Wednesday 1 May 2002
My hands smell like chlorine.
Such an unfamiliar smell. This morning I toddled along to
my first aqua aerobics class. I arrived half an hour early
and got changed in the tiny little change room full of interesting
shaped bodies and then went out and sat by the pool, watching
little kids learn how to dive. I have never seen so many painful
belly flops in a row, even the swimming teacher was visibly
wincing. The warm smell of chlorine was not as alarming as
I thought it would be. It did remind me of other horrible
indoor pool experiences but all around me everyone was having
so much fun I started to relax a little. Slowly the rest of
the pregnant mums of various sizes turned up and we got into
the water while Mandy, our instructor, smiled down at us from
the side of the pool. There was one other new girl besides
me (we even had matching bathers) and Mandy smiled especially
kindly at us. She started jogging on the spot. I thought,
this is ok! I can do this! And we all started jogging on the
spot in slow motion through the water. After about ten minutes
of different kinds of jogging and twisting and I was puffing
and groaning, Mandy said "Ok! That's the end of the warm
up! Let's get into it." Eep! I was doing ok until we
were given foam barbells which we had to push through the
water while we did star jumps or twists or rolls or bicycles
around in circles.
When I ticked the "I
am not confident in water" box on my form which I gave
the instructor at the beginning I thought that perhaps she
might realise that that meant that I am not particularly confident
in water, and a couple of times I truly pondered how embarrassing
it would be if I had to be hauled out and given CPR. It would
be especially embarrassing if it was during the "relax
and float, just be with your baby" segment of the class
when I spent the whole time struggling not to disappear under
the water - I am afraid that bonding with the child-inside
didn't get much of a look in. During one particularly uncoordinated
maneuver I realised we were dancing along to Blame
it on the Boogie and the words "I just can't, I just
can't, I just can't control myself" kept ringing over
and over in my water filled ears. How fitting as I slipped
and bobbed, trying to do some crazy high kick forward followed
by a high kick back only to find myself splashing around madly
trying to regain my footing. Graceful I am not. Fit I will
be.
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