Happy New Year!
I'm running late. Again. This should come as no surprise to my friends and family, as I always always underestimate the amount of time it will take me to do most anything, and consequently run late for nearly everything.
But never mind all that. The point is that I'm finally posting my New Years Resolution. Yes, I actually have one this year, and no, it's not to be early, prompt, or even on-time. Obviously.
I can deal with tardiness (and procrastination) another year.
This year's big resolution is...
insert splashing sound, please
...to learn to swim.
There you have it: 2012 is the Year of the Swimmer (that's me).
The only thing getting in my way is the itty bitty fact that I'm terrified of water and have been for as long as I can remember.
Like most kids, I took swimming lessons when I was little. But unlike most kids, I never outgrew the tadpole class. At least skill-wise, anyway. Size-wise, I'm sure I was head-and-shoulders above the other tadpoles by the time I finally aged out of the class. That's when my mom gave up and stopped making me take lessons.
I was relieved. Now I regret it. Being a tadpole at age seven was a little embarrassing, but it doesn't compare with the humiliation of being a tadpole at age...well, thirty-something.
Last summer, I enrolled Sunshine in swimming lessons for the first time. (I don't ever want her to be as fearful and helpless around water as I am. Fortunately, she likes the water.) I watched in awe as a group of kids who are barely old enough to use the potty by themselves performed feats in the kiddie pool that I'd never even imagine attempting.
Things like doing the front and back float, and retrieving objects underwater. I watched those four- and five-year-olds learn the proper techniques for moving their arms, kicking their legs, and breathing while swimming.
Then I looked over at the kids taking lessons in the big pool. I noticed the six- and seven-year-olds swimming laps, the eight- and nine-year-olds learning how to rescue someone who's drowning, and the ten-year-olds learning to dive.
I was fascinated.
It got me thinking. If these kids could learn to do all that, why couldn't I?
I could and I would, darn it! Or at least that's what I decided last summer.
Fast forward six months, and I have yet to take a single swimming lesson. Sigh. I find myself conveniently procrastinating. (2013: Year of the Proactive.) So, I figure, what better way to motivate myself to face my fear of water and learn to swim than to make it my New Years Resolution? And post it on the old blog?
I'm going to conquer this fear this year.
I will.
Now, dear blogging friends, will you please hold me to it?
