Overcome

Who says that you can't have a swim meet during a pandemic? Not the Strathmore Bel Pre Dolphins, I tell you what. Yesterday, our team pulled off a socially distant, mask-wearing, sanitize-everything-in-sight, swim-in-shifts honest-to-God swim meet, and it was amazing. 

Dolphins' backstroke flags through
the business end of a clipboard. 

Late in May, when it looked like pools might remain closed all summer, I tried to remember my older son's last race of 2019. It might have been his last swim race ever, and I couldn't remember it. If I'd known at the time that it could have been his last race, I'd have remembered every detail. But I couldn't even remember the event. 50 backstroke? 100 IM? No idea. His swim career was likely over and I couldn't remember his last swim.  

*****

But we had a plan. Our team decided that if the pool opened, we would have a swim season, one way or another, hell or high water. Even if we had to compete against ourselves, even if we had only one meet, even if the league canceled the season, we were going to do something. Most of the local summer leagues actually did cancel their seasons. Ours did not. Half of the teams wanted to hold a season, so the league quickly rearranged divisions, and we came up with a plan for virtual meets. Each team would swim at its own pool, and the coaches would then exchange times to determine a score. 

But our county is also enforcing a 50-person limit for gatherings, and a swim meet is nothing if not a gathering. Even with half of the normal number of people on deck, we would still have been well over that limit. So we broke it down even further, with three separate sessions by age group. If you know anything about scoring and order of events in the Prince Mont Swim League, then you know that this took some doing. And we figured it out. By "we," of course, I mean people who are smarter and better organized than I. 

*****

It was nice to be up and out first thing on a Saturday morning in July, My kids left the house at 6:50 and I followed about 15 minutes later. Music was playing when I arrived at the pool, and parents were singing along with Van Morrison. I didn't start to cry until I tried to sing "Saw you just the other day / My, how you have grown." It's been so long. I hadn't seen some of these beautiful kids in months, and my how they have grown. I'm overcome just thinking about it. 

******

I forgot how much I love watching my sons swim until I saw my oldest step up for the first race of the morning. He wasn't as fast as usual. None of them are. Practices are shorter and less frequent, and they are all a little out of shape. But they still swam a great race and the cheers were almost as loud as ever, even with so few people on deck, and even with masks muffling the sound. 

This really is my son's last year of swimming. He ages out this summer, and that's it. We have three more meets, and I'll be watching every race. I won't miss anything, and I won't forget.