouble sleeping that  night.

Tuesday morning I started slowly once more, but I was in the water at Twin Rivers by 9:30. I swam

2,100 straight and easy in 40:15
100 kick with Zoomers
5 X 200 @ 4:00
100 kick with Zoomers
6 X 150 @ 3:00
100 kick with Zoomers
8 X 100 @ 2:00 with medium paddles
300 easy
Total: 5,400 meters.

I was amazingly strong considering I swam 6.6 miles the day before and was troubled that day over shoulder tightness. Tuesday I was troubled over nothing. Everything was strong and healthy feeling and I was able to pretend speed, at least in my own mind. After lunch, I ran a bunch of errands and followed them up with a 3.05 mile run. Now I ponder tomorrow. Pond of pool? That is the question. If I know me, I'll answer my conundrum over a cup of coffee or three with Luvie purring softly against my leg. I can't wait.