‘Young at Heart’

I suddenly realised that my pledge to swim 1000 lengths with Swimathon, to raise funds for Marie Curie Nursing has been rather neglected over the last few weeks- though a combination of factors (not least of which is the garden) – and that in order to complete the self-imposed challenge I have to get a wiggle on.
Yesterday evening I added up the lengths I had done: only 190 lengths and I only have until 10th April. So my plan was to swim today and do 110 lengths, thereby making the total up to 300 so far. Then I’ll be nearly a third of the way there….
However yesterday, in the garden, I bashed myself while trying to remove ivy from the apple tree and woke up with a stiff right hand. I have a quail’s egg sized lump on the outside of my hand and a stiffness and discomfort in my middle finger.

“Swim one handed,” said Scout, cheerfully, as he left the house for school this morning. “That won’t work though,” he said, poking his head back around the kitchen door, “unless you swim in circles.”

I don’t think swimming in circles will do it.

One of the problems of this pledge is finding an appropriate time to fit in the swimming – and as I work three days a week and the general public sessions are rather crowded and full of smaller swimmers of the ‘non-specific direction’ kind AND I had promised myself that the evening slots were not compulsory this year, that leaves Monday and Thursday lunchtime.
However I discovered something last week, on Thursday lunchtime when I swam at the local pool.

Now I am ‘over 50′ rather shockingly I can swim in the ‘OAP / disabled’ sessions, and on a Thursday afternoon there is a three hour slot which I shall try this week. My fear is it will be full of slower, head-up, flowery-hatted females who have come for a chat rather than a swim…
but as long as there’s a lane free for me to plough up and down, maybe I shall make my 1000 lengths before the dawn of 11th April?

Today at the pool I discovered the key phrase I need to get in with a reduced ticket price is ‘young at heart’ – so here I am back from the pool, collapsed in the chair and not particularly feeling ‘young at heart’ – but at least I have now reached 300 lengths.