Reclaiming the Water

I must be crazy.  All my kids are asleep, and I'm up blogging at 5 a.m.
Like Christmas morning...I couldn't go back to sleep.
Eyes bing awake, and I just want to get up. See what's out there.

I went back to the pool on Monday.  I haven't swam for about 9 months.  Lydia tells me  it will make my arms too big, and I should stay away from the pool.
"But it makes me feel alive every time I finish a mile swim,  I'm good at it"  Tiny Sarah voice says.

"Is that what you want?  Huge-manly arms?  Cuz that's what you'll get if you start swimming again.  It's not gonna make you skinny.  It's just gonna make you bulky.  In fact, maybe you should just stop exercising all together.  Be like those girls who live off pop-tarts and don't exercise at all.  Then you won't have so much muscle.  Besides, you're not that good at it,"  Lydia echoes in my head.
We are riding in the mini-van down to the rec center.
I am going anyway.

In the locker room I feel enormous.  I put on my swimming suit.  My old pregnant suit.  A tankini.  I look in the mirror.  My baby pocket of a belly pooches out between the top and bottom.  I try to suck it in, but it won't be hidden.  My hips bulge out the sides of the french cut bikini bottoms.  My nursing breasts are far from Baywatch.  I always wear mis-matched suits from the D.I. cuz I wear through them so fast. My ensemble is not cute.  I look like I went rummaging through the lost and found because I left my real suit at home.
My hair is a greasy, grown out A-line.
This is me.
 I take a deep breath.
This is me.

I go out to the pool.  My legs are tree-trunks.  No one knows I just had a baby.  They think this is me.  It is me, and "they" think nothing of it.  The ping pong match - It Matters vs. It Doesn't Matter.

I sit on the edge, dangle my feet into the water as I've done 1,000's of times.
Scoop hair up into cap, and suction goggles onto face, deep breath and I submerge my whole body.
I swim a mile without stopping.  "Just don't stop no matter what"....this has been my mantra.
In the water, I am strong.  No one is watching.  It is only me and the water dripping from fingers tips each time I turn my head to breath...and breath...and breath.