My daughter taught a private lesson today. She was standing in for another teacher who was sick. The lifeguard warned her that they were beginners. She expected this to mean that they had some swim skill, but after observing them, my daughter knew these kids couldn’t swim at all.

They were a family of African children, ages 7, 9, and 11. My daughter encouraged the young swimmers to use kickboards, showed them proper form and helped them by holding up their legs. By the end of the lesson, the oldest, a boy, was kicking independently. She cheered for him, and their mother told my daughter she hoped to see her next week.

The lesson reminded me of the things I read about closing the swimming gap between blacks and whites. Most articles tap dance around the subject of black swim teachers. Maybe because since the drowning rate is generational, black swim teachers are uncommon.

But Cullen Jones is going all over the country getting in the pool with youngsters, encouraging them to swim.

And now my daughter, who once quit swimming because of hair (or so I thought) is now happy to share what she learned with other young black people.

I thought back to her long rough road to learn to swim. The teacher she had when it really clicked for her? Black. I hadn’t thought of that before. I remember the young man with the bleached out afro who either just happened to be there when everything came together for my daughter to get it, or who actually pushed her over the hump.

The way she grumbled about his coaching, it was probably the latter.

checking goggles

Originally uploaded by kzoomoo

I watched this same kid, (my son), accidently (?) pull those flags down. As they fluttered into the pool, my son. . . tiptoed away. In his defense, he was only 10 at the time. I’d like to think he’d fix the problem, or at least tell someone today, at 14.

My daughter has been working as a swim teacher for a little over a month now. It has been on the job training from the beginning, learning from an experienced teacher, working as a team.

But today she taught solo. Her experienced coach/teacher out with the flu, my daughter was a little nervous to take the wheel at first. But it was parent’s day, the last day of the swim session, so she only had to teach for 15 minutes per class and then announce free swim. A piece of cake. And as a bonus, she got to work with the advanced class for the first time, reminding her of her buddy coaching years at the old swim club.

In other developments, we are working it out so we can enroll our 5 year old in one of her swim classes. I better get on that immediately, if the swim session starts next week! Also, swim teachers get free lifeguard certification training, so my daughter will soon be a lifeguard as well.

Another life dream realized.

This commercial is sweet even without the sound! (that’s the way my computer rolls)

My husband and I have a friend from Kenya who talked about crocodiles being the reason he couldn’t swim. This guy didn’t let a thing like that stop him. That’s what I’m talking about!

We’ve talked about some of the barriers to swimming: generations of non-swimming, lack of access, poor facilities, disinterest, the hair thing. . . but sometimes you can get sick in the pool. When I was a child, I got swimmer’s ear just about every time I went swimming.

It was enough to make me think swimming wasn’t for me.

Swimmer’s ear is a painful infection of the ear canal. It occurs when water stays in the ear canal and washes away the protective wax. That’s the perfect environment to grow bacteria.

If you get swimmer’s ear, call a Doctor, who will either prescribe antibiotic drops, or use a wick. A wick is a tiny sponge with the swimmer’s ear medicine on it. The wick would stay in until it was finished.

You need to stay out of the water 7-10 days after getting swimmer’s ear. I had no problem with that as a child–good riddance! But now, that would be quite a blow. I’d rather head swimmer’s ear off at the pass. One way to ward it off is to put drying drops in your ears after swimming. Ask your Doctor first.