I love to swim, and I am a very good swimmer. The whole family is the same, there’s not a one of us that isn’t happiest in the water, no matter what kind of water it is. We’re strong and confident in and on the water.
Several years ago I was on a trip to Mexico with my mother and I went down to the beach for a swim. I went by myself, though there were lots of people around, though none of them were a lifeguard. This didn’t bother me because… see above. I swam out and made my way through the shorebreak, the spot where the waves are dumping and breaking near the shore – and started to swim along. Next – to be honest I’m not sure what happened next, except that I broke a rule (never turn your back on the sea) and a huge wave I didn’t see coming broke right on top of me as I was coming up for a breath. It shoved me under the water and rolled me around a bit, and then released me and I popped and grabbed another breath as another big one broke on top of me again. This one pushed me way down under the water and then I could feel it pulling me fiercely, pulling me away from the shore. I didn’t panic because I am indeed strong and confident in the water, and besides letting the ocean have its way with you is usually safer than fighting, and when I popped up again I could see that I was in deeper than before.
“Crap” I thought to myself, just as another wave the size of a Subaru smashed me under and dragged me further out again. I came up, took a deep breath and wham – under again. As the water pulled me down and under, I started to realize I could be in trouble, and that I needed to figure a way out of this in a really big hurry. I reached for the surface and didn’t find it, and in that moment I remember thinking really, really calmly “Oh wow, I think I’m drowning.”
I didn’t. I mean, obviously since I’m writing this to you now, but it was a near thing, and I only got out of it because I saw what was happening and right away used every self-rescue technique I have ever known. I let the ocean take me for as long as I needed to in order to get control, I took a breath when I was able, I didn’t fight the current and I rested floating on my back whenever I could, and I slowly made my way sideways across the current and waves until I was finally able to wade up on the shore where I sat exhausted on the beach and goggled at how near a miss it had been. If I’d have lost my cool I… well. I wouldn’t be writing about it.
Another story about the ocean. My sister and I were in the ocean, playing around and swimming, and my mum was making her way into the water. She waded in where the waves were small, then deeper and deeper and the waves grew bigger, and mum gave a little hop with each one to keep it from bashing her about. She was about that deep, maybe hip deep when she got distracted by something on the shore, I can’t remember what it was. Mum was standing there, hands on her hips, looking off along the shoreline, and Erin and I suddenly saw a mammoth wave headed right for her. We started waving and shouting and finally got her attention just as the wave reached her. Mum turned to see us madly waving our arms in the air shouting “Wave! WAVE!” and at that exact moment, it crashed into her. Suddenly Mum is gone and all we can see is a jumble of limbs. The wave tumbles her under and over and into the bottom and we see an arm go by, and then a leg, and then the wave starts to recede and mum stands up, bedraggled, soaked, covered in sand, and most spectacularly – the wave has rolled her strapless bathing suit clear to her waist.
Mum staggers for a second, then reaches a hand up to smooth her hair, and completely unaware that she’s absolutely topless – gathers herself to her full height (5’1″) whacks a smile on her face and calmly shouts to us “It’s all right, I’m just fine.”
For most of the pandemic (and more properly, since Charlotte’s death, though the two things happened at the same time and are hard to separate for us) I have been like my mum, I think. Standing there bashed up after every wave, but on the whole cheerfully ready to go on. These last few months though – I don’t know what happened, but I woke up one morning and realized that if I wasn’t didn’t immediately do something I was going to drown.
The anniversary of Charlotte’s birth and death were upon us, and any way you want to slice it it has been a very, very long winter. Joe’s broken arm (still not quite healed and driving us both mad) has meant that anything we’ve tried to do has been frustrating or difficult (and most of the time both) and this last wave(s) of the pandemic really got me down. It was hard enough when we were all in this together, but this phase where low-risk people charge about having parties and vacations while vulnerable people stay home and hope for the best has been the wave where I can see we’re not all in this together anymore. (Also, low-risk people treating high risk people like they are bananas is super not helpful so please quit that.) I can’t stress enough that I haven’t been drowning these last weeks, I just saw the big waves headed for me and decided to do whatever it took to keep my head above water.
I have knit a lot over the last while. I’ve cried quite a bit too – though it is unlike me. Mostly, I practiced a lot of self-rescue techniques. I’ve rested when I needed to, I’ve let the ocean take me when it must, I’ve grabbed a breath when I’m able, and all of this has helped keep me well afloat – just sort of tired, with a lot of yarn lying around.
I’ll try and show you a bunch of knitting over the next bit but let’s start here. Elliot in his birthday sweater -a whole five years old. (The kid, not the sweater.)
Sweater pattern is the always reliable Flax Light, and the yarn’s Targhee/Nylon Sock in “Electric Heel” from Indigodragonfly. (This was from a SQWID box a while back, but they’re always doing more.)
Meg and I knit some shawls too, and show you those – for now, consider this post the internet equivalent of proof of life- me flailing by, all arms and legs in a crashing wave of the ocean, and then coming up topless.