Pretending to be Marilyn Bell

2018


I showed up at Sunnyside for a lunch time dip, only to find it closed (whhhhhhy do I go without checking?!) but I was already there, with a suit and towel, and Claire was with our beloved caregiver, so for the first time since 2010, I hopped in the lake and swam! It was chilly but lovely, and I screamed at a very big fish, and the lifeguard escorted me with a rowboat and I felt like Marilyn Bell, sans pablum and eels.


These full, closed pools are breaking my turquoise blue heart!
  • Lindsay
  • Tuesday, June 26, 2018

The first Sunnyside swim of the year

2018

Glory be! It's here! It's actually here - the first outdoor pool swim of the year. I've been waiting for this day since the day after Labour Day last year and after biking by an empty Sunnyside Pool for moooooonths, it was full and the sun shone and then it was Saturday at 10am and I got to swim!

Last year's first swim of the season was a wretched disappointment. It seems funny now, how hard it was to find a window to leave the house with a 2-month-old, how meticulous I was about packing and how thrilled I was about biking down to my happy place, only to find out someone had pooped in the pool, followed by a thunderstorm. Okay, maybe it's still a little early to be entirely funny...

But this year is not last year! The baby is 14 months old and needing me less and less, and my plan was to swim first thing in the morning so there was no chance of poop getting in the way of my swim. The atmosphere in the change room is usually fairly perfunctory, but everyone was positively jubilant. 


I was the fifth one in the clear, turquoise blue pool and it was pure heaven. I realized swimming length after length (or, well, width after width), that the first Sunnyside swim of the year is a combination of New Year's and the start of the school year. I can't help but remember all of the first swims that came before, reflecting on where I was then, who I was then, and where and who I am now. It's like all those years of Lindsay are swimming at the same time.

I will admit that Saturday wasn't the warmest and at the 45 minute mark, I couldn't feel my hands, but then came the best part: sitting on the deck, watching the wonder that is a public pool filling up - all of the different ways to swim, all of the different bodies, the different suits, the riot of beach towels. And because it was the most glorious swim in the history of swims, I then met a trio of fellow swimmers who were wonderful company (and because Toronto is a small town, we of course had heaps of friends in common) and I left the deck with an invitation to Monday night bocce ball. Man, I love this city!

Kerry Clare sums it up perfectly: "I love public pools, where everybody just shows up on hot days. I love all the bodies, the splashing, the obnoxious people, the towels spread out on the deck, the way the water cools you down just like that, and how my children have turned into little fish. The swimming pool is everything I love about living the city." (You can read the full post here - it's wonderful and full of all things summery!)


This weekend must've been charmed because I got to swim on Sunday as well - a much warmer swim and I had to tear myself out of the water and bike home to my family where I convinced them all to put on suits and sit in the tiny wading pool in the backyard...I will make swimmers of them yet!

To Summer 2018 and all the swim fun ahead!




  • Lindsay
  • Monday, June 18, 2018

2018 Summer Swim Goals

2018

It's June 1st, which means the countdown to swimming in Toronto's outdoor pools IS ON! I follow a lot of UK lidos on Twitter and watching them fill with that incredible turquoise blue makes me so envious - BUT, my beloved Sunnyside opens on Saturday June 16, and most of the other pools open the following weekend.

Last year's opening weekend was, ahem, less than successful, so I have great hopes for this year's!

Here's a chart with the opening dates of alllll the outdoor pools!

So while I wait for the chlorinated blue to fill the pool, I've been thinking about my 2018 summer swim goals.

So far, I've got:
- 50m evening swim at Smythe Pool with my fast lane pal
- taking my 14-month-old for her first Toronto swim (last year didn't count...!)
- a week of lake swimming
- a Lake Ontario dip off The Island
- a swim in The Beaches
- a roadtrip to the Elora Quarry
- getting a new bathing suit
- a dinosaur park/picnic/swim combo with my kiddos
- a SHWHK team swim!

Anything else I should add to my summer swim list?

  • Lindsay
  • Friday, June 1, 2018

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