Fitness Update - Trust the plan

213.2

That is what the scale said this morning. After 2 weeks of being back on track with Lose It!, trying to watch what I eat, working out like crazy, and weighing in every day, I am at 213.2 pounds, exactly where I started.

During this time I weighed in at 210.4 after a run, and in a shocking development, I had a 3 pound upward spike and hit 215.6, later that day it was 216.2. I was stunned, but not surprised. It happened on Wednesday to Thursday. I knew I was going to go out to eat twice on Wednesday. I had a sushi lunch with my boss, and that night I had a business meeting over dinner. I started off the day with the 9 mile run to earn myself some points, to counterbalance the meals I knew were coming. Apparently it did not work

There are a couple of schools of thought about how often the person should weigh in while they are trying to lose weight. When I worked with Weight Watchers a few years ago we had a weekly weigh-in that was our “official” weigh-in. I always liked having mine on Mondays because it helped me stay focused over the weekend. They encouraged fewer weigh-ins in order to not get discouraged by spikes like the one I had this week. I go the other direction; I weigh-in every day, write it down, and worry. I don’t really worry, I just get frustrated, but I know if I stick with the plan that it will work in the long run.

While it was distressing to see a 3 pound spike I knew it was coming. I knew that with sushi and Chinese food there was no way I was going to avoid it, however, I knew it would come off quickly as well, and it did. I am back to where I started.

If Wednesday was my weigh-in day on a weekly schedule I would have been devastated to be up so much with 7 full days to wait to see if I have any changes.

I like to correlate what I eat with what I weigh, though I know that is not an exact science. Water weight, bowel habits, calories versus roughage versus bulk, all play into what the scale says. Also, there is not a daily correlation because what I eat today does not get metabolized before I go to bed, it has to work its way through the system in the body pulls out fat, sugar, nutrients, and water, and does all sorts of miraculous things with it. Unfortunately, some of that miracle involves storing fat so I have to get away from the idea of “dodging a bullet” on days when I eat poorly.

Just because I have a good weigh-ion the next day, doesn’t mean the bad news is over. The cheeseburger and fries I eat today doesn’t count until tomorrow or the next when my body’s done with it.

The key is to not get discouraged.

Gaining weight is easy, losing weight is hard. We all know that but we somehow think we have the magic bullet solution. We think that if we drink lots of water, avoid one particular food like chocolate, or go to the gym for a little bit longer that it will work before the next wedding, date night, shopping trip, or trip to the scale.

The one thing I have not yet measured during this round is my body fat percentage. At my old gym I had access to some of the trainers and their tools and a body fat meter was one of them. I have a feeling that my body fat percentage is going down, but that usually just turns out to be wishful thinking.

It is like today in the pool. I am getting better in the pool. I am swimming longer without stopping which is my main goal, endurance. I am not, however, getting much faster. That is all about technique and energy level. Today I swam for 45 minutes without stopping, at my pace that is 45 laps or 1.25 miles. That is very good. I do not, however, know how fast I was really going. In the middle of the swim I felt very fast I was at a good stroke pace (stop giggling) and felt like I was moving along better than usual. But when I looked at my watch, reality struck and I was still right around the one minute per lap pace I’m always at.

The fact that I felt good, felt fast, and wasn’t getting tired is the best sign, but my optimism always outstrips reality, and I think I’m faster, leaner, or better than I am. Coldhearted measurements me bring me back to earth but, like the scale, they do improve over time so I have to keep measuring. I have to keep track because in the long run, it gets better.

So don’t get discouraged in your plan. Keep track, write it down, measure the progress, and allow yourself time. Allow yourself to have good days and bad days, fast ones and slow ones. If you miss a day, don’t beat yourself up, just get out the next day. If it is too cold outside, do something inside. If you are too tired, be extra good with your eating. Increase your water, eat more vegetables, make simple changes that allow you to feel good about each day.

If anyone has particular ideas on what is working for them, please share them in the comments, I hope that these Monday posts can act as inspiration for more than just me.

Never give up the fight! No healthy choices ever wasted, no effort goes unnoticed,, and every step is a step in the right direction.

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TMI Tuesday - My boring answers

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Questions submitted by Virtualsin.wordpress.com
1. Did you ever play strip poker (or strip spin-the-bottle, or similar)?
Did nudity result? Were there further developments? Details please.
NOPE, NOPE, NOPE.  I know, it's pretty boring, but I warned you

2. Did you ever play a nude party game, such as Naked Twister? Did it
lead to anything further?
HA HA HA.... Hell no.

3. Did you ever play a game of Truth or Dare that led to nudity, or
fondling, or more?
Never played it.  I have really either really boring friends from church who would never admit anything, or never do anything, or friends from other places that have already told me everything.

4. Did you ever attend a party that led to sex with a more or less randomly chosen partner, i.e., swingers-lifstyle party, key party*?
*key party – A couples party where all of the men put their car keys into a bowl or bag and at the end of the party, the women blindly select a set of keys to determine who she goes home with for the rest of the evening for sexual gratification.
I did switch girlfriends once, actually, the girls switched boyfriends for a week because they each wanted to kiss someone else for a while.  That was very very good.  My girlfriend was tall athletic, bright and sunny and beautiful in a very California Girl kind of way, Beth was slim, angry, blonde, wilder, more confused, hornier, but more shy, it was a wild ride going back and forth.  And, when we hung out together it was a rush knowing that I had been with both of them.

5. Did you ever participate in unexpected co-ed skinny dipping in a group?
Monica lost her top on a water slide once, that's about as unexpected as it gets.

Bonus: Do you have a favorite fantasy about a sexy party?
Please share.

I have a recurring fantasy about a barbecue that turns into a sex party. It starts when my wife allows me to use handpick the guests for our 4^th of July barbecue. It’s an easy list to build. One from the gym, two from work, four from church. Add in my wife and we have eight of the most beautiful women I know. Their husbands are irrelevant to the equation. I like four of them, don’t know two of them, and I despise two of them.  They know it, and I know they know it. They also know that the only reason I invited them is because I want to fuck their wives.

The day is hot and as the sun climbs clothes begin to shed and the pool fills up. The moms, reluctant at first to strip down and get in the water, give in when the thermometer hits 105°F. The kids have all been sent next door to the bounce house where my neighbor has agreed to allow me to use his backyard. Teenagers from church baby sit and watch over them, keeping them out of the adult section of the party. A high fence ensures our privacy.

The high desert sun bakes the clothes right off my partygoers. Soon all 16 of us are in the pool with drinks in hand and inhibitions are dropping. Cindy is the first to cross the line, kissing her husband passionately as she hangs underneath the diving board. He kisses her back and more than one pair of eyes begin to watch. I call my wife over with a curl of my finger and begin to rub between her legs under the water. The look on her face quickly gives us a way, and Toni comes over to watch more closely.

Cindy moves back toward the pool wall to give Klara room on the diving board. They kiss for the first time and several people cheer. Their husbands are emboldened and begin to touch their wives through the thin swimming suit fabric as they kiss, four breasts, four hands, one kiss.

Toni stands surprisingly close and locks eyes with my wife. Suddenly I feel Toni’s hand join mine between her legs and my wife gasps in surprise. I take Toni’s freehand by the wrist and guided to my wife’s full breasts and soon they have been removed from their triangular top and Toni bites them roughly. I call out to Toni’s husband and he comes up behind her and pulls my wife’s best friends bikini bottoms down and they float away.

Cindy and Karla have attracted a crowd and I smile as I watch their tongues intertwined in their hands reach behind them to touch their husbands. We all gravitate to the shallow end of the pool and one by one suits are shed and flesh is exposed.

Toni’s fingers slide inside my wife and her first orgasm crashes over her. The party cheers and Toni smiles and then kisses me and then my wife.

My special friend from church, the blonde I have been lusting after for years, is now sitting topless on the edge of the pool, her legs spread her bikini bottom almost translucent and our eyes meet. My wife and Toni are now deeply involved but she looks over at me, and then to the blonde, and tells me that this is my best chance and I should go to her. I kiss my wife, then Toni, and thank them both.

I walk over to her, pulling my shorts down and off as I cross the warm water. Without a word I grab her by the hair and pull her in for a kiss my hand taking her nipples between two fingers and tugging tightly.  Her hands come to my face, holding me in for a long kiss, and I feel her hips rocking back and forth as her friends peel her bikini bottoms off for her. Everyone knows that we have had the hots for each other for a long time and several of the men are now holding her husband back, telling him to give up, and just let it happen.

“She’s wanted him for as long as he’s wanted her.” They say, pending his hands behind his back. “He’s going to fuck her, and she’s going to come.” He fights and cusses and swears, as my two fingers penetrated his wife’s wet pussy.

With my wife and 13 friends and one enraged husband watching on, I put my head between her legs and taste her for the first time. She is, as in all fantasies, perfect. I climb out of the pool and grab a lounge pillow and lay it down and kneel between her legs as she spreads for me.

“Fuck me.”

As my friends push her husband underwater to stifle his screams I do just that, entering her with a mighty stroke and bringing her to orgasm within seconds. The crowd cheers, her husband cries, and I know that my barbecue will be the most popular party of the summer for years to come.

As the party breaks up I go to my office and sit behind my computer, calling up the live feed from my security system.  I open the chat window from an overseas friend and type.

“Did you see all that?”

“Yes I did,” she replies.  “And thank you very very much.”

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How to play TMI Tuesday: Copy the above TMI Tuesday questions to your webspace (i.e., a blog). Answer the questions there, then leave a comment below, on this blog post, so we’ll all know where to read your responses. Please don’t forget to link to tmituesdayblog from your website!

Happy TMI Tuesday!

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Fitness Update - The Pool

Push glide kick kick right kick kick pull rotate left kick kick breathe right kick kick pull rotate left kick kick breathe right kick kick pull rotate left kick kick breathe… It is dark outside

breathe kick kick breathe plunge twist push glide kick kick… Manny is here, finally.

kick kick pull rotate left kick kick breathe right… I can’t be late for work.

right kick kick pull rotate left kick… I hope she’s not with the swim team

kick kick pull… Come on, there are three open lanes

breathe plunge twist push glide… Is that five or six? Damn. Who stole the freaking clock?

glide kick kick … Eight, I think

breathe…1:03?  I have got to speed up one minute per lap is so slow.

kick kick… Who gives a shit? You’re just going to undo all of this at lunch.

Breathe… 55, that’s better, use your anger Luke, use the fucking force.

Plunge push… I have got to work on my flip turns, I look like a spastic dolphin

Kick kick left… Stop thinking about her, she’s gone.

Right kick kick left kick kick right kick kick last kick

27…

And one bonus for losing count…

I peeled off my goggles and tossed them onto the bench next to my towel. My throw was off and they hit the edge and clattered on the cold cement floor, leaving the first scratch on the new lens. “Crap.” I muttered under my breath as a rested my head on my forearms, catching my breath. The rhythmic splash in the next lane got louder as she approached, and I watched her glide the last 2 meters before she executed a perfect flip turn. Her deeply tanned bottom winked at me from under a shiny black Speedo, covered with water and spray as she turned pushed and kicked her way into another lap.

I let my body slip under. Closing my eyes I let the cool water calm my heart. I shouldn’t think about Angela while I swim, this makes my heart flutter when it should be pumping strong, and it’s uncomfortable trying to clear away tears inside your goggles. As I floated on my back I let myself sink lower until my shoulder blades touched the bottom of the pool. My heart beat louder in my ears and my lungs began to tighten as my air ran out 10, 9, 8, my heart rate was increasing and I could feel the pressure building in my ears.  7, 6.  I pinched off my nose and blew gently to pressurize, not wanting to come up too soon. 5. What if I just stayed here? With one big breath he could be over.  4 Don’t be an idiot, you’d thrash around like a fish and even if you succeeded it would be ugly, and stupid.

3. I blew out the last of my air and let the back of my head rest on the bottom of the pool. I wished I had kept my goggles on so I can look up through the water shimmering, the sunlight now coming through the large windows to my left. I loved watching the sunrise stream through the windows and into the pool. They told me that I was strong enough to swim long enough to see the sunrise, that made me feel good. I like the way the water glowed with the glow of the morning sun behind. It would come through the dirty windows, diffuse and hit the water and on clean days, most days, it made the water shimmer and dance as my arms and legs disturbed it with kicks and strokes and breathing.

2 I clamp down not wanting to give into quickly but I could feel my heart pounding in my ears I knew I should come up.

1. I flashed back to last year when I held my breath a little too long and came up too quickly. That is why it is always best to stand on my right when you need to talk to me. And if I put you on my left, well, no one wants to stand on my left when they have something to say.

I rolled to my stomach and pushed myself up off the bottom of the pool. It’s only 1.2 m deep at that point and I quickly stood with a gasp and opened my eyes.

“What a fucker.” She stood there staring at me with her hands on her slim hips, “You know I was about 10 seconds away from calling 911.” She did not seem amused when I smiled back at her wiping the water out of my eyes.

“Weren’t you going to try to save me yourself?” My attitude was a mix of ‘I don’t give a shit’ and ‘you are so far out of my league it doesn’t matter.’ Of course, the fact that I outweighed her by a good hundred pounds made the thought of her lifting up me off the bottom of the pool a moot point.

“I was only going to call 911 so you didn’t leave a mess in the pool.” She smirked at me, “I don’t want them shutting down my pool because of your crime scene.”

“Crime scene?” I gave in retort.

“Yes,” she said putting her goggles back in place, “your so-called flip turns are criminal.”

She ducked back to underwater and pushed herself over to the wall or she came up for just a moment with her hand on the edge of the pool caught my eye, winked, and pushed off for a long glide before surfacing in steady rhythmic strokes. I shook my head in confusion and hoisted myself out of the water landing with a thud on the pool’s edge.

I felt self-conscious sitting there, my slightly oversized stomach formed a pooch that should have been banished years ago except for my love of ice cream, cheese, and the sweet sweet call of carbohydrates. I stood up and gather the paraphernalia of my swim. My fins and kick board were still dry having been ignored when I felt good enough to go for the long haul. My goal was 18 laps, half a mile, but I felt good and I just kept going. That might’ve been a mistake as, after a few laps, my mind begins began to wander.

I like swimming. I like swimming because it’s difficult to think about anything but swimming. When I go for a run I know that I will have thinking time, the steady rhythm of my feet on the path and the automatic breathing allows me to turn the mechanics over to my body and let my mind take control. But, swimming is different, at least for me. I’m not a good swimmer so I have to think about it.  I’m trying to improve my legs so I have to think of rhythm, pacing, my kick, my form. I have to concentrate on my breathing and the timing. My friends say I should breathe every four strokes, left-right-left-right-breathe. They say it’s more energy-efficient for ocean swimming and is faster, but I can’t do it yet. I have to breathe every time my right arm comes up out of the water. I can hold my breath for over 30 seconds, and I can run for miles and catch my breath within moments of finishing, but I can’t do four strokes on one breath in the pool.

I picked up my newly scratched goggles and threw them in the reusable grocery store bag that holds my gear. I fished my phone out of the bottom before it can get dripped on and see that I have no calls.

“Idiot.” I chastised myself for false hope.

She was coming my way in her lane so I dawdled over packing my bag as an excuse to watch one more flip turn. Always the letch, I wasn’t above hesitating to see that black bottomed suit flash at me from the water once more. With perfect timing she kicked, paused, and flipped with a form that betrayed hundreds of hours, thousands of laps, and turn after turn of coached workouts.

She flipped on her back and converted to backstroke so I stared a moment longer. Even when obscured by the clear cool water, it was obvious that she was beautiful. Strong legs, muscular thighs, a suit that cut high upon the hip and tight around the arms and neck meter made her move in the water like an otter. Her arms reached high above her head and pulled efficiently through the water and I began to walk in pace with her along the side of the pool.  She turned and stared at me from behind her tinted goggles. She passed the flag line and knew it was time to flip for another perfect turn so I stopped to watch. 

My blatant violation of pool etiquette threw her off, her flip was late, and, instead of landing 2 feet on the side of the pool for another powerful push, she smacked her butt into the wall, and crashed, and burned.

She stood up coughing and out of breath, trying to clear the water from her nose and throat. She ripped her goggles off with an urgency that made me nervous and I began to walk over towards her, unsure if I would need to intervene. Feeling guilty for disrupting her rhythm I dropped my bag and towel and jogged over to make sure that she was okay.

With the final cough she put her hands on the edge of the pool to steady herself.  I bent down and picked her goggles out of the lane next to her as they floated away.

She looked up at me with malice, “Are you satisfied now you slow old pervert.?”

I sheepishly handed her goggles back to her and muttered an apology. My first reaction was the wrong one, “SLOW?”

She glared again as I laughed.

“I didn’t mean to distract you.” For some reason I did not let go of the rubber strap as she tried to take her goggles from my hand. Our eyes met and I tried to smile, my heart now pounding in my chest for a different reason, “your flip turns are perfect and I just wanted to watch one more.”

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And that is all I have for my fitness update this week, fantasy.

Last week I started with confession, this week I’ll just admit defeat. Defeat at the hands of good meaning neighbors who bring over goodies, failure at the hand of a seven-year-old boy who really wanted ice cream, and failure at the hands of nature that have made it rain all week.

I did an okay job at the gym, I got in to half-mile swims, a lot of jump rope, sometime on the treadmill which I detest, and one good run on the day it decided not to rain. I have so far dodged a bullet and am up less than 5 pounds on the scale, there are still two weeks before New Year’s Eve is over.

Technically we have one more fitness post before Christmas, so let’s all go to the sporting goods store and treat ourselves to some new gadget with the excuse that we will use it next year. I hope you all have a wonderful, and healthy, week

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Dream

Every once in a while I will have a dream that seems to span an entire night. I can wake up several times during the course of it, but upon falling back asleep I will pick up where I left off in the dream and continue. Last night was one of these dreams:

I was on a public street, on a very steep hill, walking between some gray, poorly-constructed buildings, and there was a man who was paying far too much attention to me. I kept trying to get him to leave me alone, but he wouldn't. He kept asking me to go with him, and I knew he wanted to put his hands all over me, torture me for his own pleasure. He was of medium height, balding, and wore round glasses.

Finally I ran from him, and ended up wandering into a sort of cooking demonstration put on by my coworker. He took a huge cast iron pan/wok (it was rounded on the bottom) from underneath the stove, and pressed a hidden button somewhere that made the bottom of the pan begin to glow blue. It floated up onto the stove of its own accord, rocked for a bit, and then stabilized, hovering about 2" above the surface of the stove.

A diverse crowd of people was sitting on some short bleachers behind him, oohing and aahing at his levitating pan. He added some shredded pork and a bit of sauce, then decided to take his work back with him to a different cooking station behind the crowd. He walked over to his new spot, and his pan began to follow him, but it didn't go around the crowd. It tried to go right over them. I saw a young girl cringing as the hot pan came nearer and nearer to her face, just barely avoiding it.

I jumped up and wrapped a towel around the pan's handle, then gave it a good wrench to pull it off its planned track, away from the girl's face, and dragged it back to where my coworker was now standing, trying to get it there before the heat from the pan's handle burned me through the towel. I put it on the second stove back where he was, noticed he'd put some potatoes on to cook as well, and helped myself to a piece of pork, commenting that it was odd he was preparing it, given his religion. He shrugged and told me that a friend had asked him to make it, and that it was fine so long as he didn't eat any himself.

Around this time, I began to remember the threatening man from earlier in my dream. I saw him in the crowd then, making his way toward me. I ran to the back of the room and through a doorway, emerging in the middle of an orchestra rehearsal. I didn't want to interrupt, so I quietly made my way to the back, and wedged myself into this little cutout space I found inside a wall, pulling the carpet-lined concealing door closed after me. People had given me some odd looks when they saw me doing this, but those did not last long.

Not two minutes after I pulled the concealing door shut, I heard gunshots being fired and people in the orchestra room panicking. I could hear the sounds of them stampeding to get out, bangs and crashes from all the instruments hitting the floor. I could see out through a tiny crack in the door, and I watched as my pursuer slowly stalked through the now-empty room, looking for me.

He missed my concealed hiding place and left the room. I was overcome by an immediate desire to get out of there before he returned, and threw open my door, making a beeline for the stairs. I ran down multiple flights as quickly as I could, sometimes jumping and sometimes using the handrails to slide down even faster.

When I finally reached the bottom, I burst through the exit door and found myself in a field of tall, waving yellow and green grasses with a river running through it. The sun was shining, and I was now wearing my one-piece black swimming suit instead of the street clothes I'd been in previously, so I dove into the water. I began swimming at a normal pace, front crawling my way along with the flow of the river. Soon I came to a house that I recognized as being owned by a friend of mine.

I climbed out of the water and banged on her door. She opened it and gasped at seeing me there, then ran to get me a towel that I wrapped around myself. We spoke for a few minutes, and I filled her in on what was happening with my pursuer. She looked worried and told me that if I'd somehow forgotten, I could always swim faster. I asked her what she meant, and she vaguely alluded to some sort of half-swimming, half-teleportation. I was skeptical, but agreed to give this a try.

Just then, we heard a banging at her front door (I'd arrived at the back, and we were sitting on her porch at the rear of the house). She hissed at me to run while she delayed him, and I dove off the side of the deck back into the safety of the river.

I can't remember how I managed to use the skill she'd mentioned, if I just thought it to myself or what, but now it seemed I could almost fly when in the water. The banks whizzed by in a dizzying blur, and I passed rapidly along the river toward first a lake into which it flowed and then out to the sea.

For some reason, I decided the saltwater wasn't safe, and retreated back upstream to the lake, then picked a new river branch to zoom down. I swam and swam until I came to a place where trees and rocks were becoming abundant along the banks. Here I suddenly became aware of someone else who had entered the water with me. She was beside me, and I had at one point known her as a friend, but now her eyes were wild, and I knew she could no longer be trusted.

I was certain she was going to try to detain me until my pursuer could overtake us, and I warned her to keep her distance when she tried to approach me more closely as we drifted with the current. She eyed me warily, and then seemed to decide that informing on my whereabouts would have to suffice, rather than capturing me herself. She retreated to the bank, and I drove myself forward through the water away from her as quickly as I possibly could.

More land sped by as I flew through the water, much faster than any human could ever normally dream of doing. The river made an abrupt left turn at a place where the banks were made of black, rich soil and greenery abounded. Trees of immense height towered above me, their huge trunks green and rubbery-looking.

The day was getting on in hours, and I knew I'd have to find a place to sleep soon, hopefully where my stalker couldn't find me. I hauled myself out of the water and began climbing up the steep bank, but soon realized that the route I'd chosen was too sharply inclined for me to navigate. I doubled back and found a way up onto a higher section of bank, the ground crisscrossed with enormous tree roots.

The thing about dreams is that, no matter how fast and clever you are or how slow the thing chasing you seems to move, it can always catch up to you when it wants to. My would-be assailant in this dream was no exception.

I had only just settled into a comfortable position to rest and watch the river for signs of pursuit when he found me. He appeared beneath my hiding place on the bank and gave me a nasty smile. I had a feeling he didn't want to approach the trees any closer, as he was standing on a rock at the edge of the river and showed no desire to climb up to grab me, which seemed strange when you considered all the effort he'd already invested in trying to capture me.

The wind blew his baseball cap up to me, and it landed on the soil in between two tree roots. I kicked it off my ledge and back to him, since I didn't want anything of his up there with me. It had brushed against the tree roots as I removed it from my resting place, and when he put it back on his head, he immediately started cursing and scratching his face, ripped the hat off and threw it on the ground.

I wanted to laugh at the thought of my pursuer, who had spent so much time and energy trying to find me, being foiled by an apparently violent allergy to tree roots. He glared up at me and told me he'd be back very soon. Then he took off downstream, presumably to find outerwear that would protect against the trees and allow him to climb up to seize me.

I of course had no intention of allowing this, so as soon as he was out of sight I clambered off my bank down the other side and slid right onto the deck of someone's luxurious house. Built directly over the river, it had a wonderful view of the rapids and different waterways created by the many large rocks that now crowded the river's bed.

I could hear rapid footsteps behind me and knew he was coming. I jumped off the deck into the nearest section of river, hoping the water would be deep enough for me to use my water flying ability. It was, but only just, and only for a very short time. In approximately a quarter mile I was brought up short with a gasp when I came to the edge of a cliff, which I assumed was just another waterfall, and saw the river had disappeared. No, not disappeared, gone underground.

What are you to do, when the alternative to being slowly violated and tortured to death is possibly (probably) drowning underground as you are dragged along in the blackness and trusting to the water to eventually provide you with air again?

I considered all this and weighed it in my mind as I stared at the dark hole where the water was making its own escape. I could still hear sounds of pursuit, and I knew I had only a few minutes to make up my mind. Which death would it be? With only a few seconds left to decide, I swore I'd never give in and give my stalker the satisfaction of taking me alive. If he ever got his hands on me, I'd already be dead.

I used the last of my remaining strength to rip away several of the rocks covering the entrance to the river's underground course, just enough so I could slide myself down into the rushing dark. My last thought before I slid underground was to take as big a breath as I possibly could. Then I let go and allowed the water to sweep me into the black.

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