long-distance swimmer

Be not the slave of your own past
Plunge into the sublime seas, 
dive deep, 
and swim far, 
so you shall come back 
with self-respect, 
with new power, 
with an advanced experience, 
that shall explain and overlook the old. 
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

This quote was introduced to me by Mary Engelbreit, who illustrated it for her now no-more magazine.  Why is this not better known?  It certainly spoke loudly & clearly, from the first moment I saw the graceful figured poised for her dive.

It's not just true for me.  It's true for all.  

Ask any long-distance swimmer if it's easy.  No how, no way.  But it can be wondrous.  Ask Sydne Didier, who loves long-distance swimming.  

To the multitude of people who back away from a little reflection & detachment, that's the woman I point to.  Hey, as a child, Didier didn't even like swimming - she did everything she could to get out of lessons!  Nope - she didn't start until she was 26, learning her first swimming strokes in a beginners class.

At 43, she's not exactly a spring chicken, but she competes in long-distance, open-water swimming races.  Last month, she took 2nd place at the Lake Zurich Marathon Swim in Switzerland, in the women 40 years & older bracket.  She swam 26.4-kilometer race (16.4 miles), across a beautiful lake with a backdrop of the Alps.  Didier, who was flanked by two English swimmers in the standings, was the only swimmer from the western hemisphere.  

Long-distance swimming is never about pleasure, but digging deep to discover depths you didn't know existed.  You just hang on, even when you question yourself & your stamina for the task.  

 







As Didier said in a recent interview with the Boston Herald (she lives in Amherst),  "There was a point where I thought my shoulder wasn't going to let me finish.  There's always a point where you think, 'This is so stupid, why am I doing this?' Every race, that (thought) comes."  

Didier mentions something I discovered about my own long-distance swim toward a new sense that could "explain & overlook the old" - it's a team sport.  She couldn't get there without her husband & her now 13-years old son, who kayak alongside her throughout the race, monitoring encouraging sustaining her strength & courage. 

She had her John & son & a host of invisible supporters, all keeping her going across keep the majestic, 70 degrees (F) lake.  I have my John, paddling alongside me, & my own host of ever-with-me boosters.

My John is an ideal support, one of a long line of coaches, mentors & role models who were with me on my long swim out out out & then all the way back.  

Unlike long-distance running or cycling, long-distance swimming - in the very moment it is happening - is NOT a solitary endeavor;  Sydne's son & husband were alongside her the whole way.  And there's another crucial difference between swimming & the other two sports - cyclists & runners bike & run through terrain that gives some sort of a sense of placement;  swimmers stroke & kick their way through placeless, timeless water.  I am sure that each lake, river & ocean is different, but each still embodies a certain sense of...  nothingness missing in the other sports.  

A comment by Didier's husband, John Urschel, reflects back to that - "From a kayaker's perspective, it's incredibly quiet. It's more physical cues."  

When my John is at his best as my primary life coach, he's picking up on the unspoken cues, how I'm holding my shoulders or my tone, on some intangible whatever that only someone who truly loves can spot.  

I needed Sydne Didier in my life.  Her hubster notes, "She does not give up. If she starts something, she finishes it."  That is the flip side of my old life pattern, which was enjoying all the zest of a new idea, the energy of a fresh endeavor, but flagging & failing to follow through when it came to the grunt work needed to turn it from concept to reality.  She didn't win 2nd place by jumping in the water on that day, but by doing that every day.  Which is no small thing in frosty, frozen New England.

Sydne Didier didn't let Mother Nature be an adversary.  She & her husband built an indoor lap pool behind their Massachusetts farm house (in spite of friends who asked, "Haven't you seen your kitchen?")  It is spare, but elegant, form & function tied to beauty - no surprise, as Sydne is a designer.  We all need to figure out what/who are the adversaries on our long swim & find our own ways to get around them.  We're doubly blessed when the solutions can be as elegantly functional as Sydne's!

 

As she wrote in a blog post (which I couldn't, alas, locate) about the race, it was good ol' mind over matter that got her through. (Arrgghhh!  Visualization  - something I've never mastered.  Time to give it another go.)  She envisioned herself at the finish line, she'd feel if she traveled all that distance, swam almost miles, only to fall short - then have to share that with everyone back home. 

Experienced a twinge of recognition reading about her passion for open-water swimming.  Her husband says it allows swimmers  to "swim for themselves."  They can be in a field of 100 other swimmers & still be alone.  I know that feeling.  It's lovely to see it expressed in such a positive way.

It's my experience that the most remarkable things show up just when they can be appreciated.  About ten years back, it was Mary Engelbreit's illustration of an unknown Emerson quote.  Today, it's discovering the long-distance swimming of Sydne Didier, a woman who embodies so many of the awesome dynamics I'm facing in my own here & now life. It wasn't until I was 24 that it became clear how little in understood the basic stroke-work & kicks needed to get into life's swim, took a variety of coaches in different areas to get me headed in a better direction,  required a master coach to help me put it all together.  But when it comes down to it & I am out in that open water of fresh endeavors & bold new directions, it comes down to - in a good way - me, by myself, working my way through whatever waters surround me, keeping at it to the finish line.