Louisa Simmonds

Dear Person Who Cannot Read/Swim,

As a staunch supporter of community public services, I have commandeered myself to remind you of the swimming etiquette in our local public pools. For while the lifeguards are confident to chat for hours with Kardashian-esque 20-30 year old, svelte swimmers in itsy-bitsy bikinis  erect signs with suggested swimming styles/speeds for each lane, they do not see it as part of their job description to enforce them.

The pool is a wonderful local facility and one in which everyone is encouraged to swim. Note my use of the verb ‘swim’ here, because that is the aim of the majority of members that come to the pool.

Understandably though – and please believe me when I say that I am as inclusive as the next person – some people prefer to thrash about like idiots/frolic/and generally act like they’ve never seen water before, and that is why the recreational lane is kindly donated for them in which to express themselves.

Fortunately, this leaves another four or five lanes for the serious ‘swimmers’. These are allocated fairly, to accommodate every level of swimming ability, from the slowest, most painful creepers, to the Porsches of the swimming world. That is why the boards state respectively, ‘slow lane’, ‘medium lane’ and ‘fast lane’.

Allow me to explain this more coherently:

If you cannot swim at all, or walk faster than you swim, are heavily pregnant, have mastered no other stroke than a doggy paddle, like to jiggle around embarrassingly to music in water or prefer to walk in the water because some hippy yoga teacher called Bluebell told you that this counts as exercise, you belong in the slow lane.

If you suspect that you are an average swimmer, which means that you don’t need an inhaler to breast stroke or the aid of flippers or snorkel, you can reach the other end without stopping, have acquired some breathing technique and swim much faster than the swimmers that bottle-neck in the slow lane, you may promote yourself to the medium lane.

Unless:

The fast lane is as busy as the motorway to Mecca for the Hajj, causing the slower swimmers to hold up the roadrunners, who, (because they are familiar with swimming etiquette), have given way sulkily majestically and retrenched back into the medium lane. In that situation, you get back in the fucking slow lane with the kids and learners. News to you, I know, but it is indeed possible to switch lanes.

And so finally to the fast lane (sigh). On no account do you dip your toe in this holy water, unless: your body is as ripped as Michael Phelps and you possess the aquatic capabilities of the Man From Atlantis; you mastered not only free-style as a new-born, (even the breathing), you don’t splutter when water fills your goggles or gets up your nose, and you have the bionic speed to match the statement created by your bulging, white, G-string Speedos with matching swim cap; you also do a pretty good impression of the ‘butterfly’ stroke and have never second-guessed why it was invented or how silly it looks).

Yours faithfully,

Louisa Simmonds

#community #swimming #Health #Swimmingpool #Humor #fitness