The hottest day of the summer. And that water looked so inviting.
“Come on, Luce. You can’t not swim on a day like today.”
I could, cos I couldn’t swim. And that river was deeper than me.
“Jo, grab her feet.”
No!
“Terri, her arms. Throw her in.”
NO!
But my screams didn’t save me. Into the water, glug, glug, glug, arms thrashing, feet kicking. Somehow I managed to surface, gulp air and paddle the water.
Hey, I was afloat. And I was paddling back to the bank. But why did I want the bank? I was swimming, of sorts, and this water was cool.
Not quite how I learned to swim. No one helped me, I jumped in. But the consequences played out the same
Swimming for the first time can be tough, but with determination, one becomes able to swim. Me too, I was like that.
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I was younger than Luce when I learned to swim (I’d not yet started school), but everyone else was jumping into the river, so I did, too.
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That’s so nice 👍 I learned to swim while I was on the fifth or the sixth grade.
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I tried to make sure my children could swim. Except the eldest girl just would not trust the water!
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Does she not like swimming?
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Nope. Refused to learn cos she wouldn’t trust the water… and still won’t, all these years on
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That’s great
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Thanks, Wolfgang. That’s not the real place where I learned to swim, but it is where, as a teenager, I swam with my friends
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My pleasure❤️
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🙏💖
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That’s one way to learn 😆 I thought myself to swim when I was 10 on a summer holiday every day I was in the sea until I succeeded 🤣
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Gosh, not easy to learn in the sea. Though the salt water is more buoyant, those waves can be frightening (at least on our coast they are)
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It was in Spain so much warmer too 😄
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Oh, but jelly fish?
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I never saw any 😀
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I’ve heard stories…
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My mother said I was swimming before I could walk! I’ll have to take her word for it. 😀
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It became a thing to take babies to the swimming pool
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And tossing them in! 😂
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Best way to learn
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I love that moment when Luce surfaces, gulps air and suddenly wonders why she even wants the bank anymore. Being thrown in against her screams turning into the cool joy of swimming is such a vivid little truth about how we sometimes learn 🌹
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Thank you. And I agree. Not enough words to say there were people in the water to help if she was genuinely in trouble
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If this were true, it would be horrible. To be thrown in involuntarily gives me the shudders to think of possible consequences (one would hope they would help if they saw to what extent you were struggling). However, if you really did learn by jumping in without knowing how, then kudos to you!
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I’ve never been thrown in. And it might sound sexist to say this, but that’ wa the behaviour of boys, not girls 🤪
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Thank goodness. And it would be more boys who would do this… Not sexist, realist.
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Yep!
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A very cool story. I also chose this photo
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I shall visit, shortly
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Thanks 🙏🏼
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Swimming eh? (Not for me out there by the way)
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One of the cleanest rivers in our country. And no nasty predator fishes
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A lovely story, Crispina. I, too, really wanted to learn how to swim, but I never got the chance.
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It was an essential for me. Three rivers, each of a different depth, width and size, and several flooded gravel pits, and I was exceedingly inquisitive and often roamed alone
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