Watching the Olympics reminded me of how I’ve not been athletic in my entire life.
It’s not that I didn’t try.
During the summers, I spent half the summer at my father’s house. He lived across from a country club, in fact he had permission to put in an gate that led to the clubhouse rather than having to drive several miles to the front entrance.
During those summer months, I joined the swim team. My best strokes were breast stroke and freestyle. The best I could do was come in Third Place during any competition. Of course I wanted to come in First or Second but that never happened. Except when I was five years old when I placed First in the race across the width of the Olympic-sized swimming pool. I still have the blue ribbon. What no one alive knows, except me, is that I was the only swimmer in the race! I should have won two ribbons; one for the fastest time, and one for the only kid who could swim that far at five years of age.
My home with my mom and stepfather, had a half acre pond in which I swam in all the time, with my brother and neighbor kids. Even knowing that I’d be on the swim team during the last part of summer, I didn’t practice. I just had fun putzing around, diving off the floating dock, swimming down through the warm and cold springs.
During the winter Michigan months, my stepfather would shovel an area at one end of the pond and a circular path that would serve as a racing track in the middle of the pond.
I was a lame skater, mostly because I wore my mom’s skates that were too big for me. I basically skated on my ankles. When my brother and the neighbor kids would play hockey, I tried to join in – to no avail. Total loser.
Same with baseball. Last one picked, first one stuck out.
I did play baseball in my late 20s for a bank I worked at. That’s when a ball took a bad hop and I caught it with my nose. My only broken bone, which ended my baseball career.
But like all the Olympians, I didn’t give up. I learned to row. I even trained with a team of four to enter a regatta. We met at the Long Beach Rowing Club boathouse at 5A.M. and would row the 2,000 meter course several times. To fight off the early morning chill we wore gloves and hats and scarves and then had to peel them off as we heated up. Each workout got more difficult as we near the day of the regatta. Three days before the race I came down with bronchitis. The damn bronchitis again.
I watched the race from the shore. Sad sad sad. Coughing like crazy.
Still I didn’t give up. Instead of racing, I rowed a single and paced myself with just enough speed to stay upright. Rowing was my most favorite sport. I haven’t found any sport that made so peaceful; slicing through the water, with the sun shining, alone with me, myself and I.
What’s a girl to do?…perhaps begin to row again, somewhere in Clear Lake, when I’ve kicked bronchitis’s butt!
Lucy Llewellyn Byard is currently a columnist for the Record-Bee. To contact her, email lucywgtd@gmail.com
