Swim Caps: A Short Story

In the bland little suburb where I grew up, the planners had seen fit to install Olympic-sized swimming pools every 20 blocks or so. As in many such places, they also saw fit to compose a broadsheet's worth of rules for proper conduct. None of them made any sense. One was "No suntan lotions or oils in the water." In today's sunscreen-obsessed culture, that one certainly wouldn't go over very well; I doubt it did even back in the mid-1960s. The lifeguards could be shits when they wanted to be, but most of the time, as long as they had other lifeguards to flirt with, they didn't much care what you did once you got past the Gatekeeper, who checked to see that your pool tag was current and listed in the master database, and that you had an actual swimsuit on (she made you strip off your outer clothing so she could check). She, too, was a shit, but she had no one to flirt with, you see.

One of the rules everyone remembers was (and I am quoting accurately here): "All females must wear swim caps while in the water."

That was fine, up until about 1969 or so. Then, of course, the entire world turned upside down and "our boys" started growing their hair long, like "those hippies."

Immediately, a controversy ensued. If girls (even with very short hair) had to wear swim caps in the water, then long-haired guys should have to, as well. The purpose of the rule was to prevent long strands of hair from clogging the filters.

I'm sure the Pillars of the Community would have really preferred simply to ban those dope-smokin' war-protestin' hippieboys from even entering the pool enclosure, but that was not to be. In the spirit of fairness, the rule was amended to read "All persons with hair over 3" in length must wear a swim cap while in the water."

I heard tell of one young man who chose to comply with this rule, but he disappeared the next day and was never seen again.

By 1975 or so, there was no longer any swim cap rule at our local pools.

And the persons rejoiced.
Click Here to Read More..

Dad

I can't possibly be the only one who engages in light fantasizing while listening to the NPR interview show Fresh Air.

Drew Barrymore was on today (a rerun from April) and I found myself silently responding to some of Terry Gross's questions as though they were directed at me.

I think the best thing about Terry's interview style is the open-endedness of her questions. She invites the interviewee to ramble wherever their mind wishes to go, and that results in some thought-provoking answers.

In the course of my own mental wanderings, I sometimes answer a question and discover some interesting new things about myself.

Today, I found myself describing my father, and how my upbringing was influenced by his worldview.

I've been aware, for a long time, that he desperately wished for me to grow up utterly protected and sheltered from all of life's realities, especially money and sex. To a degree, it worked, because I didn't leave home until age 22, and that somewhat naive, suburban part of me still lives on rather too strongly.

But today I thought about him a little more and came to some new conclusions.

To sum up, everything that made my father the least bit edgy, and brought some depth to his biography, he steadfastly disavowed. He was ashamed of ALL of it. This was a man who never broke a law in his life (except for one DUI when he was 60). He thought he was deeply unworthy, and wanted everything in my life to reflect some idealized opposite of the way he saw his life.

He rejected:

• being Jewish
• being the 1st generation of his family born in the US
• growing up on the streets of Brooklyn
• having a stepmother and some half-siblings
• dropping out of high school and going out on the road to make his fortune as a musician
• traveling through Europe with the Army band
• working for a company that distributed records to jukeboxes

To me, these sound like elements of a pretty decent novel. But my father either didn't want to discuss certain aspects of his life, or he would simply dismiss them, with a grimace and a wave of his hand, as being one of the many things that he thought made him inferior. And any time I showed signs of resembling him in any way (such as having problems with math), he would get downright frantic. Any time I expressed interest in having my life go a different way than what he had orchestrated (wanting to live in Manhattan, for example), the reaction was similar. I was dismissed as a fool, who didn't "understand what the world was like."

I've seen similar characteristics of others from his generation. That sense of shame; the resorting to silence. His was, I think, the secret-keepinest bunch of people who ever populated the modern age. Put up, shut up, ignore it and it'll hopefully go away. Click Here to Read More..

No Identity Issues Here

I just received an e-mail from someone asking if I'm the same Volly who has a Christian book site.

~Cringe~

No -- I use this name only on this blog, and as a commenter on others. That's it. I do have a gallery of pseudonyms on LiveJournal, MySpace, Facebook (actually, I use my real name there), Twitter and a local message forum, not to mention Yahoo, Google, Hotmail and AT&T e-mail. All different, and rarely overlapping.

I tested it, though -- typed "Volly blog" into the Google search engine, and the "real me" didn't appear until page 6, with my Blogger profile.

That's the name, and I try not to wear it out... Click Here to Read More..

Recommended

Somewhere in my travels through the Googleverse, I discovered techrepublic.com.

If you're not familiar, check it out. Developers and computer non-geeks alike can benefit from its wide range of articles. Everything from the most in-demand tech careers to the best way to format an Excel spreadsheet to new Firefox add-ons to tips for dealing with clueless IT department managers, and beyond. It has downloadable .pdf's, the best of which is the regular "10 things" feature.

If you use a computer (and if you've got a blog...) this site will help you -- probably within the next week. Click Here to Read More..

Ranting Again

Not long ago, I got all ranty about commonly misused words and phrases, and it felt good. So I've found another target.

A bunch of people form a group with a common goal. Do they:

a. Ban together,
or
b. Band together?

The answer is b. This is pretty straightforward. They're like a "band" of brothers, or if you prefer graphic imagery, they are held together cohesively, as though with a rubber band.

Snap.

The problem starts when the past tense rears its ugly head. Then people get all confused and start saying "We banned together to get a stop sign put up on the corner."

Um, no....

You banded together.

I think the mix-up comes from two possible sources.

First, remember when you were a little kid and you excitedly told your mother what you heard from some other little kid, about an accident at the pool? C'mon, you remember the conversation. You told Mom "Some kid drownded at the pool."

Everybody says "drownded" the first time. And everybody gets corrected - the present tense is drown, and the past tense is drowned. So deep in our subconscious, we retain the "lesson" that one never uses a word that ends in "nded." Unless it's the word ended, which still (oh, go on, admit it, you'll feel better) makes you slightly nervous.

Another unacknowledged factor that leads to the misuse of band and banded is the context. You and that bunch of people are getting together to -- what? Okay, maybe you want that stop sign put in. Maybe you're circulating a petition to end the war. But in at least fifty percent of the cases where people band together, they are working to ban something or cajole the government into having something banned.

"We banded together and the City Council banned smoking in the park."

Yikes!

Maybe we should forget about banding together and just gang up on the local politicos.

Probably get faster results that way... Click Here to Read More..

Massaaaaage...Wonndaful.

It's been about 16 years since my last massage. I don't know why, just as I don't know why it took me so long to hit the gym and the riverwalk. But there it is. Time slips by, and you're left with a bad case of "WTF?"

Evidently, my body was quite unused to being used; shortly after my first two workouts, things started knotting up badly. If it wasn't my lower back and right hip complaining, it was my neck, right shoulder and right arm, suddenly taking major exception to my days spent mostly on the computer with mouse in hand. I persevered two more times at the gym, but couldn't get beyond one mile on the treadmill and feared an unexpected twinge that might cause me to fall or stumble and embarrass myself. Wednesday I skipped a night, and yesterday I asked my doctor to recommend a massage therapist. I got an appointment for mid-morning, which meant I got to sleep in a little.

It was nice having today off; the timing couldn't have been better. A 30-minute massage was within my means (this week). The process was uncomplicated, and I'm so glad I did it. When I got out of there, I felt floaty, but noticed that my driving reflexes were just as good as ever, if not better.

The therapist said it took at least half the session to work through the surface tension in my shoulders. She strongly recommended coming back for at least one 1-hour session, or weekly half-hour sessions. I can't do that just now, but will certainly not let another 16 years go by before the next one. I'm hoping to be able to get in at least one 30-minute session per month going forward.

Meanwhile, my sister-in-law Yolanda has been volunteering as a test case in the healing touch method. She's just as much of a skeptic as I am, but has been fairly impressed with the results. Before she even told me about what she's been doing, I noticed a distinct difference in her speech over the phone. Typically, her speech is rambling, scattered and disorganized, and it's sometimes a chore to converse with her. She will repeat the same idea several times in a row, attempting to summon just the right words. There are long gaps between words and sentences, as though she goes away for awhile, making it necessary to wait. If you cut in, she "loses her place" and starts over. She's suffered at least one small stroke. But this afternoon, she sounded very present, with a cohesiveness I hadn't heard from her in awhile. I think the healing touch therapy is beneficial to her, and for one simple reason, having nothing to do with chakras, vibrations or any other kind of woo-woo. It's the fact that she is in a room with one person, getting their undivided attention and interest. She's had a few failed relationships; she's been alone for awhile and tends to get her relationship needs met by spending her time with couples. She often complains about being the third wheel. So it must be nice to experience caring touch and a listening ear. I have no doubt that alternative therapies work, for this reason. And as long as it doesn't cause the user to part with ridiculous amounts of money that enrich the "therapist," or to get drawn into a cult or isolated from their normal life, it can only help. It's a stressful world out there. Trying to tough it out alone doesn't generally accomplish much.

Note: Just in case anyone wonders about the title of this post, it is a direct quote from an enterprising gentleman who greeted my son and me at the entrance to a NYC subway back in the summer of 2000, when we lived there. Good price, too: "Ten dolla." Click Here to Read More..

Moving Day

No, not moving as in boxes & bubble wrap - moving as in not allowing my body to sit in a chair in front of the computer all day.

I'm SO sedentary, it's not funny. I need to lose somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 lbs. My diet is reasonably good, and changing it has only yielded temporary improvement. What I need to do is exercise. But I don't. Probably my most active years (true for most Americans, I think) were from birth through about 13. My parents wanted me home & safe, so they installed a swing set in the back yard, and a succession of swimming pools. We had a very large above-ground pool with a rim you could walk around, and a slide, and it was used for at least three years. When we took it down, I was still walking the mile or so to school most days, and it was easy to walk to local stores. But once I got that driver's license, I lost most incentive to walk, and the pounds started to creep on. After childbirth and gallbladder surgery, the gain was steady. Now, more than ever, I'm feeling the multiple effects of being too heavy. Sleep apnea; acid reflux; fallen arches; general achiness and lethargy because my frame is simply bearing too much. Not to mention the frustration of trying to shop for clothes. And the interesting thing is, while so many women have body dysmorphic disorder, in which they are not terribly overweight but visualize themselves that way, my problem is the opposite. I'm always surprised when I look in the mirror and see my "wide-load" self, because in my head, I'm still that rather stringy-looking individual I was for so many years.

But today I resolved to get moving. The local park has a fitness center that costs only a dollar to get into. It's pretty basic, but pleasant, and the only requirement is that you wear gym shoes. "No work boots or sandals" the sign says; I can only imagine some people thinking they can use an elliptical machine wearing work boots...

I got on the treadmill and did 2 miles. About half of that was at 3 mph or slightly above. For any lower speed, I raised the incline to about 4 degrees. It really felt good. I used to do 10K's, but a few years ago, tried a 5K and came in second to last. Humiliating. So I have plenty of incentive to work out, and the fitness center is open until 8pm, so I can go there right after work. Tomorrow I'm skipping church and doing some walking along a local trail. If I'm such a "morning person," I might as well put that to some use.

One of my co-workers has lost a fair amount of weight over the last several months and I think it's about time I started following her example. Click Here to Read More..