You Can Do This, Clover

In Kari Strutt’s “Touching Bottom” the whole story is about and told around swimming. The use of swimming as a defining element cements the story together. It keeps the story from feeling like three unrelated parts of the main character's life. In the first part Swimming is used as a foundation to develop the main character and also set up and foreshadow the main conflict in the story. In the second part swimming is used as the main conflict as the main character and her step-son are caught in a strong current and almost drown. The third part shows the main character later in life, finally swimming again. The use of swimming in the three main sections glues them together into one cohesive story.

As I jumped into the water, I only had one thing on my mind: saving the victim. As I swam towards her I saw her head slip under. I called for a backboard before I dove beneath the surface to bring her head above the water. I

All my life, I have been fascinated with the aquatic realm. It began with my adolescent admiration for the Little Mermaid, and flourished when I joined and became the captain of my swimming and water polo team at North Miami Beach Senior High School. Therefore, when glancing at vimbly, I automatically went to the tab of explore and active outdoor. Just how I adore sitting and spending time reading a book on a day of leisure, being able to devote a day out under the sun and having an adrenaline rush is what ends up being a memorable moment in my book. To my delight, there was a section solely for water sports. As I scrolled through the pages filled with various pastimes, my eyes focused on scuba diving. I am infatuated with the countless tales

Dinitia and I stayed in the pool all morning, splashing, practicing the backstroke and the butterfly. She flailed around in the water almost as much as I did. We stood on our hands and stuck our legs out of the water, did underwater twists, and played Marco Polo and chicken with the other kids. We climbed out to do cannonballs and watermelons off the side, making bug geyserlike splashes intended to drench as many people sitting poolside as possible. The blue water sparkled and churned white with foam (191).

In this extraordinary book, the world’s most extraordinary distance swimmer writes about her emotional and spiritual need to swim and about the almost mystical act of swimming itself. Lynne Cox trained hard from age nine, working with an Olympic coach, swimming five to twelve miles each day in the Pacific. At age eleven, she swam even when hail made the water “like cold tapioca pudding” and was told she would one day swim the English Channel. Four years later—not yet out of high school—she broke the men’s and women’s world records for the Channel swim. In 1987, she swam the Bering Strait from America to the Soviet Union—a feat that,

I dove through the cold currents, feeling my hands create an opening through the water. I closed my aching eyes and let the water submerge me, pulling me in. The sun cast shadows on the floor of the pool, shifting every now and then. I could feel the warmth of the sun as I swam further. I sighed, deeply content.

at Keuka Lake. Grandpa put his strong arms under me and told me to paddle with my arms and kick with my legs. “Reach as far as you can, Lynnie,” he told me. Grandpa showed me how he cupped his hands to pull through the water, keeping his fingers together. One time, I took such a big gulp of air before going under, that I made Grandpa laugh. Grandpa laughed so hard that he swallowed some of the lake water. He made me laugh, too. Suddenly, I wasn’t afraid anymore! And before I knew it, I was swimming through the water on my own. Just as my grandfather stayed by my side and prepared me to go out on my own, so too did Garvey prepare Cole for his important

“Where others saw obstinacy, I saw determination,” Ryder said. When Marilyn Bell’s parents were looking for an instructor for Bell, Gus Ryder was one of them. He has been running “The Lakeshore Swim Club” for over 20 years. When Bell started swimming lessons for the first time, at the end of her lessons Ryder invited her to join a competitive swim club. Ryder soon became one of Canada’s most famous coaches. Without telling anyone Ryder started to train Bell to make the swim across Lake Ontario, but in order for her to earn that she needed to prove herself. Ryder knew she was ready for it so he started to coach her to become a long – distance open water swimmer. Whenever Ryder told Bell to do something she wouldn’t complain to him. He was the main reason why Marilyn was in the lake. Now the Lakeshore Swim Club now teaches swimming to the children who are physically disabled,

As if it were an instinct, my body launched itself into the freezing cold water. I snapped my arms quickly, like my coach had told me, swimming the stroke of butterfly. However, half way through the lap, my arms drew weary and began to drag slightly.

As she swam she seemed to be reaching out for the unlimited in which to lose herself. Once she turned and looked toward the shore, toward the people she had left there. She had not gone any great distance - that is, what would have been a great distance for an experienced swimmer. But to her unaccustomed vision the stretch of water behind her assumed the aspect of a barrier which her unaided strength would never be able to overcome” (Page 57).

Throughout my six years as an elementary school student, I was a helpless victim, drowning in a sea of stressful book reports and searching for a way to express myself in open-ended questions. As I entered middle school, however, a life preserver was thrown to me. From the moment it appeared, I held on tightly until my rescuer taught me to swim on my own.

Once I was afraid of bodies of water since I did not know how to swim, now I am in love with any activity that has to do with water. I was raised in the Dominican Republic, a caribbean island, where it is customary to throw one’s child in the deep end of a pool so that their natural instinct of swimming is awakened. I was not the case. My mother pushed me to the water and amazingly enough I did not panic. Instead of panicking, I accepted my fate and sunk down. After about 30 seconds in my cousin dove in a took me out. Once out of the water, I began to panic. Consequently, I began crying, shaking and screaming at my mother for throwing me into the pool. Shortly after that my mother placed me in swimming classes and everything changed.

Our refreshing day at the lake was now a day of oppressing heat. Despite the more than warm weather, I had not exercised at all that day. In an attempt to get in a little of the daily exercise recommended by my soccer coach, I swam to the neighboring buoy. The buoy was about 50 feet away from the boat dock. The swim was not far, but it was far enough to make me breathe hard. It also made Katrina, Madison, Lauren, and Olivia, who had followed, breathe hard. Behind them, closing in on the buoy, were my mom and two younger brothers slowly paddling on their floats. About 6 feet from our destination we drifted upon a shoal. The shoal was rocky, muddy, and algae-ridden. When the filthy red and green mixture of algae and mud squished between my toes I cringed and refused to lower my legs

The crash of the waves hitting the sand, the crisp scent of salt in the air, the soft grainy texture under the toes, the vast blue water stretching out in front looking endless, as I step into it ever so carefully. I descend into the refreshing water, with just a snorkel sticking above the brink. I am surrounded by neon colors of corals, fish and many other sea creatures. Encompassed by the sea life, I felt like they accepted me as one of their own as they whirled around me. The strategic way of swimming is new but life changing. Swimming amongst many other living species was difficult because you really couldn’t use your legs; if you did you could possibly disturb the life around you. Swimming without using your legs is quite difficult because you are then force to use just your arms to project yourself forward.

The next part of the training turned out to be the toughest. We were required to dive ten feet to the bottom of the pool and retrieve a ten pound weight. Once the weight was brought to the surface we were supposed to tread water for two minutes while keeping the weight above the water line. This appeared to be simple so I dived in, expecting an easy time. I had no trouble getting the weight to the surface and proceeded to tread water with a feeling of undoubtable success. But once again my anti-floating physical quality began to take effect. At one minute and thirty seconds I began to sink and within the next fifteen seconds my head was submerged and I was fighting for air. The water from the pool began flowing into my mouth with each desperate grasp for air; it felt as if an ocean were draining into my body. I remember hearing from under the water the instructor's muffled voice counting down the last ten seconds of the exercise. When it was all over I slowly made my way back to the pool's edge where I was informed by the two young girls that they had no difficulty