Heavy Petting and Smoking

I fully accept that I am the newbie in the Sunday afternoon adults only swim session at the Municipal Baths.

There appears to be a protocol about who is allowed to hog a certain lane even when I made sure to be the very first person into the water at 2.30pm sharp.

This stood for naught in the hierarchy of the regular attendees.

I have only one swim award which I am sure that my Mother still has somewhere with my baby teeth, first pair of shoes and those other , precious "first of" things. The distance swam, at about age 8, was the, for then, new fangled metric 25 metres. The Certificate confirms this. However, the authoritative figure who put on their scribbled signature of authentication to my achievement had also in the same pen stroke struck out the words "in good style".

In truth, I admit I would have accepted a footnote of "barely".

You may laugh at a mere 25 metres.

That would not be enough to save my soul if I fell off a boat midstream, dropped off the central span of a river bridge or found myself floundering about in any meaningful body of water. I calculated that it would be enough if confronted by a ducking in a canal, average watercourse or in a leisure park.

The award also included a purple sew on badge intended for swim cossie or swim towel. The next distance of 50 metres may as well, to me, have been the equivalent of a cross channel attempt.

My introduction  to swimming was involuntary. I have a clear recollection of a near death experience after falling into the sea from a slippery slipway at about age 3. A bit like a standard image from a Cousteau TV series was the swirl of greenish water and the watery sun far above my flailing limbs.

My Father saved me.

I feel it must have been an heroic dive by him into deep water, a frantic search in the froth and a thrust up into the daylight and sweet air. In reality he probably just leaned in and picked me up by the arm or leg out of a few inches of rockpool.

There was very little by way of opportunity to learn to swim.

The town pool was open air, as many were in the 1960's and 70's, freakishly cold and hellishly deep.

At infants school the on-site facility was no more than an industrial sized tank of very strong chlorinated water, opaque and with the sensation of lots of bits of something swilling about around your bare feet. It was not an environment to encourage confidence in water.

A local farmer, a customer of my Bank Manager Father had an outdoor pool and we were invited to use the facilities one summers day. I was interested in finding out the purpose of a red painted line about half way along on the tiles of the bottom. I edged out carefully, still technically a non swimmer, and discovered that the line marked the dramatic sheer drop from shallow end to deep end.

My Father saved me, again.

By the mid to late 1970's our small town had a brand new indoor heated pool and leisure centre. It took over from the town centre as the in-place to meet girls. It was also the place to show off. This consisted of trying to do all of the things displayed prominently as prohibited on one of the usual pool side notices. It was one of those cartoon type illustrations meant to get a response of obedience from young persons but in rather olde worlde terms of "Will Patrons Kindly Refrain From.....".

I did not know anyone called William Patrons, at least not in my year at school. He must have been a very naughty lad given the amount of singular attention. The notice, rather than inhibit certain practices actually provided an easy to follow list, in full view and encouraged bad behaviour in and around the pool.

What better way to spend a Saturday morning than in running, pushing, acrobatics and gymnastics, shouting, ducking, bombing and making sure to swim in the diving area. The strangest prohibition was for smoking, as if someone would go to the trouble of risking their fags getting soggy and mushy. The last and most elusive item on the list and perhaps the main reason for our attendance in the presence of girls of our own age was the heavy petting.

My swimming ability did improve a bit from my regular visits to the pool as I was always showing off to the lasses but never got a date.

I was confident enough in the water by my mid teens to attempt open sea swims. In any British resort this was not pleasant given the icy cold temperatures and the added chill factor of a typical onshore breeze even in the height of summer. Teeth would be chattering and skin raised in sensitive goose bumps all over just from wading out to about knee height.

On the one occasion that I actually managed to cover a decent distance from the shore I looked back only to see the red flags flying on the Lifeguard Station warning swimmers of hazardous undertow currents. It was a frightening struggle to get back to the shore.

My Father was not there to save me, for the first time.

I am now at ease with the environment of a swimming pool although it has taken a good part of my half a century to reach such a stage.

I maintain, faithfully, consistency in having no good style.

In my most recent sessions at the Municipal my slow pace and labouring effort has been highlighted by the grace and speed of those sharing the 20m by 10m space. I have to weave a bit to dodge the more proficient in the pool and then return to a straighter, more efficient line.

Being the newbie I am not on speaking or even nodding terms with anyone yet. Coincidentally, there is a warning notice displayed on the poolside targeted at the same Will Patrons as in my younger days. I would like to meet him one day as he must be about my age and we do, after all, have a common interest.