journal entry from march: hot, heavy, oppressive heat. the kind that makes breathing an enormous task, shallow and rapid, then the occasional, desperate sigh. lung meniscus. no one was home, mother in bed napping, so I went to the pool in search of air. cheeks flushing, I frightened off a squirrel while stepping out of my shorts, peeling off my old harvard shirt i bought for too much money when i was sixteen and infatuated with the idea of higher education, cut at the bottom to become a crop top. now I wade, ankles first, then knees, and then Iām teetering on my toes, my hips just below the water. I teeter there for ages, resisting, the whole time thinking about how a just-turned-twenty-four body is becoming the testament to my motherās refrain from my childhood that age would make getting into pools much harder, which I didnāt want to believe, but did believe, with a sadness as heavy as this heat. now, here it is, manifested, my thighs still getting used the water, my nakedness a vulnerability in a giant garden with a meadow behind the fence, stretching to meet a road somewhere in the middle distance. finally, I flatten my feet, dip my hands in, let the water lap at my wrists with little licks. deep breath in in preparation to submerge, but then I breathe out again, my brain having made the decision without my body. try again, the same process. and once more. finally, some courage in my abdomen thrusts me under, and the cold is like winter hands on a warm neck, and Iām up again, and my hair isnāt even properly damp, but Iām used to it now, so I do it again ā fast. then I step out with a glide and a splash or two, twist a towel around my hair, step back into the clothes, and, barefoot, make my way across the prickly, dried up grass to the front porch Iāve inhabited all morning.
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