jock librarian

Black Orchid Blues by Persia Walker

2012-01-26T18:18:00.000-08:00

When crime reporter turned society columnist Lanie Price gets invited to the Cinnamon Club, she becomes witness to a vicious massacre and the kidnapping of “Black Orchid,” a towering, talented drag queen best known for her bawdy banter, commanding stage presence and sexy lyrical delivery. Was the singer kidnapped for revenge or money? And what is the performer’s true past? Impressive and fast-paced, Walker’s mystery features both gritty and glitzy views of 1920s Harlem and an assembly of deftly developed characters ranging from the hypocritical to the sympathetic and sinister.

Another star

2011-08-08T18:18:00.000-07:00

Because we had a full house this morning with seven swimmers per lane, the coach gave us shorter distances. First, we focused on stroke technique and later, we sprinted.

12 x 50
1 - 6 FR
7 -12 BK/FR odds, BR/FR evens

4 x
75 FR/BK/BR
25 FR sprint
25 K sprint
50 FR moderate
25 stroke IM order

4 x all FR
25 sprint
25 ez
25 sprint
50 ez
25 sprint
75 ez
25 sprint

Magical Monday!

Little Sunflower on 107th Street

2011-08-04T18:36:00.000-07:00

This morning's practice fed our little middle distance souls. Here's the main set of the workout:

6 x 200 FR
5 x 100 IM
6 x 50 (FL/BK odds, FR evens)
30 seconds rest

4 x 200 FR
3 x 100 IM
5 x 50 (BR/FR odds, FR evens)
30 seconds rest

2 x 200 FR
1 x 100 IM
4 x 50 FR
30 seconds rest

Breath of heaven! Thank you, Coach Brad!

Coach Tom's Recipe for Success

2011-05-01T16:54:00.000-07:00

L'antipasto
400 FR
4 x 50 drill/swim rev IM order
100 choice

Insalate
6 x 50 BR focus on pullouts

Il Primo
Kick 4 x (75 moderate/25 fast)

Il secondo
400 IM
--regroup 1:00 minute
4 x 100 FR
2 x 200 IM
2 x 200 FR
4 x 100 IM
400 FR

Il dolce
4 x 100 forced descend
1 & 3 free, 2 & 4 stroke

Buon appetito!

AKA

2011-03-01T18:01:00.000-08:00

Philip Sirois IS Philip Sixking. And he's got new work.

The Love Song of A. Jerome Minkoff and Other Stories by Joseph Epstein

2011-01-19T15:26:00.000-08:00

Tender, wry and subtly told, Epstein’s fourteen stories explore the ordinary lives of middle-aged Jewish men. In “Casualty,” a professor is bullied by a colleague who is “not very keen on the advent of Jews in English and Irish studies.” In “Janet Natalsky and the Life of Art,” a self-deprecating scholar-critic recounts an uneasy relationship with a former high school classmate. The narrator in “My Brother Eli” struggles to understand his kid brother’s suicide. And in the exceptional title story, Dr. A. Jerome Minkoff, a recently inducted member of “sad fraternity of widowers,” stumbles through a new romance. Epstein’s cast of characters are somber, witty and complex. They struggle with questions of identity and openly ponder whether “we can will ourselves to be something other than we really are.”

The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain

2010-12-11T10:43:00.000-08:00

In The Wall, Peter Sis, the internationally acclaimed author illustrator, traces his development as an artist, as well as, the history of Soviet-controlled Czechoslovakia from 1948 up through the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. The picture book which contains entries from early journals, panels of richly detailed black-and-white drawings and bright multicolored illustrations explores the contrasts between East and West; domination and liberty; and expression and silence. A young Sis who discovers a profound love of drawing later finds himself secretly making paintings at home. Art, books and films are censored. Political indoctrination and public displays of communist loyalty are compulsory. Life in Prague proves oppressive as everyday citizens are followed, monitored, harassed, imprisoned, deported and tortured. And yet, Sis manages to capture great (albeit brief) moments of hope such as the Prague Spring of 1968. The artist describes a time when censorship is eased and everything seems possible. Sis learns about the Beatles, Beach Boys and rock 'n' roll; Allen Ginsberg and beat poetry; American basketball, blue jeans and travel. The Wall is a moving memoir that encourages the deep discussion of art, truth and freedom.

Clash of Civilizations over an Elevator in Piazza Vittorio

2010-11-07T13:13:00.000-08:00

Lorenzo Manfredi is found dead in an apartment building and a fellow tenant named Amedeo has suddenly vanished. The Roman police believe Amedeo to be a person of interest and question his true nationality. Yet, his neighbors in Piazza Vittorio proffer evidence, attesting to Amedeo's honest character. Parviz, an Iranian living in exile, is convinced that Amedeo has nothing to do with the crime. Benedetta, an old Italian concierge, considers the accusation groundless, but thinks that one of the immigrants in the community is responsible for the murder. The storekeeper Iqbal Amir Allah believes Amedeo to be "good as mango juice" while Elizabeth Fabian believes Amedeo to be the only tolerant person in the building because he never complained about her dog's barks. Peruvian elder care provider Maria Christina Garcia says that Amedeo generously offered support during her darkest times. And both Antonio (the university professor) and Johan (the young dutch filmmaker) scoff at the idea of Amedeo being a foreigner, pointing to his broad knowledge of Roman history and Italian cinema. Part mystery and social satire, Lakhous's novel is a delightful romp of a read, offering fascinating insights into immigration, culture and identity.

Applying the umph

2010-09-21T18:35:00.000-07:00

At Monday's practice, I experimented in the water, imagining swimming over a shallow reef.

3 x 150 build free
2 x 75 free (breathe every 7 or 8 strokes)
1 x 50 free fast
:30 rest

4 x 150 build free
4 x 75 free (breathe every 7 or 8 strokes)
2 x 50 free fast
:30 rest

4 x 25 stroke build
4 x 75 IM (no free)
100 free

Challenging!

Progressive movement

2010-09-19T05:49:00.000-07:00

Visiting from Kona, World Master swimmer and coach Karlyn Pipes-Neilsen taught a freestyle technique clinic at Baruch College yesterday. The workshop focussed on dryland body awareness, balance, stroke and swimming efficiency. Karlyn offered us plenty of food for thought and takeaways including the following sage advice: "Look for progress--not perfection."

Tuesdays with Tom

2010-09-15T17:06:00.000-07:00

This week, Coach Tom announced that he's retiring from morning practices because he's old and needs his beauty sleep. His news made some swimmers chuckle and most others sigh.

Here's our last dance:

12 x 50 butterfly (1 perfect fly stroke, then swim the rest of the distance free; 2 perfect fly strokes, swim the rest free; etc.)

3 x 100 free descend by :05 each

300 choice fast
300 choice slow
200 choice fast
200 choice slow
100 choice fast
100 choice slow
50 choice fast
50 choice slow
25 choice fast
25 choice slow

100 cool down

Lovely!

Filipino soul food

2010-04-03T16:44:00.000-07:00

Dr. Connie Mariano is a notable Filipino woman. "Keeper of the presidential pulse," she served as the White House physician from 1992 to 2001, directing the White House Medical Unit and achieving the prestigious rank of rear admiral in the United States Navy. In her absorbing memoir, Mariano writes about her humble beginnings growing up as the daughter of a Navy steward and her profound desire to "pay back" through service. She chronicles both the expected and unexpected on-the-job challenges including: performing search-and-rescue exercises; adapting to the new face of the White House ("This would become a delicate dance in which both partners struggled to avoid stepping on each other's toes"); preparing for the worst-case scenario ("The specter of assassination hung over all of us"); caring for visiting dignitaries; surveying cities to identify environmental health risks; and accompanying the president on his travels across America and around the globe. In recounting the Clinton years, Mariano not only gives insight into the private side of the American presidency, but shares her own personal triumphs and tragedies ("My greatest achievements as a physician and career naval officer would be my most painful failure as a wife and mother").

Blood Hina: A Mas Arai Mystery by Naomi Hirahira

2010-03-31T05:12:00.000-07:00

When asked to be the best man at his bosom buddy's wedding, Mas Arai reluctantly agrees, keeping his personal opinions quiet. ("Why was Haruo, at seventy-one years of age, even thinking of getting remarried? Might as well just buy two cemetery plots right next to each other and put a bow tie on one headstone and a veil on the other"). Although Mas claims never to have been 'best' at anything in his life ("other than perhaps regrets"), he feels a weight of responsibility. Haruo, a former gambler who's "lost his wife and house to craps" clearly has faults, but he and Mas share history and a common bond, having both survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. When the wedding is abruptly canceled and the groom is suspected of stealing a valuable set of imperial Japanese dolls, Mas turns amateur detective. Hirahira's elderly protagonist, the self-described "has-been good-for-nothing gardener," is a thoroughly likable hero. Although the novel is sluggish at times, the author brings a different lens through which to view Los Angeles' Japanese-American community.

The Book of the Unknown: Tales of the Thirty-six

2010-01-18T17:53:00.000-08:00

Keats' engaging book opens with a fictional scholar's quest to understand the meaning behind a list of names found during the excavation of a German synagogue. After interviewing local villagers, Jay Katz, Ph.D discovers that the names are based on the "Lamedh-Vov," a group of 36 virtuous people who justify human existence before God. What follows is a finely crafted series of stories featuring 12 of these prominent characters including a liar, a thief and an idiot. In The Book of the Unknown, Keats pays homage to the rich tradition of Jewish folklore while deftly exploring issues of morality and the mysteries of human nature.

Clara's War: One Girl's Story of Survival

2010-01-18T17:51:00.000-08:00

Kramer was a teenager when the Nazis invaded the Polish town of Zolkiew in World War II. Her moving testimony of survival is based on journals she kept during the 18-month period when she and 17 other Polish Jews secretly hid in a shallow dirt bunker underneath a neighboring couple's home. Kramer's memoir grippingly details the families' miserable daily living conditions, individual and collective fears, as well as, dangerous, close encounters with death. Clara's War, illustrating the harsh truths of survival, is profound and utterly compelling.

Lucky Child: A Memoir of Surviving Auschwitz as a Young Boy

2010-01-18T17:47:00.000-08:00

"I grew up in camps--I knew no other life--my sole objective was to stay alive, from hour to hour, from day to day." In Lucky Child, the Czechoslovakia-born Buergenthal shares the compelling story of his survival in World War II, revisiting the difficult memories of his early youth spent in a Jewish ghetto, the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, children's barracks and an orphanage. Throughout the narrative, Buergenthal's voice is intimate, understated and direct. He asks such potent questions as: "What is it in the human character that gives some individuals the moral strength not to sacrifice their decency and dignity, regardless of the costs to themselves, whereas others become murderously ruthless in the hopes of ensuring their own survival?" Lucky Child is a riveting, poignant and remarkable memoir deserving wide readership.

I Love Yous Are for White People: A Memoir

2009-11-22T15:39:00.000-08:00

Forced to leave war-torn Vietnam, four-year-old Lac Su and his family flee Danang traveling aboard a sixty-foot boat packed with over 300 people. After several weeks of drifting across the violent South China Sea, landing in Hong Kong and getting shuffled between tent cities, the family immigrates to the United States and settles in a drug-ridden neighborhood in Hollywood, California. Home is not the heaven Lac and his family imagine. Rather, their new world is marked by the "mayhem and commotion" of police helicopters shining their floodlights across rooftops ("crackhead and junkie haven[s]"), Los Angeles' booming traffic (a "tangled, teeming mess") and uneasy underworld encounters with drug dealers, prostitutes and gangsters. In his provocative debut, Su boldly writes about the trials of his youth, chronicling the loneliness of life in America, the challenges of growing up with a demanding father (a "firecracker with a testy fuse") and his intriguing, yet dangerous liaisons with street gangs. Su tells a frank story of tough love, expressing a deep human need for acceptance while exploring the universality of family life.

Revenge of the Mooncake Vixen

2009-11-10T22:26:00.000-08:00

Marilyn Chin spins together forty-one tales into this wild, fiercely inventive novel about Moonie and Mei Ling Wong, a pair of Chinese-American twin sisters growing up under the watchful eye of "the Great Matriarch," their cleaver-wielding grandmother. The books begins with a fearless Moon taking revenge on a group of "trashy white boys" who have humiliated her. Moon's retaliation is sardonically described: "For thirty days and thirty nights [she] scoured the seaside howling, windswept--in search of blond victims. They would drown on their surfboards, or collapse while polishing their cars." Subsequent sections of the book follow the sisters' transformation from Chinese food delivery girls ("certain Wong-named-nobodies") to two overtly ambitious young women ("I'm attending Stanford and Mei Ling's at Harvard, both of us on pre-med scholarships and on our way to becoming important doctor s"). Throughout the novel, Chin playfully sprinkles her tales with Chinese myths, parables, Taoist thought and Confucian beliefs, while presenting a terrifically diverse cast of characters including a young monk, donkey, ex-San Diego Charger, eight-armed bodhisattva, surfer and cook. The chorus of first- and second-generation Chinese immigrants is especially rich. Their voices are full of yearning, hope, rage, passion and pain.

The future is overdue

2009-04-30T17:53:00.000-07:00

On September 26, 2009, I will be participating in the 5.85-mile Little Red Lighthouse Swim to help raise monies for ALA's Spectrum Scholarship and bring awareness to the critical need for more ethnic and multilingual librarians within our profession.

I will swim the Hudson River in honor of five special librarians: Bonnie Farrier (supervising librarian, Andrew Heiskell Braille and Talking Book Library, New York Public Library); Jane Fisher (director, Rutherford Public Library); Cecil Hixon (former adult programming specialist, New York Public Library); Marsha Howard (coordinator, Poetry in the Branches, Poets House); and Raymond Markey (former president, Local 1930, New York Public Library Guild). Through their daily work as librarians, they have inspired me and countless library workers within New York City and beyond to embrace activist roles, foster community and commit ourselves fully to public service.

Dolce

2009-04-26T04:43:00.001-07:00

Wrong directions. A lost ID. Misplaced keys. A dead car battery. Despite a series of unfortunate events, our team fared spectacularly well at the Nike Swim. The combination of mild water temperatures, sunshine, the Miami skyline and a Gary Hall Jr. sighting made for a perfect start to the open water swim season.

Swann in love

2009-04-24T17:53:00.000-07:00

The sky was enchanting at the 6:00 AM workout.
4 x 50 FR
200 kick/swim by 50
200 drill/swim by 50
10 x 50 descend by :05 seconds
8 x 50 controlled breathing (six breaths, five breaths...)

At the second morning practice, the water glittered as we swam:
400 FR
200 IM drill
3 x 200 stroke IM order (without FR)
6 x 100
100 K
2 x 100 BK
100 K
2 x 100 BR
500 FR
500 FR with zoomers
200 cool down choice

In the evening, a group of us went to hear Olympian Dara Torres talk about her new book, junk food, training and competition at a local library fundraiser.

Sessions of sweet silent thought

2009-04-24T12:26:00.000-07:00

Spring training and Proust are "putting me on the right road." On Thursday morning, we swam:

400 FR
400 reverse IM
4 x 200 FR
4 x 100 rolling IM
4 x 100 K
2 x 300 IM (no FL) with zoomers
2 x 300 FR with zoomers
6 x 50 stroke/free fast
300 cool down

At the technique clinic, Coach Bonnie emphasized two points: 1) swim like you mean it; and 2) swim like you're a monster (i.e. tall, long, big).

In the evening, Coach Marty's short-course workout consisted of:

6 x 50
6 x 25 (descend 1 - 3, 4 -6)
4 x 25 K (2-medium, 2-fast)
4 x 50 swim (3-moderate, 1-fast)
4 x 25 K (2-moderate, 2-fast)
2 x 25 K (1-moderate, 1-fast)
4 x 25 FR fast
6 x50 (descend 1-3, 4-6)

In the chapter entitled "Combray," Proust's narrator says, "I seek my way again, I turn a corner...but...the goal is in my heart..."

Overture

2009-04-23T19:32:00.001-07:00

Our first long-course morning practice in Fort Lauderdale was straight out of Proust:

The moment they become wet, stretch and twist and take on colour and distinctive shape...solid and recognisable...

300 FR
100 K
200 FR
100 K
100 FR
100 K
9 x 100
3 x (3 x100 FR/100 stroke/100 K)
5 x 200 IM with fins
1-4 rolling 50 K, 5 swim
4 x100 FR/stroke

In the evening, Coach Marty's practice was "all-powerful joy."

4 x 50 FR
4 x 50 FR drill/swim
6 x 100 build IM
1- FR
2-FR/FR/BR/FR
3-FR/BK/BR/FR
4-FL/BK/BR/FR
5-IM
6-Choice

Spring training

2009-04-21T18:59:00.000-07:00

The first night's practice was splendrous. We watched the colors of the sky change with every lap.

3 x 100 FR
6 x 75 k/d/s, odd FR, even stroke
4 x 200 rolling 50 fast
4 x 100 rolling 25 fast
6 x 50 kick odd FR, even stroke
200 FR cool down

We are so privileged to share the lanes with the FLA masters.

Insensatez

2009-04-05T17:16:00.000-07:00

This morning, I chose to swim drills at the McBurney Y. The water was as fluid and welcoming and warm as a bossa.

B-Ball wisdom

2009-03-29T16:09:00.000-07:00

"You can't learn how to shoot a basketball at practice. The kids that really have game are the ones that are willing to spend 3-4 hours playing on their own, practicing their shots on the playground." Philip's comments struck a chord with me. I've come to realize that I won't make much progress in my sport if I spend all of my time in the water at practice (i.e. basically trying to keep pace with others in the lane). If I truly want to improve, I'm going to have to carve out time during the week to swim on my own, stop the frenetic cadence, focus on the basic movements, slow everything down to a Tai Chi waltz, imagine and breathe.

Fir, forest, grass, jade

2009-03-17T19:28:00.000-07:00

This morning's main set emphasized a mix of aerobic and anaerobic swimming:

12 x 75 FR s/k/s

4 x 100 sprint stroke
Dive off of the blocks and descend by 100
Rest 2:00 minutes after each 100

4 x 100 sprint FR
Dive off of the blocks and descend by 100
Rest 2:00 minutes and (our coach added) "focus on gathering up your chi."

Is practice a step on the path to enlightenment?

Sparkle plenty

2009-03-15T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today's short course yard Spring Fling Masters Meet in Nassau County was grand! Harald, David, Janet H. and Martha were among the registered TNYAers in attendance along with the extraordinary Coach Christopher on deck. After checking in, finding a spot on the bleachers and studying the heat sheets, I penned my assignments on the inside of my wrist:

E5 E8 E10
H1 H1 H2
L6 L9 L6

Coach C's pep talk significantly boosted my performance in the 200 IM and 50 FL. And I really tried to maintain a steady pace in the 1000 FR, (luckily!) squeaking into 3rd place in the heat. A light exists in spring!

Midstream

2009-03-08T14:55:00.000-07:00

Like Langston Hughes, Akiko Busch knows rivers: the peaceable Delaware; Connecticut's shifting channels; the Susquehanna's gracious waters and the Hudson's storied past. Busch knows the subdued currents of the Monongahela; the dark waters of the Cheat; the Mississippi's multiplicity; the wide green Ohio and the Current's blue springs. Her Nine Ways to Cross a River is texturally rich and beautifully written.

And equally lovely and inspiring was this morning's aquatic choreography:
4 x 75 BK
4 x 75 BR
4 x 75 IM

200 IM
100 IM, one minute rest

300 FR fast
250 FR recovery
200 FR fast
150 FR recovery
100 FR fast
75 FR recovery
50 FR fast
25 FR recovery

Weekend service changes

2009-03-01T12:18:00.000-08:00

Martha and I have been prepping for a short course yards meet in Nassau County. The competition (and three ill-fitting pants) has given me extra motivation to train.

Our head coach posted this welcome workout this morning:

6 x 50 FR

Do the following set four times through--all BK, all BR, all FL, and all FR:
1 x 75 k/s/k
2 x 75 s/k/s
3 x 75 all swim

300 FR
200 FR
100 FR
6 x50 FR

Fabulous five

2009-02-18T18:16:00.000-08:00

Enrollment for the 2009 Manhattan Island races opens this Thursday and I am anxiously awaiting to hear whether or not I qualify for the inaugural Liberty Island Swim. Being a bit of manatee, I'm not entirely optimistic that I'll make the cut. Nevertheless, I definitely plan on signing up for MIF's 5.85-mile Little Red Lighthouse Swim which starts at Clinton Cove and ends at 165th Street. This year, I would like to swim in honor of five public librarians (who have been incredible role models and mentors--and whom I owe a great debt) and raise funds for ALA's Spectrum Scholarship. More later.

Metropolitan Life

2009-02-17T18:55:00.000-08:00

I've been moved reading the poetry of fellow librarian Liana Alaverdova. Of the twenty-three works featured in From Baku to Brooklyn, I've found "The Insurance Agent" especially poignant. The narrator asks:

Can't you find me a plan
To insure against my sorrow?
You have managed my assets
With the help of your chart.
Can you give me some pointers
to manage my heart?

Thanks to some goading, I've managed to get back on the workout track. Yesterday, Kathleen, Janet and I celebrated President's Day at Riverbank State Park by swimming:
8 x 300s
1 - 4 50 FR, 50 kick/swim IM order, 50 FR
5 - 8 50 FR, 50 drill/swim IM order, 50 FR

This morning, Coach Breath-of-Heaven started us with a hypoxic set, followed by a series of pulls:
20 x 50s
Odds: 25 swim underwater until second backstroke flags, 25 FL
Evens: 25 BK, 25 FR with only two breaths
15 x 75 pulls
1-3 rolling IM
4, 5 FR
4 x 100 FR descend

Hora del poder

2009-02-12T18:46:00.000-08:00

At this morning's breaststroke clinic, Coach Stefan emphasized drills, gliding and body positioning in the water.
Fortunately, the evening's Hour of Power provided an excellent opportunity to practice some of the new moves.
Here's the delicious main set:
8 x 25 IM order
8 x 50 IM order
8 x 75 IM order

Lapland

2009-02-11T18:06:00.000-08:00

This evening, we celebrated Lincoln and Darwin's 200th birthdays. And Coach C.A. gave us a main set consisting of a series of 200 yard distances, instructing us to "finish all strongly, with tight efficient turns, flipped or open."

200 FR
100 IM x 2
200 FR
50 stroke, IM order, x 4
200 FR
25 stroke, IM order, x 8
200 FR
200 IM
200 FR
2 x 100 IM continuous
200 FR

There were seven swimmers in the lane, including three uber speedy boyz. Sigh.

Glittering geography

2008-10-08T16:56:00.000-07:00

Meena Alexander summons up ancestors.
Sandra M. Castillo swims across an island of memory.
Richard Blanco examines brown sugar histories.
Andrei Codrescu deconstructs modern culture.
All of the above make me think, but Justin Chin makes me smile. Check out "directions":

I've told you
once before
not to
ask
Gertrude Stein
for directions.
We need
to get
there
by suppertime.

Training for diversity

2008-05-02T05:03:00.000-07:00

I've spent more time training in the water than on land over the past seven months, but that's about to change--now! Martha and I have both signed up for the New Jersey State Triathlon. She's a veteran triathlete, while I'm an absolute novice, but we're both up to the challenge of the Olympic distance (1.5K swim, 23 mile bike, 10K run) event.

One of my primary reasons for registering for the triathlon is to raise monies for the American Library Association's Spectrum Scholarship. As a public librarian, I am mindful of the pressing need to develop collections that reflect the interests of diverse communities. And I am especially aware of the need to recruit more ethnic librarians (i.e. Native American, Asian, Native Alaskan, African American, Latino, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander students) within the profession.

On Sunday, July 27, 2008 I will swim, bike and run in honor of three dynamic library and information science educators: Kay Cassell, Assistant Professor, Rutgers University; Kathleen de la Peña McCook, University of South Florida; and Andrea Japzon, Adjunct Faculty, University of Maryland. Individually and collectively, Kay, Kathleen and Andrea have inspired many of us to be proactive, inclusive and compassionate library leaders. Through their daily work, they remind us to lift as we climb.

"C'mon, let's go get strong!"

2008-04-11T12:01:00.000-07:00

Spring training has been rigorous, engaging, enlivening and fun. It's been magic distilled.

At the Tuesday morning practice, we paddled through radiant waters and reached for the wide unstudied sky:
300 swim
16 x 50 IM order
100/200/300/400/300/200/100 FR
100 ez
200 kick with fins
4 x 100 IMs with fins
12 x 50s maximum push off
2 FL
2 BK
2 BR
2 BR
6 FR (descend :10 by groups of 3)
300 FR

In the afternoon, we listened to Olympic hopeful Leila Vaziri's inspiring talk about her personal journey and training progress. And after yoga, we attended Coach Marty's evening short course workout:
8 x 75 K/D/S IM order
One round of each IM stroke: 3 x 25 K, 3 x 50 drill/swim, 75 stroke
8 x 25s (swim with 4 breaths only, then 3 breaths only, then 2, then 1 breath only twice, build back up to 4 breaths) "Relax, relax, relaaaaaax!"

200 swim down

Refilling my water bottle before bedtime, I ruminated over Coach Hash's sapient observation: "Staying calm changes everything."

On Wednesday morning, we returned to the long course pool and swam:
400 FR
300 BR
200 BK
100 FL
6 x 100 BR/BK
24 x 50 K IM order (with fins)
100 ez (with fins)
200 ez (with fins)
7 x 100 FR sprints

In the afternoon swim clinic, the coach offered us the following advice:

Try to keep your head in a neutral position and your elbows high (letting your hand hang down loose) while swimming freestyle.
Glide more in your breaststroke and aim for a fast turnover.
Focus on your body position while swimming backstroke; press your head and back in the water.

Coach Marty's evening practice seemed more challenging than Finnegan's Wake. Holy commodius vicus of circulation! I was back to Howth Castle or rather, square one. Completely spent mentally. Sigh.
200 k/s
150 free
150 drill/swim
150 build
3 x (225 FR smooth, 150 neg. split, 75 fast)
200 cool down

Coach Conrad's Thursday morning's workout was surprisingly manageable (more Dubliners than a progression of anagrams and disfigured words):
400 reverse IM (with 100 FL drill)
200 FR
200 BK
200 BR
200 FL
Repeat 400 reverse IM with alternating k/s
200 FR with fins
200 BK with fins
200 BR with fins
200 IM with fins
16 x 50s four of each stroke, maximum push off underwater--with fins
200 cool down

Reflecting on our four-day progress, my lanemate Charles remarked, "It's pretty amazing. You don't really know what you're capable of until you push yourself and try."

The focus of the evening practice was speed:
6 x 50 (3 kick, 3 drill/swim)
5 x 50 (descend 1-3, 4-5)
3 x 50 breakouts off the wall
150 moderate
4 x 25 odds fast off the blocks/evens, ez FR
150 moderate

On Friday morning, the warm-up set was 300 FR followed by 700 FR with fins. And after we split up into groups of 10 (i.e. five swimmers on each end of the pool), we swam a series of seven relays:

50 sprints
50 BK from one side of the pool and 50 BR, from the other
FR toward the middle of the pool and exchanging a double high five with partner
50 FR wearing a baby pink souvenir baseball cap
50 FR donning a pink Florida t-shirt
FR toward the middle of the pool wearing matching t-shirt and cap, then exchanging outfit with partner
50 FL

On Friday evening, we enjoyed a recovery workout:
2 x (100 pull/50 kick/100 swim)
4 x 100 FR
4 x 75 kick choice
4 x 50 IM order slow
200 warm down

Tomorrow, we're swimming in the ocean. And I'll be joining the two-mile group--"climbing that imaginary rope up to heaven."

Switching to decaf

2008-04-07T11:50:00.001-07:00

Part two of the poem "Fallen Leaves" reads:

...In the mixed scent of mosquito
repellent
and jasmines wafting from the yard I fall asleep
Dreaming of carefree flying, like a red-crowned crane thrusting forth
from the matting of a
Chinese scroll, an almost transparent snow-white
spreading its large cartwheel wings, floating amidst
an ascending range of mountains. Time shifts its balance
in the wind, changing speed as it pleases.

On this second day of spring training, I reconsider Yang Mu's words:

...In the mixed scent of sun-
block
and hibiscus wafting from the pool deck I fall asleep
Dreaming of carefree flying, like a white-crowned pelican thrusting forth
from the matting of a
beach blanket, an almost transparent snow-white
spreading its large cartwheel wings, floating amidst
a horizontal plane of palms. Time shifts its balance
in the sea breeze, changing speed as it pleases.

Here is this morning's splendiferous long course workout:

4 x 100 free
6 x 50 (fly, back, free)
4 x 200 free rolling 50 kick
6 x 50 free with fins
4 x 400 free descending with fins

And the fab afternoon short course workout with the FLA follows:

800 warm up
8 x75 kick/drill/swim IM order
400 free (3 and 5 breathing pattern per 25)
4 x 100 kick (IM order)
9 x 100 descend :10 seconds in groups of 3

"Inhale, extend and exhale, releeeeeease."

Transformed utterly

2008-03-23T15:52:00.000-07:00

TNYA had an impressive showing at yesterday's Asphalt Green meet. As one teammate remarked, "We channeled our inner mermaids."

This morning, the Easter Bunny delivered this goody-filled workout:
12 x 75 swim/kick/swim IM order
6 x 200 free (50 ez after each 200)
3 x 100 BK
all kick
kick/swim/kick/swim
all swim
2 x 100 BR
kick/swim/kick/swim
all swim
200 ez

Spring sunshine and enchantment!

Caressing time

2008-03-16T16:40:00.001-07:00

I dipped into the manga/comic book/graphic novel universe for three weeks and happened upon some truly fascinating reads including:

Birth of a Nation by Aaron McGrudder and Reginald Hudlin
Shortcomings by Adrian Tomine
Embroideries by Marjane Satrapi
Brownsville by Neil Kleid and Jake Allen
American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang
King Volume 3 by Ho Che Anderson
The Essential Guide to World Comics by Tom Pilcher and Brad Brooks
Pictures and Words by Roanne Bell and Mark Sinclair
An Anthology of Graphic Fiction, Cartoons and True Stories by Ivan Brunetti
Barefoot Gen: A Cartoon Story of Hiroshima by Keiji Nakazawa

Good news, Persepolis. SPLAT was splendid!

Patriot Act

2008-02-24T17:21:00.000-08:00

Hands down, The Rivals: Chris Evert vs. Martina Navratilova: Their Epic Duels and Extraordinary Friendship (2005) is one of my favorite sports biographies. Howard's book piqued my interest in both athletes' personal migrations including Navratilova's defection from Czechoslovakia at the age of eighteen. I am currently reading Navratilova's memoir, Martina (1986), and have come to truly appreciate the tennis player's candor and spunk:

I didn't feel I belonged anywhere, until I came to America for the first time when I was sixteen...This country was waiting for me. It would give me the friends and the space and the freedom and the courts and the sneakers and the weight machines and the right food to let me become a tennis champion, to play the best tennis any woman ever played, which I think I have done in the past few years.

Excuse me if that sounds like bragging, but being blunt with your feelings is very American. In this big country, I can be as brash as New York, as hedonistic as Los Angeles, as sensuous as San Francisco, as brainy as Boston, as proper as Philadelphia, as brawny as Chicago, as warm as Palm Springs, as friendly as my adopted home of Dallas--Fort Worth, as as peaceful as the inland waterway that rubs up against my former home in Virginia Beach.

And forgive me if this sounds like bragging, but a water country was waiting for me at Flushing Meadows this weekend. And it would give me the friends and the space and the freedom to swim the best 1600 yard workout in the Q-Boro:
400 free
2 x 200 IM
400 free
2 x 200 IM

Midlife fancy

2008-02-09T11:14:00.000-08:00

The 1 train was running express this morning, so I arrived early enough at Columbia to crack open a sports memoir. Yum. Set for an early June street date, Off the Deep End chronicles 41-year-old W. Hodding Carter's audacious quest to qualify for the U.S. Olympic swimming team. To echo the mighty words of our dashing dryland coach, "Rock on!"

Here's this morning's main set, chicos y chicas. We began with a series of 15 x 100s:
1 x100 (Fly/Free/Fly/Free)
2 x 100 IM
2 x 100 Free
1 x 100 (Back/Free/Back/Free)
2 x 100 IM
2 x 100 Free
1 x 100 (Breast/Free/Breast/Free)
2 x 100 IM
2 x 100 Free

After an extended stop in IM Central Station, we swam 10 x 75s in the following pattern:
Swim/Kick/Swim (odds)
Kick/Swim/Kick (evens)

It was in a word: rigorous. And, to insert a quote from page 43, "The feeling was an epiphany."

Lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub

2008-02-02T09:36:00.000-08:00

TNYA recently hosted its annual One Hour Swim and over 130 masters swimmers from all over metropolitan New York joined the grand party. This year, we dedicated the event to our beloved Coach Paul and raised monies to support the good work of the AIDS Service Center and Ali Forney Center.

Our team is now focussed on preparing for June's IGLA Championships and we are so ready to train. McKibben's Long Distance: A Year of Living Strenuously has stirred me to action:

We want to expand the comfort zone, and to do that you can't be afraid of failing. In other words, if you run the first three kilometers, you may end up with a breakthrough time, and you may fall apart on the last 2K and need to crawl home. If you're going to expand your comfort zone, you're going to fall on your keister pretty often, said Lamb. And if you just keep it in that safe zone, you're going to go through life living in suburbia, and you'll never know what's in your heart and soul.

A-leaping and a-swimming

2007-12-23T14:08:00.000-08:00

This morning, we warmed up with 12 Drummers drumming (200 Free, 100IM) and 11 Pipers piping. And our main set consisted of:

10 x 25 Lords a-leaping (4 x 25 Free, 3 x 25 Back, 2 x 25 Breast, 1 x 25 Fly)
9 x 75 Ladies dancing (Back/Breast/Free and Fly/Back/Free)
8 x 100 Maids a-milking (4 x 100 Free, 2 x 75 Free/25 Kick, 2 x Free S/K/S/K)
7 x 50 Swans a-swimming (25 Back/25 Breast)
6 x 25 Geese a-laying (All Breast--and according to Alfredo, "Breast is best.")
5 x 50 Golden rings (Fly drill: 25 Right Arm/25 Left Arm)
4 x 100 Calling birds (IM Reverse)
3 x 150 French hens (Pull)
2 x 100 Turtle doves (Stroke, moderate pace)
1 x 200 True love (200 ez swim) and a partridge in a pear tree!

Since setting my training goals for 2008, I've come to appreciate Sally Edwards' sage advice regarding time management. In Triathlons for Women, she writes:

If there's a consistently huge difference between the time you have and the demands you place on your time, you will crash and burn. Stay ignited, and find a new way to relate to time. Referees call time; musicians mark time...statisticians keep time; athletes race against time. The fact remains that we are all given the same amount of time. There are 24 hours in a day, 168 hours in a week. Use them fully--live every moment.

Imaginary Garden with Real Toads

2007-12-02T14:57:00.000-08:00

If Moore and Bishop were alive today, they would sing Julie Sheehan's praises--because Orient Point is that good. The extraordinary is subtly revealed through the ordinary: a blooming pinecone, a tough pack of teens, a stray pet. "Gifted in humor" and "giftedly dramatic," Sheehan's voice is splendidly cool. "Polar Bear in the Central Park Zoo" would pair perfectly with Bishop's "At the Fishhouses" (or better yet, "The Imaginary Iceberg") in a poetry discussion group.

Watched, captivating, he swims to the rocky shelf
and berths a beat before pushing off with plate-sized
foot, belly up, yellow head plowing a watery furrow.

He soaks. A forepaw of backstrokes the water once
idly, but with force enough to speed his streamlined
bulk, across the dole of open sea he's fathomed utterly.

He dives as if tethered, submerged body spread and flat
against the viewing glass, mounted momentarily, a trophy
hide on the lodge wall. Watchers shriek, but he moves on

his fixed orbit, water-logged planet, up to the rock, a push,
one backstroke, dive, eyes closed the while. His swim,
compulsory as a Busby Berkeley routine, has captivated

the bear, too, or made him half captive, while the other half,
repeating his invention move for move, seeks a different
outcome: a new mercy, colder, austere; more genuine ice.

Bravo, Julie Sheehan--a most genuine voice!

Twice a week the winter through

2007-11-25T10:49:00.000-08:00

Boxers. Climbers. Football Players. Wrestlers. Whatever It Takes: Women on Women's Sport is chock full of passionate essays about personal dreams and aspirations, competition and self-discovery. I was surprised to learn that before she crafted poetry, Maxine Kumin exercised racing dives, straight-armed windmills and dolphin undulations. In "Swimming and Writing," Kumin notes she matched the "rhythm of memorized poems to the stroke-breath-stroke of the trudgen crawl." Upon receiving a copy of A. E. Housman's "A Shropshire Lad" around her sixteenth birthday, Kumin recalls:

Without making any conscious effort to do so, [I] had committed to a good portion of the book to memory. I swam to Housman's cadences, his classic romantic elegiac voice suffusing my long-distance swims with gentle melancholy. "With rue my heart was laden," I droned, swiveling my head for the next intake of air. "For golden friends I had," I bubbled, breathing out into the water.

Yesterday, my golden teammates gathered for a classic workout:
12 x 50 IM order stroke/free (descend :05 seconds by groups of 4)
12 x 100
first round: 1, 3 (free) and 2, 4 (100 IM)
second round: 1,3 (free) and 2,4 (stroke)
third round: 1,3 (ez free) and 2,4 (fast free)
Kick IM order
25 kick
50 kick/swim
75 swim/kick/swim
Generously adjusting our lane's intervals, Coach Lisa gave us no reason for rue.

Perfect circle

2007-11-04T11:19:00.000-08:00

Last week's 5-miler in Central Park was special. In the mix of 6,000 were Halloween revelers who kept the mood festive. Cats, witches and an unusually lively pack of women dressed up as candy corn bopped along the course. A member of a Chinese team bore a t-shirt that said "Powered by dim sum," and a portly 60-year old wore a shirt that read "I know. I'm slow. Get over it." Some ran with good humor and others, with heart. I spotted many shirts bearing the logos of Team in Training, Fred's Team and Race for the Cure. Running with purpose, these folks inspired me to do the same. Ignoring minor discomforts, I picked up my pace and ran for Coach Paul.

On Sunday, November 18, 2007, some of us from Team New York Aquatics will be participating in Central Park for the 14th Annual Race to Deliver. The 4-mile run/walk is a fundrasier for God's Love We Deliver, a not-for-profit agency which provides free nutritious meals to those living with HIV/AIDS, cancer and other serious illnesses. Please join us! To register for the event (or make a donation), visit the race site and look for the Team New York Aquatics page.

Liberation

2007-10-23T17:53:00.000-07:00

One evening, Rehana Haque and her children hear the following announcement on the radio:

I, Major Zia, provisional Commander-in-Chief of the Bangladesh Liberation Army, hereby proclaim, on behalf of our great national leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the independence of Bangladesh. I also declare we have already formed a sovereign, legal government under Sheikh Mujibar Rahman. I appeal to all nations to mobilize public opinion in their respective countries against the brutal genocide in Bangladesh.

So this was it: a war had come to find them. Whatever was going to happen had already happened; now they would have to live in its shadow. Rehana wrapped her arms around herself and squeezed tight, willing the old strength to rise up within her again.

Uprising. Revolution. Tahmima Anam's moving debut novel A Golden Age is scheduled for release in January 2008. Look for it!

On this unseasonably warm October morning, it was easy to will the old strength to rise up and head for the John Jay pool. Our Red Bull drinking coach presented us with a series of revolutionary sets:
2 x (150 ez swim, 150 pull, 150 kick, 50 free fast)
6 x 75
(2 x fly/back/free)
(2 x back/breast/free)
(2 x breast/fly/back)
200 pull
2 x 150 free build
3 x 100 drill/swim
4 x 50 kick
8 x 25 free fast
400 fly kick with fins

90 minutes of splendor

2007-10-14T08:44:00.000-07:00

Still reeling from last night's 11th inning loss, I packed up my swim gear and headed for the John Jay pool.
Coach Conrad's morning workout was a gift:
400 reverse IM (swim/drill/kick/swim by 25)
300 reverse IM (kick/drill/swim by 25)
5 x100 free (descend by 5 seconds)
Swim the following four times through. The first round is all backstroke, followed by all breaststroke, then fly, and ending with IM order. Use the kick as recovery.
25 kick
25 stroke
25 kick
50 stroke
25 kick
75 stroke
5 x 100s
50 kick/50 pull
50 pull/50 kick
100 pull
100 kick
100 swim free
Rest for 30 seconds, then repeat the set of 5 x 100s
6 x 50 freestyle (50 sprint/50 ez)
It was if, as poet Charles Wright writes, the water spoke and said yes. The liquid world was affirmative, assenting and agreeable.

Finding the action she craves

2007-10-08T05:50:00.000-07:00

Stephanie, my teammate, is enrolled in a MS program in Library & Information Science at Pratt. When she's not in the pool, the library or the classroom, she's working to help Ladies Home Journal develop their archives. The other day, she stumbled upon this little poem about swimming and looking trim (sigh):

If you'd acquire a figure trim,
Lose no time getting in the swim.
To find the action that she craves
The modern girl cuts through the waves,
She emulates the streamline trout:
No hips! They're definitely out.
By swimming strokes her curves are placed
Where they belong -- above the waist!

"When auntie swam the old breast stroke."...
What memories those words evoke!
Long bathing skirts and stockings, too,
And bathing hats of every hue,
And ladies trying valiantly
To breast their way into the sea:
It must have done the trick at that,
For auntie surely wasn't flat.

- From "Sing or Swim," Louise Paine Benjamin, LHJ, July 1936

The action that I've been craving has been on land. Inspired by Jose Aponte, I've been outdoors most everyday running in the neighborhood in preparation for some short NYRR races this fall. I do plan to get back in the pool before too long however (seeking to avoid the locker room ribbing of the slacker).

Maraming Salamat

2007-09-27T17:33:00.000-07:00

The Big Shoulders 5k in Chicago was divine! Mighty thanks and hearty shout outs to Mary, Ray, Ismael, Susan, Hara, Stephanie, Carol V. H. , Marsha, Jim, Melissa, Kathleen, Hong, Tara, Brigid, Mario, Loida, Carol T. , Nina, Louise and the good people of Local 1930 for their encouragement and support. Together we raised $800 for the REFORMA scholarship program. Cheers!

Stormy, husky, brawling laughter

2007-09-06T04:15:00.000-07:00

This week, Yolanda Bonitch and Carl Sandburg have been my inspiration. And I've been reading Chicago Poems online. Check out the first entry:

Hog Butcher for the World,
Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat,
Player with Railroads and the Nation's Freight Handler;
Stormy, husky, brawling,
City of the Big Shoulders:
They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I have seen your painted women under the gas lamps luring the farm boys.
And they tell me you are crooked and I answer: Yes, it is true I have seen the gunman kill and go free to kill again.
And they tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the faces of women and children I have seen the marks of wanton hunger.
And having answered so I turn once more to those who sneer at this my city, and I give them back the sneer and say to them:
Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.
Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft cities;
Fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning as a savage pitted against the wilderness,
Bareheaded,
Shoveling,
Wrecking,
Planning,
Building, breaking, rebuilding,
Under the smoke, dust all over his mouth, laughing with white teeth,
Under the terrible burden of destiny laughing as a young man laughs,
Laughing even as an ignorant fighter laughs who has never lost a battle,
Bragging and laughing that under his wrist is the pulse, and under his ribs the heart of the people, Laughing!
Laughing the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of Youth, half-naked, sweating, proud to be Hog Butcher, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and Freight Handler to the Nation.

Goggles, cap, swimsuit, flip-flops, shorts. I'm packed and ready for the big swim in Lake Michigan and planning to sing with pride. The 5k is going to be sweet!

Brown girls, first generation brick

2007-08-31T11:04:00.000-07:00

Of the four poetry books that I've been juggling this week, two are absolute and utter standouts: Galway Kinnell's Strong is Your Hold and Patricia Smith's Teahouse of the Almighty. Kinnell's eleventh book of poems is loving, melancholic and meditative. Smith's work is empathetic, smoldering and muscular.

"It Had the Beat Inevitable" is an affirmation. Smith pays homage to her influences:

It's all right what Bobby Womack taught us, what Chaka growled,
O.K. to flaunt the hard stone double dutch planted in our calves.

Forgive Smokey for sending us off to search for that white horse
and the half-white boy riding it. Go on, shove that peppermint stick

down the center of that sour pickle, dine on a sandwich of Wonder
and souse, take your stand in that black woman assembly line to

scrape the scream from chitlins. It's all right that Mama caught the
'hound up from Alabama, that Daddy rode up from Arkansas and

you're the only souvenir they got. We brown girls, first generation
brick, sparkling in Dacron and pink sweat socks, we went the only

way we could. Our weather vane, whirling in Chicago wind, was
the rusted iron torso of a stout black woman. We vanished for a while.

Gwen Brooks hissed Follow. We had no choice.

Action without action

2007-08-28T17:13:00.000-07:00

Stephen Mitchell's English version of Tao Te Ching is fluid, modern and wonderfully accessible. Lao Tzu's 81 poems speak of the doctrine of Wu wei and offer much food for thought. Here's the ninth in the series:

Fill your bowl to the brim
and it will spill.
Keep sharpening the knife
and it will blunt.
Chase after money and security
and your heart will never unclench.
Care about people's approval
and you will be their prisoner.

Do your work, then step back.
The only path to serenity.

Today, Coach Lisa helped us "accomplish a great task/by a series of small acts," allowing everything to fall into place. Heaven's way is yard upon yard of calmness, composure and cool:

400 pull
6 x (50 fast kick, 25 med kick)
300 pull
6 x (50 med stroke/free, 25 fast stroke)
200 IM pull
6 x (50 free fast, 25 free med)
100 pull
5 x 100 free with breaststroke pullout at every wall

Let me bite into the azure

2007-08-11T11:47:00.000-07:00

In the preface of Charlestown Blues, Marilyn Hacker writes, "Guy Goffette is one of the most unabashedly lyrical contemporary French poets, at a time when, for English language readers at least, contemporary French poetry is characterized, or caricatured, as abstract, more concerned with concepts than with human experience (including history) and feeling: resolutely difficult." As I am writing under deadline (for LJ), my plan of action is to appreciate the "unabashedly lyrical" and avoid the "resolutely difficult." Fortunately, my first dip into the volume has been divine. Here are a few lines from the poem entitled "Ducal Ducasse":

...Let me go
away a while in search of suns more drunk
than this makeshift Orient beneath the
market-stalls' blue awnings, let me bite in-
to the azure, and like the angel with
savage eyes, let me have my turn to drink
the heady wine of the Hesperides.

Our team has turned to drinking the "heady wine" of the open water. We raced in Coney Island one weekend and the Long Island Sound, the next. And we all have been richly rewarded for our efforts. Lake Michigan awaits!

Raising for REFORMA

2007-08-04T15:24:00.000-07:00

I've been nursing a dream all summer. With the Huntington 10K and Governors Island Swims behind me, my focus has now turned toward preparation for one major race: The 17th Annual Chicago Masters' Big Shoulders 5K. My purpose for swimming this challenging event is to support REFORMA's efforts to promote library services to Latinos and Spanish-speakers and specifically raise monies for the association's annual scholarship drive. As a librarian working in New York City, I understand the importance of developing robust Spanish-language and Latino-oriented collections, but also recognize how critical it is that public libraries begin to actively recruit bilingual and multicultural staff. We need skilled library staff to lead bilingual storytimes, teach Spanish-language computer classes and help us effectively address the informational and reading needs of our Spanish-speaking patrons.

In swimming the 5K, I would like to honor Yolanda Bonitch, a very special librarian who has for many years been closely associated with outreach services. Yolanda has positively impacted the lives of thousands of New York City residents and through her daily work has set a fine example for many public librarians.

Summer 1967

2007-07-31T16:10:00.000-07:00

I've been reading some extraordinarily fine novels this summer among them Alice Greenaway's White Ghost Girls, a lyrical and haunting story about two American girls living in Hong Kong during the Maoist Revolution and the Vietnam War. The narration begins with these rich detailed lines:

What can you give me?
Can you give me a back alley, a smoke-filled temple where white-hooded mourners burn offerings and wail for the dead? The single chime of a high-pitched temple bell? The knocking of a wooden fish?
Can you give me hot rain, mould-streaked walls, a sharpness that creeps into my clothes, infests my books? The smells of dried oysters, clove hair oil, tiger balm, joss burning to Kuan Yin in the back room of a Chinese amah? The feverish shriek of cicadas, the cry of black-eared kites? The translucent green of sun shining through elephant ear leaves?
Can you give me a handful of coloured silk? An empty pack of cigarettes? A tape recorder? Narrow, stepped streets, balconies hung with shop signs, laundry strung on bamboo poles, rattan birdcages? A ripened pomelo split open? The chalky bone of cuttlefish?
Can you give me my father's hand in mind, Frankie's in the other? Then take everything and go away?
Because if you can't, it's not enough. And if you can, I might leave anyhow. I'll head for cover. Disappear in jungles of triple canopy.

This morning, our coach gave us a long and equally moving main set:
400 free pace

4 x 50 descend
300 free pace

4 x 50 descend

200 free pace

4 x 50 descend

100 free pace

4 x 50 descend

Five laws of library science

2007-07-17T18:26:00.000-07:00

What is the role of the public library in the 21st century? And what is library service? In the pool and out, I've been grappling with these two basic questions. The words of Dr. Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan (1892-1972) continue to provide me with inspiration and motivation. In the 1930s, the Indian mathematician contributed these guiding principles:

Books are for use.
Every reader his or her book.
Every book its reader.
Save the time of the reader.
The library is a growing organism.

Here is this morning's delicious main set:
400 freestyle pull moderate
4 x 100 sprint
300 freestyle pull moderate
4 x 75 sprint
200 freestyle pull moderate
4 x 50 sprint
100 freestyle pull
4 x 25 sprint

Orange you glad I didn't say banana?

2007-07-15T08:35:00.000-07:00

Gaitskill's Veronica is an unsentimental, poignant story about hard people with real hearts. The novel follows Allison Owen, a sick and aging former model, as she reflects on her life in the 1980s international fashion scene and her peculiar friendship with a tough, older and uncomely woman who has contracted AIDS. Allison unapologetically shares her view of the world in this passage of the book:

Yes, we were stupid for disrespecting the limits placed before us; for trying to go everywhere and know everything. Stupid, spoiled, and arrogant. But we were right, too. I was right. How could I do otherwise when the violence of the unsaid things became so great that it kept me awake at night? When I saw my father sitting in a chair, desperate to express what was inside him, making a code out of outdated symbols even his contemporaries could no longer recognize? When I saw him smile because my mother fell on her face and then put the smile away like it was a piece of paper? When I heard him rail against dying men because otherwise he had no form to give his hates and fears? All the meat of truth was hidden under a dry surface, everything revealed and made articulate, everything even our greatest embarrassments and lusts.

"All the meat of truth was hidden" under a wet surface at Huntington Bay this weekend. The currents were unkind. Hoping to complete the 10K distance, I patiently chased after those orange buoys, but was humbled and disappointed by the results. In three and a half hours (which included 1.5 hours of swimming in place), I had only travelled the 5k distance. Orange buoy after orange buoy, "everything [was] revealed and made articulate, everything even our greatest embarrassments and lusts." Sigh. Still, I couldn't be happier for teammates Hannah, Amanda, Colleen and Wiley who deservedly won medals and the folks from CIBBOWS who persevered, managing to avoid (what one of their members fondly calls) the "Ride of Shame."

A splendid address a really splendid address

2007-06-30T13:32:00.000-07:00

At Wednesday morning's workout, we paid homage to Gertrude Stein. Coach Chris asked us to "repeat, repeat and repeat" the following set three times through:
3 x 100 free descend
2 x 50 k ez
2 x 100 fast
1 x 50 k fast

The speedy intervals were as pleasing as the last paragraphs of a recent read. In the final scene of Fair Warning, Amy Dickerson, Butler's smart and stylish protagonist, studies the cityscape before her:

I felt a tender thing now for the Seine, for the trees and the lamps and the quai and the zinc roofs across the river and the cathedral burning down the way and the lights beyond. They were waiting for me. I'd walk alone through a Paris night to the Ritz and I'd collect myself along the way. I slipped my clothes back on and I took my first step, and as I did, I glanced toward Venus.

I understood now the look in her upturned face. She was alone in the world, but she was still rapturous in love. Even in the dim light I could see the twinkle in her eyes.

Life on the front line of learning

2007-06-26T18:43:00.000-07:00

Sharing the stage with former Senator Bill Bradley, Vartan Gregorian, president of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, spoke at the opening general session of the American Library Association Annual Conference in Washington D.C. this weekend. In his highly charged speech, Gregorian touched on topics ranging from the history and future of libraries to democracy, knowledge, community and change.

Born in Tabriz, Iran, Gregorian documented much of his life in The Road to Home: My Life and Times. In Chapter 12: A Rendezvous with the New York Public Library of the fascinating memoir, the legendary philanthropist Mrs. Brooke Astor discloses the secret to youthful longevity:

Be an optimist, be curious, read every night, don't meet the same people all the time (sooner or later they become lazy, boring, and repeat themselves), don't be a cynic, don't envy or be jealous (these sentiments are corrosive and they diminish you), spend some time in solitude in order to reflect, meet different people, young people, travel, and, if you are rich, adhere to the Gospel of "the Joy of Giving."

Pretty in pink

2007-06-17T18:14:00.000-07:00

This morning, we had IM repeats for appetizers followed by a distance pull set for the main course:
6 x 125 IM (with a rolling 50 stroke)
1-2: 50 fly
3-4: 50 back
5-6: 50 breast

400 pull
6 x 75 free pace
200 pull
4 x 75 free medium
100 pull
2 x 75 free fast
Our lane made every interval, and we were breathing hard by the finish. The coach's shout out from the deck ("Good. I know you're working hard when your backs are all pink") made us all smile.

Di momento de gracia

2007-06-10T17:36:00.000-07:00

Our head coach asked us to imagine the following open water scenario: "You're swimming along at a steady pace when all of a sudden, the currents turn unpredictably against you. And you have to make adjustments and pick up your turnover."
Saturday and Sunday's main sets focused on swimming in variable waters and involved lots of pulling. Both days provided intense upper body workouts.

Here is Saturday's main set:
100 free moderate swim
1 x 50 pull fast
100 free moderate swim
3 x 50 pull fast
100 free moderate swim
5 x 50 pull fast
100 free moderate swim
7 x 50 pull fast
100 free moderate swim
9 x 50 pull fast
100 free moderate swim

From Sunday morning...repeat the following six times:
150 pull moderate
3 x 50 pull descend

My reading, this weekend, was purposely light. After finishing Betsy Carter's sweet novel about a young woman who leaves the Bronx to join a school of mermaids in Florida's Gulf Coast, I picked up Gracie, a teenage sports story. My favorite part of the book is when the teen and her father are studying film clips of Pelé, the former Brazilian football player.

"Keep watching," Dad said to me. On the screen, Pelé was tracking a much bigger opponent. The player knocked him down, but Pelé sprang back up, stole the ball and scored.
"Pelé wasn't tall or fast, but he had it up here," Dad said, tapping his forehead. "And he had it in here," he pointed to his heart. "He made the impossible possible." He turned his attention back to the screen. "Look how he absorbs that guy's energy and turns it on him!"
Dad got up and began to pace as he watched Pelé in action. "In every game there's one moment when one player can change everything. Di momento de gracia."
Dad rewound the film and gestured for me to come beside him so we could look at it together. This time he ran the scene of Pelé taking the ball from the larger player in slow motion. "Right there, when that guy hesitates...that's the moment, when everything sets up perfect and then pauses. Pelé feels it [and scores].

Skip

2007-06-04T18:58:00.000-07:00

The characters in James Salter's Last Night stand like carefully rendered Hopper figures--lonely men and women desperately searching for an authentic life. A man is chided for being "oblivious to the wreckage" of his first marriage. A wife finds herself competing for her husband's attention. And in the story "Bangkok," when two former lovers revisit their past, one tries to dismiss the "phantom skip" of his heart. Written with such an economy of words, Salter's spare and startling stories read like urgent messages from the front.

The dazzle of the here and now

2007-05-29T17:14:00.000-07:00

Captivated "by the dazzle of the here and now," Eamon Grennan writes poetry which offers refreshing "quick blinks" of the natural world. Each piece in "The Quick of It" is untitled, composed of ten lines and marked by a crisp use of color, rich movement and atmospheric change. Bloodred tulips, russet stones, "spear-shaped" green leaves and the "depthless black reflecting eye" of a finch are observed, as are: windhovering hawks, "the zigzagging cruise of bees" and a heron's rise and glide. Grennan asserts the need to "settle down" and "drink" in a world both lush and luminous.

These days, our pool workouts have been equally resplendent. Our focus is pure distance:
1 x 400 Free Pace
2 x 50 Kick*
2 x 300 Free Pace
2 x 50 Kick*
3 x 200 Free Pace
2 x 50 Kick*
4 x 100 Free Pace
2 x 50 Kick*
*Swim as recovery.

Happy wandering fishes in water

2007-05-28T15:01:00.000-07:00

In How to Be Sexy, Carmen Electra freely admits she does not read novels; rather, she prefers self-help. I'm not sure which titles make the model/actress's top ten list, but I suspect she's not a Chicken-Soup-for-the-Soul kinda gal.

Lately, I have joined Ms. Electra's camp and been on a major league self-help reading binge. Sports psychology and motivational titles are my current staples. And Working Out, Working Within: The Tao of Inner Fitness through Sports and Exercise by Jerry Lynch and Chungliang Al Huang is a recent favorite. Based on ideas adapted from the Tao Te Ching and the I Ching, the book offers practical advice on goal setting, developing personal strength and improving athletic performance. Additionally, it presents a number of inspirational stories:

A sixty-year old athlete had set a goal of running under three hours in the marathon. After thirteen unsuccessful attempts at his almost impossible task, a friend asked why he continued to attempt what seemed to be a futile ambition. Without a moment's hesitation, he stated that the attainment of the goal was not the objective; his kick was the elation he experienced in other parts of his life from setting that goal: repeated months and years of joy, training at high levels, getting into shape, eating well and feeling terrific. Nothing else in life could do that for him. The goal became simply a lantern that illuminated his way and, according to him, "kept me totally involved with health and wellness, a process relevant to my spiritual growth in all aspects of life."

Dis-tuhns

2007-05-20T17:23:00.000-07:00

Our head coach declared Saturday the official start of the open water season. Although some of the team needed to taper for IGLA, there would be no let up for us. We would be swimming distance. Finally, an opportunity to focus on the Huntington 10K!
1000 yard warm up
4 x 25 Kick IM order
4 x 50 Drill/Swim IM order
4 x 75 Swim/Kick/Swim IM order
400 Freestyle (every 4th lap backstroke)
300 Freestyle (every 3rd lap breaststroke)
200 Freestyle (every other lap butterfly drill)
4 x 300 (laps 1, 4, 7, 10 kick)
300 IM

Desperately seeking Susan

2007-05-06T12:12:00.000-07:00

In See Jane Lead: 99 Ways for Women to Take Charge at Work and in Life, Lois P. Frankel, PhD considers the quintessential qualities necessary for successful leadership. When she asks her workshop participants to name the people who made a significant difference in their lives (e.g. teachers, coaches, bosses) and tell the group what made this person so effective, their lists nearly always include some of the following key behaviors:

Treated me as human being, not just an employee.
Believed in me when I didn't believe in myself.
Went to bat for me.
Kept his or her word.
Trusted me.
Stretched me by setting high expectations and giving me the tools to achieve them.
Asked for my opinion--and listened to the answer.
Set a good example.
Showed enthusiasm for his or her work.

Libraryland is chockfull of encouraging, trusting and generous folk. I've been lucky enough to know many a librarian with these notable charateristics. Someday I hope to pay tribute to these mentors (among them a special person named Susan).

Making noise

2007-05-02T18:23:00.000-07:00

In the second chapter of Catherine McCall's autobiography, Lifeguarding: A Memoir of Secrets, Swimming and the South, she writes about the thrill of competition:

At age six, I was something of a hero at Big Spring, at least on summer Sundays during swim meets. I was speedy and already comprehended the importance of winning, of scoring points for our team and making my parents feel proud. Somthing happened every second at a swim meet. It wasn't a quiet sport, like golf or tennis, but a busy, noisy one, full of stopping and starting and cheering and clapping. Only when the starter said, "Take your mark" would everyone stop in midgesture, mid-sentence, as if on a movie set and someone had just yelled "Freeze!" Moments later, the gunshot would release the swimmers, and the whistling and cheers would turn on again.

My meet in Yonkers this past weekend was relatively subdued in comparison. Six of us donned team suits and were a quiet force (although some of us were still recovering from the rigors of swim camp). The day's highlight was watching Coach Jun compete in breaststroke. The man has a pullout to die for. Travelling faster than a water snake beneath the surface of the water, he ends up halfway down the length of the pool in a matter of seconds. Impressive!

"Summer afternoon - Summer afternoon... the two most beautiful words in the English language."

2007-04-18T11:57:00.000-07:00

In his artful novel, The Master, Colm Toibin brings to life Henry James' rare sensibility. Toibin plumbs the writer's psyche, detailing James' rich interior life and progressive vision and shows the writer at work shaping the contours of stories. Toibin emphasizes the importance of solitude:

"He loved the glorious silence a morning brought, knowing that he had no appointments that afternoon and no engagements that evening. He had grown fat on solitude, he thought, and had learned to expect nothing from the day but at best a dull contentment. Sometimes the dullness came to the fore with a strange and insistent ache which he would entertain briefly, but learn to keep at bay. Mostly, however, it was the contentment he entertained; the slow ease and the silence could, once night had fallen, fill him with a happiness that nothing, no society nor the company of any individual, no glamour or glitter, could equal."

This week at TNYA's spring training, we have grown tone on swimming and learned to expect nothing from the day but blue skies, sun and water.

"But for one brilliant moment, they dazzled."

2007-04-14T15:00:00.000-07:00

Set in postcolonial Nigeria, Chris Abani's Graceland tells the tender story of a teenage Elvis impersonator who spends his days entertaining tourists and negotiating Lagos' ghetto walkways. While Elvis' father considers his dancing useless and friends suggest he "let go of his childish dreams," the teen proceeds wistfully determined as he sings "Hound Dog" off-key, imitates the King's hip thrusts and fantasizes about life in America. Abani traces a life of yearning and stirs wishes into a pot of bitter leaf soup. Consider the following early passage from this standout novel:

Giving up on reading, [Elvis] let his mind drift as he stared at the city, half slum, half paradise. How could a place be so ugly and violent yet beautiful at the same time? he wondered.

He hadn't known about the poverty and violence of Lagos until he arrived. It was as if people conspired with the city to weave a web of silence around its unsavory parts. People who didn't live in Lagos only saw postcards of skyscrapers, sweeping flyovers, beaches and hotels. And those who did, when they returned to their ancestral small towns at Christmas, wore designer clothes and threw money around. They breezed in, lived an expensive whirlwind life, and then left after a couple of weeks, to go back to their ghetto lives.

But for one brilliant moment, they dazzled: the women in flashy clothes, makeup and handbags that matched their shoes, daring to smoke in public and drink beer straight from the bottle; and the men, sharp dressers who did not rat on you to your parents if they caught you smoking. They let you take sips of their beer and shoved a few naira into your shirt pocket.

"First, we holiday--then we suffer,"

2007-04-08T08:56:00.000-07:00

Alfred amusingly pronounces as he pushes off the wall for a 16 x 100 freestyle set. An eager group of seven swimmers follows him up and down the lane as he alternates between moderate and hard intervals and ends with three fast 100-meter repeats.

The Way of the Champion by Jerry Lynch and Chungliang Al Huang is my current inspirational reading. In Chapter 3, the authors focus on preparing for competition and touch on the ability to learn from failure:

Athletics is a perfect environment for learning lessons about how to deal with crisis because, in the space of a one-hour contest, you are forced to face some or all of the many forms of adversity: defeat, mistakes, errors, failures, frustration, fatigue, injury, plateaus, and even success with its fleeting nature. By learning to adjust the focus of your lens of perception on these forms of adversity, and beginning to embrace them for what they ultimately offer, you take your first stop on the way of gaining the competitive edge in sport as well as all of life.

fā'vər-ĭt

2007-04-03T17:31:00.000-07:00

Last week, a special friend turned me on to Tracy K. Smith's poetry. Duende, Smith's latest collection is fiery, substantive, passionate and personal. " Her topics are marriage, war and survival. "Letter to a Photojournalist Going-in" begins:

You go to the pain. City after city. Borders
Where they peer into your eyes as if to erase you.

You go by bus or truck, days at a time, just taking it
When they throw you into a room or kick at your gut,

Taking it when a strong fist hammers person after person
A little deeper into the ground. Your camera blinks...

The narrator later confides, "Your voice fits my ear like a secret. I want to keep it there." And in the final stanza, her stance is adamant and more urgent:

I want my heart to beat like yours: from the outside in,
A locket stuffed with faces that refuse to be named. For time

To land at my feet like a grenade.

This morning, the coach's workout was equally distinct; we ended in flight.
6 x (50, 75, 100)
Repeat the following twice:
On the first round, focus on 50 fast, 75 and 100 pace.
On the second round, focus on 50 pace, followed by 75 fast and 100 pace.
On the third round, focus on 50 and 75 pace, followed by 100 fast.

4 x 75 (BK/BR/FR)
4 x 25 FL

Personal best

2007-03-27T15:27:00.000-07:00

Over 110 Metropolitan Masters swimmers travelled to Harvard University's Blodgett Pool to participate in the New England Master's Short Course Championships this past weekend. A small group of us from Team New York Aquatics attended and swam our little hearts out. I was thoroughly inspired watching the seasoned swimmers at the competition, especially those in age groups 80-84 and over. Just before the start of Women's 100 IM, the host presented an honorary award to a 90-year-old swimmer from Connecticut. The man sets personal bests every day he's in the water. I was so moved by his gracious acceptance speech that my eyes welled and goggles fogged when I stepped up to the blocks.

This morning, Coach Lisa gave us a stellar main set:
400 Free, 4 x 100 IMs
300 Free, 3 x 100 Back
200 Free, 2 x 100 Breast
100 Free, 1 x 100 Fly
For some of us, the 3 x 100 backstroke was a continuous swim.

Oh happy day

2007-03-26T15:41:00.001-07:00

Friday, March 23rd marked the unveiling of The New York Public Library's 51st annual publication of Books to Remember. It was a rare treat listening to seven of the Library's finest discussing the 25 books that they've discovered (after a year-long quest) to be the most compelling, thought-provoking and memorable of reads. The morning was a pure and absolute celebration of books, authors, reading and (I must add) librarianship. And I felt privileged to participate in the special occasion and honored to meet such extraordinarily talented writers as Rachel Sherman, Rich Cohen and Martha Collins.

A modern event

2007-03-08T19:21:00.000-08:00

With the publication of her fifth volume of poetry, Martha Collins is at the top of her game. Blue Front tells the haunting story of a witnessed crime and proffers a potent view of race relations. In a voice bold and matter-of-fact, she writes:

There were trees on those streets that were named
for trees: Sycamore, Cedar, Poplar, Pine,
Elm, where the woman's body was found,
where the man's body was taken and burned--

There must have been trees, there were trees
on Seventh Street, in front of the house that stands
in the picture behind the carriage that holds
the boy's mother, the boy's cousin, the boy--

And of course there were trees on Washington
Avenue, wide boulevard lines with exotic
gingkoes, stately magnolias, there were trees
on that street that are still on that street,

trees that shaded the fenced-in yards of the large
Victorian houses, the mansion built by the man
who sold flour to Grant for the Union troops,
trees that were known to the crowd that saw

the victim hanged, though not on a tree, this
was not the country, they used a steel arch
with electric lights, and later a lamppost, this
was a modern event, the trees were not involved.

The hills are alive with the sound of salsa

2007-03-04T08:58:00.000-08:00

bag pipes and steel drums. I just returned from a fun 5k run with Melissa in Washington Heights. Race participants were treated to an open air concert along the route. Despite the humbling hills, hundreds of runners seemed to enjoy this extraordinary morning filled with sunshine and song. Picture a beaming Julie Andrews on top of the impressive Untersberg mountain. "The hills fill my heart with the sound of music. My heart wants to sing every song it hears."

Five gentlemen and a lady

2007-03-03T12:17:00.000-08:00

Averaging six swimmers per lane, this morning's practice at City College was a full house. The head coach gave us a rigorous, highly structured workout which included: 8 x 50 rolling IMs; 400/300/200 pulls; 300/200/100 IMs; and a series of IM kick sets. Being the slowest kid on the block, I planted myself squarely at the back of the pack and tried (with mixed success) to keep apace with the boyz. Lucky for me, I swam with five chaps who were gentlemen of the highest order. Considerate, well-mannered and good-natured, these swimmers' smiles buoyed me through the most challenging sets. And with ten minutes left, Alfred's encouraging shout out ("You're doing good!") positively sustained me the final 600 yards. How generous!

State of preparedness

2007-03-02T04:48:00.000-08:00

In a profile of Wynton Marsalis, Touré describes the distinguished musician pondering his next move:

I really don't know what I'm gonna do, he sa[ys]. I'm gonna do something, though. I gotta do something to express all this gratitude. Man, you start sittin around, then the ideas stop comin to you. When you're workin the spirit understands that you are serious and you are preparing yourself to receive that information. Stay in the state of preparedness. Coltrane said that. You got to stay in the state of preparedness all the time.

Our coaches have been preparing us for the upcoming swim meet in Nassau County Aquatic Center. On Tuesday, the coach had us practice dive starts and emphasized the importance of being comfortable standing right on the edge. Initially, we jumped off the blocks feet first like penguins advancing into Antarctic waters. Later, we bent down, shifted our weight and tried driving forward. Although hardly fearless, one by one like Adelie, Chinstrap, Gentoo and Emperor, we persisted and experimented, diving, paddling and slowly waddling our way back to the start.

re- + laxāre

2007-02-24T11:07:00.000-08:00

This morning, our coach gave us the following 2,250-yard main set:
6 x 25 kick
1 x 150 free
6 x 25 catch up drill
2 X 150 free
6 x 25 EZ back
3 X 150 free
6 x 25 stroke
4 x 150 free
6 x 25 double arm back
Since we had to swim each set of 150s at progressively faster intervals, I tried as much as possible to: 1) relax; 2) mentally avoid playing catch up with the leader; and 3) focus on stroke length and rate.

This week, I am reading the deliciously distinctive pop-culturally oriented essays in Never Drank the Kool-Aid. When developing his profiles, Touré handles subjects/topics/issues like a seasoned book discussion group leader. He writes:

I interview people as if I'm talking to a friend, being relaxed and folksy and familiar. I like to let the conversation take the shape that my subject wants it to take. I guide it here and there, but I'm always trying to make it a casual journey, and I'm always trying to sense what they want to talk about. I always listen closely and respond to what they want to say rather than just running down a list of questions and having a structured back and forth. Good interviewing isn't really about the questions you ask, it's about follow-ups. Through active listening I often get people to tell me things I wouldn't have known to ask them.

Gimme Shelter

2007-02-22T18:25:00.000-08:00

After warming up with 7 x 100 FR, our crafty lane knitted a three-row swatch, swimming a 9 x 75 stroke set in a K/K/S pattern:

FL BK BR
FL BR BK
BK BR FL

When our coach followed this up with a meditative 8 x 100 FR set, I found myself thinking about Girlbomb, Janice Erlbaum's unblinking memoir of her teenage years in 1980s New York City. Here's a cogent snippet:

"How are you tonight?" she asked.
I was...How was I? Disoriented. In shock. Just two hours ago, I had been heating up some lentil soup at my mom's in Brooklyn, thinking I'd eat it and maybe read some Edith Wharton before bed. Now here I was at a runaway shelter, staring at a nun's mustache and wondering where I was going to spend my adolescence.

African-American Voices

2007-02-14T14:46:00.000-08:00

Absorbing memoirs, bold essays, compelling poems and riveting short stories. Two of my favorite libarians on the planet have compiled a booklist which highlights recent titles by and about African-Americans. In "Miscegenation," poet Natasha Trethewey contemplates the Mississippi her parents once knew and the one they left behind. In Never Drank the Kool-Aid, critic Touré examines the world of "sensitive thugs," performing artists and politicians. And in Letters to a Young Brother, actor Harper Hill offers encouraging words of advice. Inspiring!

The virtues of bilateralism

2007-02-11T12:11:00.000-08:00

After plowing through a series of IMs, our lane swam a 6 x 50 freestyle drill set and concentrated on alternate breathing (i.e. breathing every three strokes for the first 25 yards and every five strokes, the second). I found Coach Jun's bilateral breathing exercise helped me focus on stroke symmetry in the water.

These days, I have been alternating between the realms of fiction and nonfiction, (practicing bilateral reading, if you will) and have found shifting between fact and story, narration and information, tale and thesis especially rewarding. After reading Howard's haunting first novel, I turned to professional reading on transforming teams. And after following Abel Crofton rush through the streets of Amsterdam, I considered Stoddard's advice in You Are Your Choices. In swimming and reading, my goals are to find a balance and move beyond the comfort zone.

Meditations on perfection

2007-01-31T08:21:00.000-08:00

The butterfly, requiring tremendous coordination and strength, is considered by many swimmers to be one of the most complex strokes to master. So when Coach Lisa asked us to execute a series of "perfect" butterflies at a recent workout, I counted myself among the country--or rather, continent--of swimmers filled with dread and self-doubt.

Fortunately, there was no need to fret because the 12 x 25s set was not only an exercise in confidence-building, but a source of unexpected bliss. For the first 25 yards, we began with one butterfly stroke and continued to swim freestyle the rest of the pool's length. In the next 25, we swam two "perfect butterflies," again followed by freestyle. It was a rhythmic fly, fly, fly, followed by free, free, free, free, free on the third lap of the pool. And finally, after building up to the goal of six technically perfect butterflies, we happily worked our way down the ladder back to one. Delight!

The one perfect butterfly in my reading life has been Ravi Howard's compelling debut novel, Like Trees, Walking. Incredible!

Swimming with a purpose

2007-01-21T14:04:00.000-08:00

Go Sondra! Go Jack! Go David! Go Barbie! Allez, allez, allez! Over 100 masters swimmers showed up this weekend for the 17th Annual One Hour Swim, a fundraiser for two extraordinary nonprofit organizations which offer a comprehensive range of programs and services to individuals and families living with and at risk for HIV/AIDS: the AIDS Service Center NYC and the Momentum Project. Tremendous!

On training your mind

2007-01-15T18:02:00.000-08:00

In preparation for the upcoming One Hour Swim, our team practices have emphasized distance. Yesterday, the head coach gave us a main set of 2,400 yards which consisted of 24 x 100s {i.e. 3 x100 pace followed by 1 x 100 at 85% effort}. Our lane was fortunate enough to have Bill as a leader (consistency being his middle name). Finding a comfortable space at the end of the pack, I daydreamed about the views from Lake Michigan, hummed "Let it Snow" and mulled over Dean 's suggestions in Open Water Swimming: A Complete Guide for Distance Swimmers and Triathletes. The guru stresses:

70 to 80 percent of any open water swim is mental.
Mental training is a daily process.
You have to control pressure instead of letting it control you.
Relaxation is the first component of mental training one must learn.
To be successful, one's mind has to support one's body.

Power Lunch

2007-01-13T16:07:00.000-08:00

At least once a month, I join Martha (my lifelong teammate) for lunch in Midtown. More often, we discuss our shared passion for books and swimming over paninis. Early this week, we sketched out our 2007 race calendar. And among the events we're planning to train for this year are the:

Annual One Hour Swim
Groundhog Meet in Westport, CT
New England Masters Short Course Yards Championships
USMS 6+ Mile Open Water Championships in Huntington, NY
Chicago Masters' Big Shoulders 5K

This list certainly gives me five reasons to leave the safe harbor of my bed and head for the pool at 5:30 AM.

The city as beloved

2007-01-02T16:46:00.000-08:00

Set in 1960s London, Off the King's Road is Phyllis Raphael's immensely appealing story of self-discovery. Leaving Los Angeles to join her film producer husband in England, Raphael is shocked to discover him having an affair with an eighteen-year-old actress. After twelve years of marriage, Raphael finds herself navigating the world as a single mother of three, seeking solace in London's maze-like streets and the company of freethinkers, i.e. actors, writers, painters and musicians--even an "anti-psychiatrist psychiatrist" who encourages her to strip away the sacrosanct. "Break out. The nuclear family is over. Try something new." And Raphael does! The self-described "person of small ambitions" turns adventuress and finds a voice of her own. Positively delightful!

On swimming pretty

2007-01-01T07:36:00.001-08:00

A month into her job at a department store, teenage swimming champion Esther Williams receives an unexpected phone call from Billy Rose's Aquacade office asking her to audition for a San Franciso-based show. Curious about "swimming as entertainment," Williams joins fifty other women at a Los Angeles Athletic Club, and when asked to demonstrate her skills, she decides to swim as fast as she can.
"You swim very fast," the producer says.
"That's what I do, Mr. Rose. I'm a sprint swimmer. The U.S. 100-meter freestyle champion," Esther replies.
"I don't want fast; I want pretty."
"Mr. Rose, if you're not strong enough to swim fast, then you're probably not strong enough to swim 'pretty'."
He puffs his cigar and thinks about it. "You're probably right. I want you to swim with your head up and your shoulders out of the water."
"That would take a really good, stong kick," Esther tells him, " and when you swim fast you have a really strong kick."
"Well, that's very informative. You know your stuff about swimming. Do you want the job?"
"Mr. Rose, I already have a job at I. Magnin, and if I take a job swimming professionally for you, I'll lose my amateur standing and any chance to be in the Olympics."
"Young lady, there's a war on and there aren't going to be any Olympics Games for a long time. What are you gonna do in the meantime, eat your medals? You might as well make some money with your talent," Rose says handing Esther a business card.
In her sparkling memoir, The Million Dollar Mermaid, Esther Williams reflects candidly on a professional career built on swimming pretty, while personally struggling to keep her head above water.

Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)

2006-12-31T07:09:00.000-08:00

This week, I came to realize:

My father was right; "Health is wealth."
Jogging is good, but jogging with Sly and the Family Stone is better.
Distance freestyle sets (e.g. 6 x 300 meters) bring me Faustian joy.
Reading Rukeseyer's poem about Kathe Kollwitz deepened my appreciation of women's memoirs.
The modern canonical "Diving into the Wreck" continues to resonate to this day.

Chlorine Queen

2006-12-21T15:59:00.000-08:00

"You're not in the holiday spirit if you don't do a flipturn,"our head coach said smilingly. The turnout for this morning's Twelve Days of Christmas practice was formidable and the workout, fantastically varied. Included among the sets our true love asked for were:

6 x 50 double-arm backstrokes
5 x 50 six freestyle strokes followed by one somersault
4 x 25 feet-first sculls
3 x 50 sidestrokes (performed to perfection, one talented lane 5 swimmer earned the coveted title of "Chlorine Queen")
2 x 50 doggie paddle (bark included)

For the final 1 x100 set, all of us (i.e. over 20 swimmers!) hopped into a single lane and whooped it up in a spirited, carnival-like celebration.

Are you nice?

2006-12-10T16:55:00.000-08:00

I sped read through The Power of Nice: How to Conquer the Business World With Kindness, a thoroughly inspiring and refreshing new book, while commuting to Yonkers for this Saturday's swim meet. Even Thaler and Koval's introduction made me smile:

Nice has an image problem. Nice gets no respect. To be labeled “nice” usually means the other person has little else positive to say about you. To be nice is to be considered Pollyanna and passive, wimpy, and Milquetoast. Let us be clear: Nice is not naive. Nice does not mean smiling blandly while others walk all over you. Nice does not mean being a doormat. In fact, we would argue that nice is the toughest four-letter word you’ll ever hear. It means moving forward with the clear-eyed confidence that comes from knowing that being very nice and placing other people’s needs on the same level as your own will get you everything you want.

Back to Basics

2006-12-04T18:19:00.000-08:00

After spotting the full moon rise above Manhattan's canyons this morning, I should have been prepared for the unexpected. Coach Jim's practice was chock full of surprises. He started the workout with a set of sculling drills. The first in the series required us to lie on our backs in a feet-forward position and use only our hands to navigate the 25-meter pool.

He might has well have asked us (or rather, me) to paddle across the pool using a pair of plastic swizzle sticks. While the lane 2 and 3 swimmers were steadily cruising from point to point, I was going nowhere slapping and splashing water to and fro, fruitlessly attempting to make little whirlpools with my hands. Like the USS Intrepid, I felt stuck. In Baruch's equivalent of Dante's fifth circle of hell, I attempted to cross the Styx, barely inching my way to the backstroke flags.

David G. Thomas writes in the primer Swimming: Steps to Success,"Sculling is important because it is the first propulsive swimming movement you will learn. It is vital to those with very little buoyancy, because they would not be able be able to remain on the surface without it." Used by all swimmers at various times, he adds, sculling "greatly increases a swimmer's proficiency." After today's humbling exercise, I realize the need to focus on developing my basic skills if I truly want to make progress in this sport.

Hot and Heavy at the Holiday Party

2006-12-03T15:13:00.000-08:00

Nearly 5,000 runners came out for the 5-mile race in Central Park this weekend. There were teams of spirited kids and folks donning elfin and reindeer costumes. Although I was feeling hot and heavy (Translation: overdressed and overweight) during the first three miles, once I hit Cat Hill, I was ceased by the holiday spirit and followed the conga line of runners trotting up the East Side.

This year's Independent and Small Press Book Fair gave me much food for thought. The PEN American-sponsored program on Literature of Color generated a rich dialogue about race, community, the publishing industry and writing. Panelist Monique Truong, author of The Book of Salt, shared a powerful anecdote involving a solicitation from The New York Times. (If you haven't had the pleasure of reading Truong's debut novel, you must. Poignant, witty and sumptuous, the book is a fictional memoir of a Vietnamese man serving as a cook for Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas).

November in Paris

2006-11-26T16:00:00.000-08:00

Knowing that the R was going to be sporadic this weekend, I ambitiously packed three books for Saturday's commute to practice. I pored over Gabrielle Bell's wry, angst-ridden Lucky, a graphic novel chronicling her life as a young artist in Brooklyn. In one scene, she writes about her work in jewelry production: "It's an easy, painless, even pleasant job. But because I have to go to it everyday it is still a kind of jail to me, albeit a comfortable one. The wardens are thoughtful and trusting." Bell humorously continues, "In order to sustain us through mind-numbing jobs, it is necessary to tell ourselves lies, and mine is that if only I was surrounded by France, I would no longer feel perpetually ill at ease. Of course my knowledge of the country comes only from novels, music and movies, but worst of all, Proust. As far as I know, everyone in Paris spends their time gazing at flowers and searching their memories."

On the trip home, I read Joe Sacco's War's End: Profiles From Bosnia 1995-1996, a potent graphic novel about the Yugoslav War, and dipped into Kirsten Smith's young adult novel in verse, The Geography of Girlhood.

The Boyz from Ipanema

2006-11-18T10:40:00.000-08:00

You can tell our team is gearing up for the December meet because lately the workouts have been taken up a notch. This week's focus was: distance, strength and speed.

On Wednesday, we were assigned a series of stroke sets including:
4 x 25 FL, descending
50 K, no board
4 x 50 BK, descending
50 K, no board
4 x 75 BR, descending
50 K, no board
4 x 100 FR, descending
50 K, no board

Needless to say, this particular IM set was demanding, but I found a good song to help keep me focussed. (Did you know that Gertrude Ederle maintained a breakneck pace during her record Channel crossing by singing "Let Me Call You Sweetheart" while Michael Phelps gravitated toward hip hop at the Athens Olympics?). Inspired by the "tall and tan and young and lovely" swimmers around me, I contentedly hummed Antonio Carlos Jobim's well known bossa nova song until the clock struck eight.

Friday's practice was a different story altogether. When Coach hollered, "Love that lactic acid!," my internal DJ put on some good ol' fashioned punk.

IM heaven

2006-11-10T18:47:00.000-08:00

Although a morning person, I always make an effort to show up for Wednesday night's practice at John Jay. The workouts are challenging and full of splendor and surprise. One evening, our coach stood on deck donning a tinsel tiara. The following week, he decided to have a show-and-tell, pointing proudly to one of his prized possessions: a framed, autographed 8x10 color glossy of Charo.

Disappointments are rare in the pool. The only time I experience letdowns is when a lanemate complains about the set. Like this past Wednesday, when Coach topped off our stroke set with a 200 individual medley (IM). Within a millisecond, one of the swimmers stared incredulously at him and whined, "200 IM?!!"

In The Rules of Work: The Unspoken Truth about Getting Ahead in Business, Richard Templar writes, "Moaning is pointless. It is unproductive and achieves nothing." It only:

identifies you as idle, petty, trivial
wastes time
makes you a magnet for other moaners
gets you a reputation as someone who doesn't offer anything productive or helpful
demotivates you and sets up a vicious circle.

I might add, moaning (in the pool) is the ultimate psych-out.

In order to be effective, Templar suggests folks follow Rules 8 ("Enjoy What You Are Doing") and 12 ("Cultivate a Smile"). He adds, "Work is fun--engrave it on your heart."

Kick-start

2006-11-06T09:03:00.000-08:00

When you travel up and down the first lane of Baruch's pool, underwater spotlights shine on you so brightly, you feel like an understudy in an Esther Williams dance production. Guessing that Coach Jim was going to give us another one of his perfectly choreographed workouts, I was tempted to send a spirited "It's showtime!" shout out across the lane this morning--but resisted, knowing that too much pep on a Monday would surely invite some glares.

We started with what I have termed Coach's signature "Rockette" set. After swimming to the deep end of the pool, we lined up for a series of vertical kicks (i.e. alternating between breaststroke and freestyle kicks while raising our elbows up in the air for a period of 20 seconds). Like dancers, we were mindful of our posture and position in the water. And although we lacked marabou hats, sparkling sequins and ostrich plumes, Lisa, Anne and I kicked, kicked, kicked with the razzle-dazzle enthusiasm of Radio City's stars.

On Fearlessness

2006-11-05T16:45:00.000-08:00

The first three lines of Ted Kooser's "Surviving" read:

There are days when the fear of death
is as ubiquitous as light. It illuminates
everything.

Halloween marks the anniversary of my mother's untimely death. As a result, this time of year, I find myself (as the voice in Kooser's poem suggests) "attentive/to everything living," reflecting on my raisons d'etre. This evening, I decided to sign up for the New York Road Runners' next 4 miler; and I plan to run this event with purpose, dedication and love.

A Rhetorical Question

2006-10-29T13:58:00.003-08:00

It was 47 degrees with a 10 mph wind. With over 6,000 runners in attendance, Central Park was abuzz with activity. Folks were: filling out registration forms; stretching their limbs; hydrating; warming up; unpacking their gear; meeting teammates; chatting about where, when, how far and how often they run. After securing her race chip and bib number, Melissa asked, "How is it I can get up at 6:30 and travel all the way for this and can't get up in the morning everyday for work?" "Because this is play," I offered.

After spending the last six months working out in water (pool/bay/ocean/river/pond), I had no business entering a 5-mile race, but couldn't resist a chance to enjoy a run in the park with a friend. And since Melissa was game, we ran: past Strawberry Fields, the reservoir, across the transverse on to the East Drive, chugging towards Cleopatra's Needle, Cat Hill, the boathouse and Tavern on the Green. And while I was challenged by the successive hills today, I found it possible to relax by (as Dr. Keith Bell suggests) "really being there" running and focussing on the glorious autumn day. Each step we took was: a celebration, fun, play.

In Championship Sports Psychology, Dr. Bell recommends the use of imagery to enduce relaxation in a performance situation. He suggests:

imagining a pleasant, "very comfortable, peaceful setting"

carefully attending to the scene in detail

using all of your senses

looking for the various sights

noticing different colors and shapes

listening to the sounds

being aware of the smells

paying close attention to how it feels

experiencing it all in a very calm, relaxing a peaceful way.