Summer 2022: Days 92-101

The summer of 2022 ended with scorching heat.

Seriously, I can't pick out individual events during the incredible temperatures of the last 10 days. The high in Salt Lake City was 107 today, breaking the September SLC record of 105 ... yesterday, which broke the record of 104 on Thursday. I read a sobering article on how this will likely be one of the coolest summers of the rest of our lives. I never look forward to summer ending, but I'm ready for some relief.

Temperatures are supposed to drop into the normal 80s over the weekend, with rain forecast. Although this was a brutal way to end the summer, I swam often this past week. I worked from the house of our friends with a pool two days, and I also spent all day Sunday at the JCC pool while I worked. But my big swimming moment, perhaps my final frontier, came yesterday at the season kickoff party of Ben's club swim team.

We don't have a home pool, but one of the families belongs to a small swim club up in the Avenues neighborhood of Salt Lake City. Back when the boys swam rec, at least a decade ago, we had a meet at this pool, so I remembered that it had a 3-meter diving board.

When I finally became less uncomfortable in deep water and could jump in, the only place I could leap from a diving board was the JCC pool, which only had 1-meter boards. Being afraid of deep water and heights made anything higher seemed even more daunting and terrifying. Plus, I never had the opportunity to really jump off a 3-meter board.

Yesterday evening, with a 3-meter board available and the realization that I could do this, I jumped off the high dive. I was really paranoid about water shooting up my nose, but I didn't want to hold it -- but somehow, I timed it right and I was fine (which, oddly, I struggle with just jumping in from the side). My left arm meandered out from my body, and I felt it slam into the water, but that was the only glitch in the jump.

When I stood at the ladder, I surprisingly didn't hesitate. Another parent told me, once you get beyond the railings, the process becomes scarier, so I just kept moving forward and didn't look down until I got to the edge. Once there, I just went. I'm a little shocked how much confidence -- albeit, mixed with fear -- I had. My fear of deep water was always compounded by the thought that maybe I wouldn't have the swim skills to get to the surface and to the side. I knew I could handle that -- in fact, I practiced on Sunday at the JCC pool swimming across the deep end after jumping off the 1-meter board. The leap was simply the icing on the cake of learning to swim and not being so afraid of the water.

In the grand scheme, jumping off a 3-meter board at age 51 might not be that big a deal, but it was the last swimming milestone I needed to achieve. I am never jumping off anything higher, won't go river rafting or water skiing, won't go canoeing or kayaking (maybe paddle boarding), won't be in a natural body of water over my head without a flotation device, and will pass on scuba and snorkeling. And that's OK -- I'm happy with the upper limit I reached. If you told me as a 10-year-old I'd jump off a 3-meter board, I would have thought it crazy. A day after it happened, I'm glad it did, just like when I went off the deep water slide at the waterpark many years ago.

Plus, it was the perfect way to end the summer. I may not remember much about this heat, but I'll never forget that jump. Until next year, peace out on the summer blogging.