Swim Team Quotes

Did you alltake your pants off? The swim team really knows how to throw a party.

...the arms of his swim team sweatshirt still wrapped around the pillow on the bed - Em had said it smelled of him.

My mom believed that you make your own luck. Over the stove she had hung these old, maroon painted letters that spell out, “MANIFEST.” The idea being if you thought and dreamed about the way you wanted your life to be -- if you just envisioned it long enough, it would come into being. But as hard as I had manifested Astrid Heyman with her hand in mine, her blue eyes gazing into mine, her lips whispering something wild and funny and outrageous in my ear, she had remained totally unaware of my existence. Truly, to even dream of dreaming about Astrid, for a guy like me, in my relatively low position on the social ladder of Cheyenne Mountain High, was idiotic. And with her a senior and me a junior? Forget it. Astrid was just lit up with beauty: shining blonde ringlets, June sky blue eyes, slightly furrowed brow, always biting back a smile, champion diver on the swim team. Olympic level. Hell, Astrid was Olympic level in every possible way.

I used to spend a lot of time in lap pools. Growing up I was on a few swim teams. In Florida all there is to do is surf, swim, golf, and try to pick up single women at the retirement home.

Eddie completed his met with yet another swim team family.

i'm just glad i'm not in the swim team this summer

I’m so fucking glad the swim team isn’t here right now. I’m not sure I could punch every single guy who looked in her direction, although I’d give it a good go.

I only remember fighting Ozzy O'Dell once. It was back in second grade. He threw these weird windmill-like punches, which was probably an early sign that the swim team was in his future.

Every morning I cheer on my Cheerios, but I don’t really want them to win. Secretly I’m trying to drown them and eat them—just like I tried to do to my teammates in my tenure on my high school swim team.

On occasion Jobs would use the semi-abandoned Woodside home, especially its swimming pool, for family parties. When Bill Clinton was president, he and Hillary Clinton stayed in the 1950s ranch house on the property on their visits to their daughter, who was at Stanford. Since both the main house and ranch house were unfurnished, Powell would call furniture and art dealers when the Clintons were coming and pay them to furnish the houses temporarily. Once, shortly after the Monica Lewinsky flurry broke, Powell was making a final inspection of the furnishings and noticed that one of the paintings was missing. Worried, she asked the advance team and Secret Service what had happened. One of them pulled her aside and explained that it was a painting of a dress on a hanger, and given the issue of the blue dress in the Lewinsky matter they had decided to hide it. (During one of his late-night phone conversations with Jobs, Clinton asked how he should handle the Lewinsky issue. “I don’t know if you did it, but if so, you’ve got to tell the country,” Jobs told the president. There was silence on the other end of the line.)

When I was a teenager, for example, others questioned my blackness because some of the life choices I made weren’t considered to be “black” choices: joining the swim team when it is a known fact that “black people don’t swim,” or choosing to become a vegetarian when blacks clearly love chicken.

And more to the point, I have no idea what I want to do. It shouldn't be a surprise. I've had years to think about it. That and just the other day I was pestering Wolf about what he wanted to do--talk about the pot calling the kettle black. But that's just it, I guess. I've never had to think about it. I have very diligently kept all of my options open. The AP classes, the killer GPA, the SAT scores in the 99th percentile, the varsity letters from swim team, the debate club, the fundraising... I've taken on everything and succeeded at it. There is not one weak spot that can be pointed to in my resume, not a single thing that would make an administrator say, "Yes, but what about her..." Except maybe this. Except the part where it's suddenly clear to me why I've been struggling so much with my college essays, with articulating who I am in so few words. How can a person even know who they are if they don't know what they want?

Back in Henrietta, night proceeded. Richard Gansey was failing to sleep. When he closed his eyes: Blue’s hands, his voice, black bleeding from a tree. It was starting, starting. No. It was ending. He was ending. This was the landscape of his personal apocalypse. What was excitement when he was wakeful melted into dread when he was tired. He opened his eyes. He opened Ronan’s door just enough to confirm that Ronan was inside, sleeping with his mouth ajar, headphones blaring, Chainsaw a motionless lump in her cage. Then, leaving him, Gansey drove to the school. He used his old key code to get into Aglionby’s indoor athletic complex, and then he stripped and swam in the dark pool in the darker room, all sounds strange and hollow at night. He did endless laps as he used to do when he had first come to the school, back when he had been on the rowing team, back when he had sometimes come earlier than even rowing practice to swim. He had nearly forgotten what it felt like to be in the water: It was as if his body didn’t exist; he was just a borderless mind. He pushed himself off a barely visible wall and headed towards the even less visible opposite one, no longer quite able to hold on to his concrete concerns. School, Headmaster Child, even Glendower. He was only this current minute. Why had he given this up? He couldn’t remember even that. In the dark water he was only Gansey, now. He’d never died, he wasn’t going to die again. He was only Gansey, now, now, only now. He could not see him, but Noah stood on the edge of the pool and watched. He had been a swimmer himself, once.

In the meantime, seemingly miraculously, the sun rises each day and sets each evening. The globe does not stop spinning, and there are spelling tests to prepare for, swim team carpools to drive, math homework; there are dinners to be made and, afterward, dishes to wash. There is work—articles to be written before inflexible deadlines.

Remember, an education is one thing no one can take away from you.

T he first request arrived the next day. At least I’d gotten through all my classes this time. I survived math, kept my eyes open through English, had a nap in study hall (favorite class ever), and got to meet the swim team in seventh period. The coach said our first swim meet would be on Thursday. No problem, as long as I remembered not to breathe underwater, swim at

Lastly, because you are a superhero, you are really good at putting together a good team. You can look around the room and notice the other superheroes because they are the ones noticing you. The friends you meet over forty are really juicy. They are highly emulsified and full of flavor. Now that you’re starting to have a sense of who you are, you know better what kind of friend you want and need. My peers are crushing it right now and it’s totally amazing and energizing to watch. I have made friends with older women whom I have admired for years who let me learn from their experience. I drink from their life well. They tell me about hormones and vacation spots and neck cream. I am interested in people who swim in the deep end. I want to have conversations about real things with people who have experienced real things. I’m tired of talking about movies and gossiping about friends. Life is crunchy and complicated and all the more delicious.

While a student in McCollum’s class, Jobs became friends with a graduate who was the teacher’s all- time favorite and a school legend for his wizardry in the class. Stephen Wozniak, whose younger brother had been on a swim team with Jobs, was almost five years older than Jobs and far more knowledgeable about electronics. But emotionally and socially he was still a high school geek.

A butterfly flaps its wings far away, let's say, over Beijing. The flapping makes a small change to the wind, which makes another small change to the waves. All those little changes add up to big changes, and by the time those changes appear far, far away... Those tiny wings can lead to whipping winds, churning seas, and a mighty storm... Or a perfectly sunny day. You never know! Small changes, big unpredictable effects!

It is remarkable that a fist-gnawingly dire England performance still has the power to shock, when in some ways this one had all the exquisite unpredictability of Norman Wisdom approaching a banana skin in the immediate vicinity of a swimming pool... The England shirt is the precise opposite of a superhero costume, turning men with extraordinary abilities into mild-mannered guys next door. Were Stephen Fry to pull it on, he would struggle to string a sentence together. Were Lucian Freud to slip it over his head he would turn his easel round to reveal a childlike scribble of a cat.

But I had almost no desire to talk with anyone about the experience I gained through books and music. I felt happy just being me and no one else. In that sense I could be pegged a stuck-up loner. I disliked team sports of any kind. I hated any kind of competition where you had to rack up points against someone else. I much preferred to swim on and on, alone, in silence.

Dan would entertain Owen and me by describing Mr. Tubulari’s pentathlon, his “winterthon.” “The first event,” Dan Needham said, “is something wholesome, like splitting a cord of wood—points off, if you break your ax. Then you have to run ten miles in deep snow, or snowshoe for thirty. Then you chop a hole in the ice, and—carrying your ax—swim a mile under a frozen lake, chopping your way out at the opposite shore. Then you build an igloo—to get warm. Then comes the dogsledding. You have to mush a team of dogs—from Anchorage to Chicago. Then you build another igloo—to rest.” “THAT’S SIX EVENTS,” Owen said. “A PENTATHLON IS ONLY FIVE.” “So forget the second igloo,” Dan Needham said. “I WONDER WHAT MISTER TUBULARI DOES FOR NEW YEAR’S EVE,” Owen said. “Carrot juice,” Dan said, fixing himself another whiskey. “Mister Tubulari makes his own carrot juice.

I was on the first one when I felt his fingers encircle my wrist. “Sophie, come on. I don’t want to fight with you.” Turning, I opened my mouth to say I didn’t want to fight with him either. But before I could, I saw the telltale flash out of the corner of my eye, and the next thing I knew, my arm was jerking out of his grasp. “If you don’t want to fight with her, maybe you shouldn’t suggest she team up with people who want to kill her,” my voice snarled. Archer backed up so fast he nearly stumbled, and I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him look so freaked out. But he recovered quickly. “Elodie, if I wanted to talk to you, I’d do a séance or something. Maybe go on an episode of Ghost Hunters. But right now, I want to talk to Sophie. So clear out.” Elodie had no intention of doing that. “You always were a crappy boyfriend,” she said. “Once you left, I chalked that up to you, you know, not actually liking me. But unless I’m blind as well as dead, you really like Sophie. In fact, hard as it is for me to fathom, I think you love her.” Shut up, shut up, shut up! Screw that, she retorted. You two spend all your time making stupid jokes and being all witty. Someone has to get real. “What’s your point?” Archer asked, narrowing his eyes at me. Her. Whatever. God, this was getting confusing. “Cal loves her, too, you know. And the last time I checked, he wasn’t part of a cult of monster killers. I’m just saying that if you’re going have loyalties that divided, maybe it’s time to bow out gracefully.” You couldn’t say Elodie didn’t know how to make a dramatic exit. The next thing I knew, I was pitching forward into Archer’s arms, my head swimming. Archer clutched my waist and then abruptly shoved me at arm’s length. “Sophie?” he asked, looking intently into my eyes. “Yeah,” I said, my voice shaking. “I’m back.” His fingers loosened, becoming more of a caress than a grip. “So you can’t control when she swoops in like that? She can just take you over…whenever?” I tried to laugh, but it came out more of a cough. “You know Elodie. I don’t think anyone has ever controlled her.” Frowning, Archer pulled his hands back and shoved them in his pockets. “Well, that’s awesome.” I grabbed the railing to steady myself. “Archer…that stuff she said. You know it’s not true.” He shrugged and moved past me onto the steps. “Saying the most hateful things possible is like Elodie’s superpower. Don’t worry about it.” He paused and looked over his shoulder. “We should probably go tell Jenna what we found down here.” Oh, right. We’d just unearthed a whole bunch of demons. That probably trumped over relationship issues. Another few seconds passed. “Come on, Mercer,” Archer said, holding his hand out to me. This time, I took it.

Make exercising fun. The same old routine at the gym can be a drag. It’s good to mix it up. In addition to dancing I also enjoy hiking and swimming. And when you work out, do it someplace you find inspiring: a hike that brings you to a gorgeous view or a workout in the sand with the surf in your sight, even a small grassy spot in your backyard or a serene, uncluttered corner of your apartment. Recreational team sports also add variety to the mix: they put the focus on the fun of the game rather than the pain of the effort.

Gradually, the deportation and mass murder became an event of the past. By the summer of 1943, special teams had disinterred and burned the corpses of those gassed at Treblinka, Sobibor and Bełec and the three camps were dismantled during the following months. Even the exhuming and burning of the corpses of those shot in Galicia and Ukraine did not remain a secret from the home front. In the Reich, municipalities started to take down the quaint, out-of-date signs forbidding Jews entry to public libraries, swimming pools and parks.68

And this isn’t high school. Now that you’re not worried that (a) your skirt is too short or too long and the other kids will laugh at you, (b) you’re not going to make the varsity swimming team, (c) you’re still going to be a pimple-studded virgin when you graduate (probably when you die, for that matter), (d) the physics teacher won’t grade the final on a curve, or (e) nobody really likes you anyway AND THEY NEVER DID… now that all that extraneous shit is out of the way, you can study certain academic matters with a degree of concentration you could never manage while attending the local textbook loonybin.

On retiring to Capri [Tiberius] devised a pleasance for his secret orgies: teams of wantons of both sexes, selected as experts in deviant intercourse and dubbed analists, copulated before him in triple unions to excite his flagging passions. Its bedrooms were furnished with the most salacious paintings and sculptures, as well as with an erotic library, in case a performer should need an illustration of what was required. Then in Capri's woods and groves he arranged a number of nooks of venery where boys and girls got up as Pans and nymphs solicited outside bowers and grottoes. e acquired a reputation for still grosser depravities that one can hardly bear to tell or be told, let alone believe. For example, he trained little boys (whom he termed tiddlers) to crawl between his thighs when he went swimming and tease him with their licks and nibbles; and unweaned babies he would put to his organ as though to the breast, being by both nature and age rather fond of this form of satisfaction. Left a painting of Parrhasius's depicting Atalanta pleasuring Meleager with her lips on condition that if the theme displeased him he was to have a million sesterces instead, he chose to keep it and actually hung it in his bedroom. The story is also told that once at a sacrifice, attracted by the acolyte's beauty, he lost control of himself and, hardly waiting for the ceremony to end, rushed him off and debauched him and his brother, the flute-player, too; and subsequently, when they complained of the assault, he had their legs broken.

What if those teams had created a better work environment? What if they had built a climate of openness where people felt able to speak up? What if that environment made it easier to be open and honest about error? To err is human. Mistakes happen—the only real question is whether we catch, admit, and correct them. Maybe the good teams, I suddenly thought, don’t make more mistakes, maybe they report more. They swim upstream against the widely held view of error as indicative of incompetence, which leads people everywhere to suppress acknowledging (or to deny responsibility for) mistakes. This discourages the systematic analysis of mistakes that allows us to learn from them. This insight eventually led me to the discovery of psychological safety, and why it matters in today’s world.

something that cannot be memorized and graded: a great doctor must have a huge heart and a distended aorta through which pumps a vast lake of compassion and human kindness. At least, that’s what you’d think. In reality, medical schools don’t give the shiniest shit about any of that. They don’t even check you’re OK with the sight of blood. Instead, they fixate on extracurricular activities. Their ideal student is captain of two sports teams, the county swimming champion, leader of the youth orchestra and editor of the school newspaper. It’s basically a Miss Congeniality contest without the sash. Look at the Wikipedia entry for any famous doctor, and you’ll see: ‘He proved himself an accomplished rugby player in youth leagues. He excelled as a distance runner and in his final year at school was vice-captain of the athletics team.’ This particular description is of a certain Dr H. Shipman, so perhaps it’s not a rock-solid system.

You might expect that if you spent such an extended period in twelve different households, what you would gather is twelve different ideas about how to raise children: there would be the strict parents and the lax parents and the hyperinvolved parents and the mellow parents and on and on. What Lareau found, however, is something much different. There were only two parenting “philosophies,” and they divided almost perfectly along class lines. The wealthier parents raised their kids one way, and the poorer parents raised their kids another way. The wealthier parents were heavily involved in their children’s free time, shuttling them from one activity to the next, quizzing them about their teachers and coaches and teammates. One of the well-off children Lareau followed played on a baseball team, two soccer teams, a swim team, and a basketball team in the summer, as well as playing in an orchestra and taking piano lessons. That kind of intensive scheduling was almost entirely absent from the lives of the poor children. Play for them wasn’t soccer practice twice a week. It was making up games outside with their siblings and other kids in the neighborhood. What a child did was considered by his or her parents as something separate from the adult world and not particularly consequential. One girl from a working-class family—Katie Brindle—sang in a choir after school. But she signed up for it herself and walked to choir practice on her own. Lareau writes: What Mrs. Brindle doesn’t do that is routine for middle-class mothers is view her daughter’s interest in singing as a signal to look for other ways to help her develop that interest into a formal talent. Similarly Mrs. Brindle does not discuss Katie’s interest in drama or express regret that she cannot afford to cultivate her daughter’s talent. Instead she frames Katie’s skills and interests as character traits—singing and acting are part of what makes Katie “Katie.” She sees the shows her daughter puts on as “cute” and as a way for Katie to “get attention.

… and one day, after Mahlke had learned to swim, we were lying in the grass, in the Schlagball field. I ought to have gone to the dentist, but they wouldn't let me because I was hard to replace on the team. My tooth was howling. A cat sauntered diagonally across the field and no one threw anything at it. A few of the boys were chewing or plucking at blades of grass. The cat belonged to the caretaker and was black. Hotten Sonntag rubbed his bat with a woolen stocking. My tooth marked time. The tournament had been going on for two hours. We had lost hands down and were waiting for the return game. It was a young cat, but no kitten. In the stadium, handball goals were being made thick and fast on both sides. My tooth kept saying one word, over and over again. On the cinder track the sprinters were practicing starts or limbering up. The cat meandered about. A trimotored plane crept across the sky, slow and loud, but couldn't drown out my tooth. Through the stalks of grass the caretaker's black cat showed a white bib. Mahlke was asleep. The wind was from the east, and the crematorium between the United Cemeteries and the Engineering School was operating. Mr. Mallenbrandt, the gym teacher, blew his whistle: Change sides. The cat practiced. Mahlke was asleep or seemed to be. I was next to him with my toothache. Still practicing, the cat came closer. Mahlke's Adam's apple attracted attention because it was large, always in motion, and threw a shadow. Between me and Mahlke the caretaker's black cat tensed for a leap. We formed a triangle. My tooth was silent and stopped marking time: for Mahlke's Adam's apple had become the cat's mouse. It was so young a cat, and Mahlke's whatsis was so active – in any case the cat leaped at Mahlke's throat; or one of us caught the cat and held it up to Mahlke's neck; or I, with or without my toothache, seized the cat and showed it Mahlke's mouse: and Joachim Mahlke let out a yell, but suffered only slight scratches. And now it is up to me, who called your mouse to the attention of this cat and all cats, to write. Even if we were both invented, I should have to write. Over and over again the fellow who invented us because it's his business to invent people obliges me to take your Adam's apple in my hand and carry it to the spot that saw it win or lose.

Agreeable even though the rector, when he arrived some years earlier, had looked around, seen a fair number of Bajians and Barbadians, who were Church of England—many of them domestics working for East Orange’s white rich, many of them island people who knew their place and sat at the back and thought they were accepted—leaned on his pulpit, and, before beginning the sermon on his first Sunday, said, “I see we have some colored families here. We’ll have to do something about that.” After consulting with the seminary in New York, he had seen to it that various services and Sunday schools for the colored were conducted, outside basic church law, in the colored families’ houses. Later, the swimming pool at the high school was shut down by the school superintendent so that the white kids wouldn’t have to swim with the colored kids. A big swimming pool, used for swimming classes and a swimming team, a part of the physical education program for years, but since there were objections from some of the white kids’ parents who were employers of the black kids’ parents—the ones working as maids and housemen and chauffeurs and gardeners and yardmen—the pool was drained and covered over.

Then, decades later, in the 1970s, a hard-assed U.S. swim coach named James Counsilman rediscovered it. Counsilman was notorious for his “hurt, pain, and agony”–based training techniques, and hypoventilation fit right in. Competitive swimmers usually take two or three strokes before they flip their heads to the side and inhale. Counsilman trained his team to hold their breath for as many as nine strokes. He believed that, over time, the swimmers would utilize oxygen more efficiently and swim faster. In a sense, it was Buteyko’s Voluntary Elimination of Deep Breathing and Zátopek hypoventilation—underwater. Counsilman used it to train the U.S. Men’s Swimming team for the Montreal Olympics. They won 13 gold medals, 14 silver, and 7 bronze, and they set world records in 11 events. It was the greatest performance by a U.S. Olympic swim team in history. Hypoventilation training fell back into obscurity after several studies in the 1980s and 1990s argued that it had little to no impact on performance and endurance. Whatever these athletes were gaining, the researchers reported, must have been based on a strong placebo effect. In the early 2000s, Dr. Xavier Woorons, a French physiologist at Paris 13 University, found a flaw in these studies. The scientists critical of the technique had measured it all wrong. They’d been looking at athletes holding their breath with full lungs, and all that extra air in the lungs made it difficult for the athletes to enter into a deep state of hypoventilation. Woorons repeated the tests, but this time subjects practiced the half-full technique, which is how Buteyko trained his patients, and likely how Counsilman trained his swimmers. Breathing less offered huge benefits. If athletes kept at it for several weeks, their muscles adapted to tolerate more lactate accumulation, which allowed their bodies to pull more energy during states of heavy anaerobic stress, and, as a result, train harder and longer. Other reports showed hypoventilation training provided a boost in red blood cells, allowing athletes to carry more oxygen and produce more energy with each breath. Breathing way less delivered the benefits of high-altitude training at 6,500 feet, but it could be used at sea level, or anywhere. Over the years, this style of breath restriction has been given many names—hypoventilation, hypoxic training, Buteyko technique, and the pointlessly technical “normobaric hypoxia training.” The outcomes were the same: a profound boost in performance.* Not just for elite athletes, but for everyone. Just a few weeks of the training significantly increased endurance, reduced more “trunk fat,” improved cardiovascular function, and boosted muscle mass compared to normal-breathing exercise. This list goes on. The takeaway is that hypoventilation works. It helps train the body to do more with less. But that doesn’t mean it’s pleasant.

De Villiers was shortlisted for the South African national hockey squad,’ the article says. True or false? False. In truth, I played hockey for one year at high school and was a member of the Afrikaanse Hoër Seunskool Under-16A team that beat our near neighbours and rivals at Pretoria Boys’ High for the first time, but I was never shortlisted for the national hockey squad, or ever came remotely close to that level. ‘De Villiers was shortlisted for the South African national football squad,’ the article says. True or false? False. I have never played any organised football (soccer). We used to kick a ball around during break at school and the game has become part of the Proteas’ warm-up routine. That is all. ‘De Villiers was the captain of South Africa junior rugby,’ the article says. True or false? False. I played rugby at primary school and high school, and enjoyed every minute, but I never represented South Africa at any level, either at SA Schools or SA Under-20, and was never captain. ‘De Villiers is still the holder of six national school swimming records,’ the article says. True or false? False. As far as I recall, I did set an Under-9 breaststroke record at Warmbaths Primary School but I have never held any national school swimming records, not even for a day. ‘De Villiers has the record fastest 100 metres time among South African junior sprinters,’ the article says. True or false? False. I did not sprint at all at school. Elsewhere on the Internet, to my embarrassment, there are articles in which the great sprinter Usain Bolt is asked which cricketer could beat him in a sprint and he replies ‘AB de Villiers’. Maybe, just maybe, I would beat him if I were riding a motorbike. ‘De Villiers was a member of the national junior Davis Cup tennis team,’ the article says. True or false? Almost true. As far as I know, there was no such entity as the national junior Davis Cup team, but I did play tennis as a youngster, loved the game and was occasionally ranked as the national No. 1 in my age group. ‘De Villiers was a national Under-19 badminton

I heard Connor’s breath catch, and I knew he was gazing at the full erection between my legs. The sunglasses hid my eyes, and I could see the tent in the front of Connor’s swim trunks. I had made him hard, just from the sight of me. Guess old Connor wasn’t so straight after all.

Ariel was on the swim team,

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There is really one reason that, forty millennia ago, our human ancestors would spend time creating art in the form of therianthropes. It symbolized something. When we see therianthropes represented in art from the past few thousand years, it’s typically associated with religious symbolism: like Horace (the falcon-headed Egyptian god), Lucifer (often depicted as half-human, half-goat in Christian art), or Ganesh (the elephant-headed Hindu god). The Sulawesian therianthropes are “the world’s earliest known evidence for our ability to conceive of the existence of supernatural beings,” Dr. Adam Brumm told the New York Times after he and his research team discovered the Sulawesian therianthropes in 2017.13 What is a supernatural being? It is a creature that has abilities and knowledge beyond what humans have. Some experts suggest that these therianthropes might be spirit guides, creatures giving us aid, answers, or advice.14 This assumes, then, that our ancestors had been asking questions that required supernatural answers. And what could these questions possibly be other than those that underpin all religions: Why does the world exist? Why am I here? And why do I have to die? These ancient therianthropes are the best evidence we have of why specialist questions swimming about in our ancestors’ heads.

About a hundred yards from land the dogs began swimming. The sled was floating and tipping. If it began to sink, and if there was no ice for me to stand on beneath the water, I couldn’t save all eight dogs from being pulled under and drowning.

A brochure that had been thoughtfully provided in the recruitment paperwork revealed that to even qualify for a SEAL tryout you had to be able to do a minimum of eight pull-ups. And that’s after you swim five hundred yards, and do forty-two push-ups and fifty sit-ups. And before you run.

That, and his team lost—and the terms of this particular water polo war were that everyone on the losing team had to do 100 yards of butterfly, nonstop. There are very few things in this world I would pay good money to see, but watching Jack flounder at the hardest stroke after years of acting all cocky about doing flips into the water is decidedly one of them.

My friend quit the high school swim team to take an after-school job as an alligator wrestler.

she won’t be making evening practice either, then rolls over, pulling her duvet high up around her ears. She feels vaguely surprised that it’s so easy. She’s reminded of her favourite Yeats poem: Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold. Her brain thick with sleep, the idea of Marcus as a falconer strikes her as quite profound. This far from Marcus, she wonders how he ever had such a hold over her. The thought sleepily occurs to her that she may never get out of bed, never return to the pool, again. As she has always suspected, the first practice was the hardest to miss and after that one slip, the whole foundation of her training discipline would come crashing down, falling apart around her. The slacker in her would take over. Yes, the pool, always her centre, has lost its hold. What, she wonders, has held the whole thing together this long? I have an intense burning desire to be a champion. That was the phrase she learned at National Youth Team swim camps. I have an intense burning desire to be a champion. They repeated the mantra over and over—a room full of fourteen-year-olds chanting the words in unison. I have an intense burning desire to be a champion. After

firing range. Non-Stackable Bomb Range Up Makes bombs, Point Sensors, and Disruptors travel farther when thrown. Primary Ability Boost = 15% Stackable Tenacity Fills special gauge automatically if your team has fewer active players than the enemy. Non-Stackable Run Speed Up Increases movement speed in Inkling form. Primary Ability Boost = 10% Stackable Swim Speed Up Increases movement speed while swimming in squid form. Primary Ability Boost = 10% Kraken form is 20% slower than squid form and gets 1/2 the boost in speed of this ability. Stackable

She looked at me again, and the sweet and shy Nicole disappeared. Her eyes blazed. "The others aren't here, are they?" she said. "You have no intention of rescuing me. Why would you? I'm competition for your precious Daniel. You don't want him, but you don't want anyone else to have him either. You're a selfish b*tch, Maya Delaney. A sl*t, too, fooling around with every guy in sight, right under his nose." As Nicole raged, the hair on my neck prickled, because in her eyes, I saw madness. Obsession and madness. "Everything comes so easy for you, doesn't it, Maya? School, boys, friends, sports. Even your precious animals. You can't just take care of them like any normal person. You have to be some kind of animal whisperer. Magical healer. So damned special. Like Serena, captain of the swim team and the best singer on the freaking island, and how much does she practice? Sings in the shower. Paddles around the lake. Do you know how hard I work? It's never enough. You two get the trophies and the solos and the As and the boys." You're crazy, I thought. Did they do this to you with their experiments? Or is this just you? I started inching back. "You're just going to leave me here?" she said. "Well, you know what, Maya? I could use a little company." She screamed, a long drawn-out shriek of feigned terror.

The instructors were consumed with abdominal strength, the reasons for which are now obvious: the abdomen is the bedrock of a warrior’s strength for climbing rocks and ropes, rowing, lifting, swimming, fighting, and running.

Kahnawake August 1704 Temperature 75 degrees It was worth going into the water just to get away from Ruth’s nagging. Mercy waded in, appalled by how cold it was. Snow Walker towed her around for a minute and then let go. At first Mercy couldn’t take two strokes without having to stand up and reassure herself that there was a bottom, but soon she could swim ten, and then twenty, strokes. Joseph, who had been swimming with the boys, paddled over to admire her new skill. Snow Walker coaxed them to put their heads under the water and swim like fish. Mercy loved it. Wiping river water from her eyes and laughing, she shouted, “Come on in, Joanna!” In front of Snow Walker, she spoke Mohawk. “It feels so cool and slippery inside the water.” Joanna shook her head. “I can’t see where I’m going on land. I don’t want to be blind in water over my head.” “Ruth!” yelled Joseph, in English so she’d answer. “Try it. I won’t pull you under by the toes. I promise.” “Savages swim,” said Ruth. “English people walk or ride horses.” By now, Mercy had flung her tunic onto the grass and was as bare as everybody else. When Ruth scolded, Mercy ducked under the water and stayed there until the yelling was over. “Just wait till you get out, Mercy,” said Ruth. “The mosquitos are going to feast on your wet bare skin.” Mercy translated for Snow Walker, who said, “No, no. We grease to keep the mosquitos away.” Joseph, of course, had been greasing for weeks, but so far Mercy had not submitted. Ruth, unwilling to see Mercy slather bear fat over her nakedness, stalked away. “Good,” said Snow Walker, giggling. “The fire is out. We are safe now.” Mercy was startled. “I never heard you use her old name.” “I don’t call her Let the Sky In,” explained Snow Walker. “She would let nothing in but storms.” Snow Walker’s not such a fence post after all, thought Mercy. “Snow Walker, why have they given Ruth such a fine new name?” “I don’t know. One day at a feast, the story will be told.” “They’ll have to gag Ruth before they tell it,” said Joseph. “She hates her new name even more than she hated her old one.” They got out of the water, racing in circles to dry off, and then Snow Walker rubbed bear grease all over Mercy. “I can’t see you from here, Munnonock,” said Joanna, “but I can smell you.” “Want some?” said Mercy, planning to attack with a scoop of bear grease, but Joanna left for the safety of the cornfields and her mother. Snow Walker went back in to join a water ball team.

January 2013 Andy’s Message   Hi Young, I’m home after two weeks in Tasmania. My rowing team was the runner-up at the Lindisfarne annual rowing competition. Since you were so forthright with your OBSS experiences, I’ll reciprocate with a tale of my own from the Philippines.☺               The Canadian GLBT rowing club had organised a fun excursion to Palawan Island back in 1977. This remote island was filled with an abundance of wildlife, forested mountains and beautiful pristine beaches.               It is rated by the National Geographic Traveller magazine as the best island destination in East and South-East Asia and ranked the thirteenth-best island in the world. In those days, this locale was vastly uninhabited, except by a handful of residents who were fishermen or local business owners.               We stayed in a series of huts, built above the ocean on stilts. These did not have shower or toilet facilities; lodgers had to wade through knee-deep waters or swim to shore to do their business. This place was a marvellous retreat for self-discovery and rejuvenation. I was glad I didn’t have to room with my travelling buddies and had a hut to myself.               I had a great time frolicking on the clear aquiline waters where virgin corals and unperturbed sea-life thrived without tourist intrusions. When we travelled into Lungsodng Puerto Princesa (City of Puerto Princesa) for food and a shower, the locals gawked at us - six Caucasian men and two women - as if we had descended from another planet. For a few pesos, a family-run eatery agreed to let us use their outdoor shower facility. A waist-high wooden wall, loosely constructed, separated the bather from a forest at the rear of the house. In the midst of my shower, I noticed a local adolescent peeping from behind a tree in the woods. I pretended not to notice as he watched me lathe and played with himself. I was turned on by this lascivious display of sexual gratification. The further I soaped, the more aroused I became. Through the gaps of the wooden planks, the boy caught glimpses of my erection – like a peep show in a sex shop, I titillated the teenager. His eyes were glued to my every move, so much so that he wasn’t aware that his friend had creeped up from behind. When he felt an extra hand on his throbbing hardness, he let out a yelp of astonishment. Before long, the boys were masturbating each other. They stroked one another without mortification, as if they had done this before, while watching my exhibitionistic performance carefully. This concupiscent carnality excited me tremendously. Unfortunately, my imminent release was punctured by a fellow member hollering for me to vacate the space for his turn, since I’d been showering for quite a while. I finished my performance with an anticlimactic final, leaving the boys to their own devices. But this was not the end of our chance encounter. There is more to ‘cum’ in my next correspondence!               Much love and kisses,               Andy

Teenage Fanclub dive impressively into the water headfirst, like a synchronised five-man Olympic swimming team. Joe McAlinden

Bright coral and sand spread thirty-five feet below, crisp in the air-clear water. Blue clouds of Creole wrasse parted as Hugh dropped. White and yellow flashes of yellowtail snapper flitting past. How could he have questioned if coming back here was the right thing? Bubbles rose from five buddy teams. Swimming five different directions. Hugh kicked hard after the nearest pair.

Sean watched Lily turn as if to follow them. Clearly she wished to avoid him. While Sean wasn’t terribly eager to chat about the good old days, Lily’s patent reluctance to speak to him had the predictably perverse effect of his being determined to do so. “So, your Lungness, I see you’ve finally decided to come up for air.” The nickname was a relic from their swim team days, and had popped out unintentionally. Still, it had the desired result: Lily stopped in her tracks. She turned and faced him. “I assume this is one of your lame attempts at wit. As usual, though, you’ve fallen way short of the mark. I have no idea what you’re referring to, nor do I particularly care. However, if you call me that again, I’ll walk right out that door.” “What? Your Lungness?” he repeated, all innocence, ignoring the fact that his behavior was childish, unprofessional, too. How could she stand there looking so coolly collected, as if seeing him again meant absolutely nothing to her? Because, you idiot, an inner voice mocked, that’s exactly what you are to Lily. Nothing.

Sean deliberately loitered on the patio with his grandmother and the other septuagenarians before going to the kitchen to pour May Ellen and Lily’s drinks. He wanted to give them a bit of privacy. As for me, Sean thought—drawing deep drafts of the scented, heavy Florida night air into his lungs--I need to pull myself together. Because it was happening already: the Lily Effect was at work on his brain. Why in God’s name had he told her he’d be accompanying her and the team on some dives, when that was the last thing he wanted to do . . . especially if he intended to maintain his sanity? Unfortunately, as dumb as he was feeling, Sean had the answer to that one. It pained him to realize that he was still as hung up on Lily as ever—and just as susceptible to her disdain. It had taken her, what, two hours since she waltzed back into Coral Beach to accuse him of crooked politics? Did Lily have any idea of the high-wire act he was attempting by trying to get the reef accurately documented and assessed before he took a public stance on the marina development? No, of course not. Sean might have filled her in, if she hadn’t made it clear she assumed his sole motivation was political gain. Stung, he’d retaliated in kind, implying that Lily might stoop so low as to manipulate the reef study—even though Sean knew the sun would set in the east before Lily Banyon committed an act of professional dishonesty. Her integrity had always been one of the things he admired most about her. That Lily actually fell for his bogus threat merely showed how profound her distrust, her dislike of him was. At the Rusted Keel, Dave had urged him to seize the opportunity to go on the research boat and work on charming Lily. Yeah, Sean thought acidly, as he carried the cocktails toward the living room. He and Lily were off to their usual great start.

He’d surfaced, spluttering, and swam as best he could in his sodden shirts, jeans, and sneakers over to the ladder. Banyon was waiting for him. John had a choice, she told him. He could climb up the ladder and cut the crap permanently, leaving her and the other women on the team alone. Or he could stay there. The water might be just cold enough to act as an anesthetic. She would dive in and bring one of the lobster traps to the surface. Since he’d been asking all week, she’d happily handle his you-know-what for him. And stuff it in the lobster trap. It’d be a yummy little appetizer for those big, hungry lobsters.

Are you introverted or extroverted? When you’re socializing with people, do you get energized or fatigued? Do you need details or do you prefer focusing on the big picture? In your lifetime, what was your favorite job or position? What specifically did you like about it? When you work on a team, what is the one role that you wish you would always get? When you get your evaluation feedback, what is the one thing that your boss always compliments you on? What are you really good at? What are you really bad at? If you could design your perfect job, what would it be? Why?

And then there was Dara, the most talented one of us all, swimming on the “B” relay team, in early heats, battling it out with — and often losing to — girls who may have had two arms but didn’t have one-tenth her strength and skill. If I’d been her, I would’ve wanted to get as far away from swimming as possible. But she clung to it as if it were all there was in the world. And maybe for her, it was. And the thing was, she was still good — not the best, but better than many, even if she was technically handicapped.

I hated all of these pursuits, except photography and horseback riding, and little did the organizers know, I was already versed in a variety of social and leadership skills. After these confidence-building challenges, the various units headed off on separate expeditions. As the individual group developed the capacity to face challenges, the instructor would ask his allotted unit to make its own decisions. I was teamed with a group of five older boys between the ages of eighteen and twenty. Our Portuguese-French instructor was a twenty-three-year-old named Jules – the moment I’d set eyes on him, I was enthralled by his handsome ruggedness, and I had made it a point to join his team no matter what it took. Meanwhile, my “gaydar” also detected a half-Chinese and part Hispanic-American teammate called Kim. He, too, was checking out our instructor, and me. I befriended Kim and roomed with him on camping trips. Singapore, being a conservative society, did not condone homosexuality, let alone at this super ‘macho’ outpost. During a swimming sojourn, I decided to pretend to drown to get the instructor to come to my rescue. Sure enough, when I feigned suffocation in the ocean, Jules headed my direction. While swimming to pull me ashore, I reached to brush his groin, as if by accident. I did this several times and felt his growing penis with every touch. By the time he’d pulled me aground, he had sprouted a full erection behind his speedo. When he gave me the kiss of life, I jabbed my tongue into his mouth. Taken aback, he withdrew contact before resuming the revitalization process. This time, he lingered when his mouth was on mine. He played it cool, since our patrol was watching the entire incident. He ordered my teammates back to their respective duties when he carried me to the tent I shared with Kim. Although he knew I was capering with him, no words were exchanged throughout the entire process; neither did he make any attestation that he was aroused by what had transpired. Before leaving the tent, he uttered, “I’ll check in later to make sure you are okay…” He trailed off when Kim entered. My dearest ex, I’m sure you are intrigued to hear the rest of my story. You will… eventually. LOL! For now, I bid you adios, because my significant other is calling me to dinner.☺   Love and hugs. Your loving ex, Young XOXOXO

I love the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team for many reasons and they have given me some wonderful memories. When I look back, I don't think about the games they lost but I remember going to see the games when I was a little boy with my grandfather. I remember talking to my mom on the phone after the Cardinals won the World Series in 2006 while I was dressed up in my Captain of the Fallopian Swim Team Halloween costume. I remember taking my lovely wife to her first Cardinals game where she broke out in hives due to the heat and humidity. I remember the joy I felt as I sat with my little man watching our first Cardinals game together at Busch Stadium. I know I need to take my obsession down a notch but in the end it is worth it because it takes me back to times I will never forget and always cherish.

That she made a point to eat only the gristliest chicken bits, the burned biscuits, the mealiest potatoes, while she complained that his children were, variously, weak-minded, hysterical or sickly, and seemed to imply that such afflictions were the result of the lack of a good piece of steak or a new bonnet, was only circumstance; were she installed on a throne at a twelve-course banquet table teaming with all of God's creatures brought from both air and field, trussed and roasted and swimming in their own succulent juices, she would heap her plate with the most exquisite victuals and lament that his feeble offspring were the way they were because they had it too well and what they really needed was a vat of cold porridge and a tureen full of dirt.

SIR – Bello’s comment (November 29th) that “The appointment of a capable economic team is good for Brazil but signals its president’s weakness” reminded me very much of the following quote from Lyndon Johnson: “If one morning I walked on top of the water across the Potomac river, the headline that afternoon would read: ‘President Can’t Swim’.” Robert Hillman Thousand Oaks, California

would have introduced him to my beautiful girlfriend, Evelyn Kastanos. It wouldn’t have been at random but at your favorite restaurant or the café in Savage River. Of course, he already would have known all about you because you’re always on my mind and I would have talked about you on our weekly calls. He would have already known how smart you are, what a good sister you are, that we like the same music, that your playlists are better than mine. I would have told him I thought I was dreaming the first time I saw you. Your beauty is that surreal. He would have known you’d gotten Marco to smile and regularly bring me to my knees. He’d be keeping track of our swim statistics and know you’re the fastest girl on our team. He would know how long I’ve been stuck on you and what it felt like when you first kissed me. I would have told him you make me want to learn to be gentle and calm because you deserve to have a boyfriend who is that way with you.

You’re not used to anyone showing up for you, Bailey. This is what that looks like. I told you I love you. I’ve never loved a woman before. Wasn’t sure I ever would. But now I do. And you and me? We’re a team. You don’t quit on your teammates. You don’t leave a man behind. So now you’re stuck with me. I’m just being patient. Waiting for you to come back.” My tears fall freely as I listen to him pour his heart out to me. “It’s like I’ve been searching for something, something to tie me to this new reality. I wasn’t looking for love; I was looking for a purpose. I just didn’t expect my purpose to be you.” I say the only thing I can say in the wake of his words, in the wake of everything he’s done for me. “I love you, Beau.” That blinding smile is back, but this time it’s matched with glassy eyes. He nods at me, every motion swimming with love. Admiration. I can feel the affection in everything he does.

Viewed from a distance, Nantucket Island is everything Karen Otis dreamed it would be: tasteful, charming, nautical, classic. The ferry passes inside a stone jetty, and Karen squeezes Bruce’s hand to let him know she would like to stand and walk the few feet to the railing now. Bruce places an arm across Karen’s back and eases her up out of her seat. He’s not a big man but he’s strong. He was the Pennsylvania state champion wrestler at 142 pounds in 1984. Karen first set eyes on him sitting in the Easton Area High School pool balcony. She was swimming the butterfly leg for the varsity relay team, which routinely practiced during lunch, and when she climbed out of the water, she spied Bruce, dressed in sweatpants and a hooded sweatshirt, staring at an orange he held in his hands

Swimming has always been a means of escape: physical, spiritual, mental. And if that’s true, then what better place is there for a swim team than a war zone?

During the first part of this stage, the encouragement and support of parents and teachers was crucial to the child’s progress, but eventually the students began to experience some of the rewards of their hard work and became increasingly self-motivated. A piano student performed for others and appreciated the applause. A swimmer basked in the approval and respect of peers. These students became more vested in the process, and their self-image started to include those abilities that were setting them apart from their peers. In the case of team sports, like swimming, the students often relished being part of a group of like-minded people. But whatever the reasons, the motivation started to shift from external to internal in origin.

The Con-U storage facility is the most amazing space I have ever seen. Keep in mind that I recently worked at a vertical bookstore and have even more recently visited a secret subterranean library. Keep in mind, also, that I saw the Sistine Chapel when I was a kid, and, as part of science camp, I got to visit a particle accelerator. This warehouse has them all beat. The ceiling hangs high above, ribbed like an airplane hangar. The floor is a maze of tall metal shelves loaded with boxes, canisters, containers, and bins. Simple enough. But the shelves—the shelves are all moving. For a moment I feel sick, because my vision is swimming. The whole facility is writhing like a bucket of worms; it’s that same overlapping, hard-to-follow motion. The shelves are all mounted on fat rubber tires, and they know how to use them. They move in tight, controlled bursts, then break into smooth sprints through channels of open floor. They pause and politely wait for one another; they team up and form long caravans. It’s uncanny. It’s totally “Sorcerer’s Apprentice.” So the iPad’s map is blank because the facility is rearranging itself in real-time.

The only way to shift a culture is to change behaviors. As you know from any shift you’ve made in your own life, it comes down to one behavior at a time. You can decide you want to be an Ironman triathlete, but if you’ve never run a 5K, you start by lacing up your shoes and going for a short run. If, on your first weekend, you tried to take swimming lessons to improve your stroke, weight training to build endurance, and ride your bike over Vail Pass, you’d end up discouraged, sore, and not much fun to be around.

Many of us have joined a swim team at one time or another, and there is a shared foundational experience here that’s worth examining. Battle past the desperate life-or-death phase of swimming, and you begin to appreciate how good the water feels. Join a team, and you begin to appreciate the company you keep. Competition happens when you get good enough at swimming to want to be better.

Iloved the smell of chlorine in the morning. It was the smell of victory! At least it was the smell of victory for me. Everyone on the team thought I was crazy for getting up and going in before school to practice. There were times when I think even coach thought I was a little crazy, but he was always there to open the place up for my voluntary solo practice.

You have no role to fill, no history to live up to—be a bully, so I can beat you! Be a rival, so I can defeat you! Be a horny jock, so I can blow you! I don’t give a fuck, just be something. I made the mistake of thinking you could challenge me. Then, I made the mistake of thinking you could tempt me. Now, I refuse to make the mistake of thinking about you at all.

Life is fragile, short, and you only get one. So if you want to quit the swim team, then quit. Your brothers will understand, I will understand, and more importantly, your dad would understand if he were here.” His eyes became watery, and I knew my words were reaching him.

I didn’t appreciate him. I was too young, and I didn’t know what other boys were like. I thought every boy would race around the side of his broken down Ford to keep me from opening the door on my own. Would drive me home every single day after school, even if it meant he had to rush back to school to get to swim team practice. Would kiss me softly and sweetly and respectfully ask permission before he tried anything we hadn’t done before.

As Cathy swam back and forth in the creek, I grieved, not for my girlhood or the swim team or the failed races, but for losing her, for losing the chances I could have had with her, and for my memories forever tainted—such was the price of transcendence beyond human.

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If we want clues, we need to look at the extracurricular activities they pushed at us. Clearly, with Daniel and me, they were trying to boost our natural talents: fighting for him and running for me. Serena, Hayley, and Nicole were all in the choir and on the swim team. Plus they’re all blonde and pretty.” “Um, thanks,” Hayley said as she came over. “But what…” Her brow furrowed. “You think we’re mermaids?” “Isn’t that sirens?” Corey said. “Those chicks we studied in Greek mythology. Lured guys to their deaths by singing.” Hayley glared at him. “I thought you liked my singing.” “Yeah, because apparently it’s magical. That’s how you seduce guys.” “Seduce them? Or kill them?” “Same thing, kind of, if you think about it. Like that other guy in mythology. The one who got his hair cut and lost all his power. Mr. Parks said it symbolized men losing their power by falling for women.” “No,” I said. “Mr. Parks said it symbolizes men’s irrational fear of losing their power to women. And unless I’m remembering it wrong, mermaids don’t sing and sirens don’t swim.” “Ariel sang in The Little Mermaid,” Corey said. Sam came over to join us. “Do I even want to know why you remember her name?

Mr. Phone took a swim when I was dropping the kids off at the pool.” “What?” Megan held up a bag of rice containing her damp phone. “Mr. Phone went for a dive and a backstroke in Mr. Toilet. Don’t worry, I’d already flushed when it happened.” “Not again,” Tina said, exasperated. “Why does that always happen to you?” “I blame Mr. Toilet. He has a gravitational pull that cannot be explained by modern science. We should get a team of researchers into the house to conduct tests.” Megan plopped the bag of rice and phone on the counter. “What were you calling me about?” Tina did an excited dance. “Your dentist came by looking for you.” “You met him? You met my Drew?” “Oh, Meenie, he’s so cute. Why didn’t you tell me he was so cute?” “I’m not shallow like you.” Tina said, “He’s a good one, Meenie. I think he might be the one.” “Don’t be gross. You know I hate stuff like that. If you and Luca start saying you’re soul mates, I’m going to throw up every time.” “Aren’t you going to ask what we talked about?” “He’d better not be buying me flowers from my own store. It’s cute when Luca does it, but he’s Luca. That sort of behavior from a man as dignified as Dr. Drew Morgan will not stand with me.” “Don’t worry. I told him not to ever buy you flowers or chocolates or any of that romantic stuff.” Megan frowned. “None of it?” “And I didn’t say anything embarrassing to him about our past.” Tina chewed her lower lip in that telltale way she did when she knew she’d done something Megan wouldn’t like.

Conversation turned to the swimming team and an upcoming meet, and Rafe’s gaze returned to the forest, like he was looking for an escape route. I eased over, close enough to murmur, “Go on.” “Hmm?” “This obviously isn’t your thing either.” I slowed to let the others get ahead. “You showed up. Good enough. Go on. Enjoy the rest of your night.” “Trying to get rid of me?” He managed a smile that barely touched his eyes. “Or trying to get out of our deal? I won thirty minutes of your time, remember.” “You can have a rain check on that, too.” He searched my face. “Are you mad because I didn’t take the kiss? It wasn’t an insult. I have every intention of cashing that check. Just not with all your friends watching.” “I appreciate that.” “Yeah?” Another searching look. Then he smiled. “Good.” “Doesn’t mean I’ll accept the chit when you cash it. But you scored points for chivalry.

I wasn’t one of those socially withdrawn fat kids, though. I was the girl who always wanted to get in the game, even if I played it really, really poorly. I was more than happy to sweat my life away on athletic teams: volleyball, track, if that meant having lots of friends. I was even willing to brave the swim team in a Speedo. I wish I had that kind of body confidence now.

1.​Find a reason greater than reality: the power of spirit If you ask most people if they would like to be rich or financially free, they would say yes. But then reality sets in. The road seems too long with too many hills to climb. It’s easier to just work for money and hand the excess over to your broker. I once met a young woman who had dreams of swimming for the U.S. Olympic team. The reality was that she had to get up every morning at four o’clock to swim for three hours before going to school. She did not party with her friends on Saturday night. She had to study and keep her grades up, just like everyone else. When I asked her what fueled her super-human ambition and sacrifice, she simply said, “I do it for myself and the people I love. It’s love that gets me over the hurdles and sacrifices.” A reason or a purpose is a combination of “wants” and “don’t wants.” When people ask me what my reason for wanting to be rich is, I tell them that it is a combination of deep emotional “wants” and “don’t wants.” I will list a few: first, the “don’t wants,” for they create the “wants.” I don’t want to work all my life. I don’t want what my parents aspired for, which was job security and a house in the suburbs. I don’t like being an employee. I hated that my dad always missed my football games because he was so busy working on his career. I hated it when my dad worked hard all his life and the government took most of what he worked for at his death. He could not even pass on what he worked so hard for when he died. The rich don’t do that. They work hard and pass it on to their children. Now the “wants.” I want to be free to travel the world and live in the lifestyle I love. I want to be young when I do this. I want to simply be free. I want control over my time and my life. I want money to work for me. Those are my deep-seated emotional reasons. What are yours? If they are not strong enough, then the reality of the road ahead may be greater than your reasons. I have lost money and been set back many times, but it was the deep emotional reasons that kept me standing up and going forward. I wanted to be free by age 40, but it took me until I was 47, with many learning experiences along the way. As I said, I wish I could say it was easy. It wasn’t. But it wasn’t that hard either. I’ve learned that, without a strong reason or purpose, anything in life is hard. IF YOU DO NOT HAVE A STRONG REASON, THERE IS NO SENSE READING FURTHER. IT WILL SOUND LIKE TOO MUCH WORK.

Did she ask about anyone else?” “Oh, everyone,” Brendan said, rushing on. “Names, friendships, hobbies. She was really interested in our hobbies. When we talked about the teams and stuff, she asked why Rafe and Sam aren’t on any. I said Rafe just moved here, and I don’t know what he’s into.” “And me?” Sam said. “I said you’re antisocial.” “Thanks.” “She asked whether you were good at any of the school’s specialties--singing, track, swimming, wrestling…I said all I know is you like to hit people.” She flipped him the finger. “What? It’s true. Then she asked if they let girls on the boxing team and I said Mr. Barnes tried to get you on it, but you weren’t interested. Then--get this--she starts asking if you’ve got a hate-on for certain people.” Sam looked worried, almost alarmed, but when she saw me watching, she tried to hide it and said, “So what’d you tell her?” “That you’re an equal opportunity hater.

When we talked about the teams and stuff, she asked why Rafe and Sam aren’t on any. I said Rafe just moved here, and I don’t know what he’s into.” “And me?” Sam said. “I said you’re antisocial.” “Thanks.” “She asked whether you were good at any of the school’s specialties--singing, track, swimming, wrestling…I said all I know is you like to hit people.” She flipped him the finger. “What? It’s true.

When we talked about the teams and stuff, she asked why Rafe and Sam aren’t on any. I said Rafe just moved here, and I don’t know what he’s into.” “And me?” Sam said. “I said you’re antisocial.” “Thanks.” “She asked whether you were good at any of the school’s specialties--singing, track, swimming, wrestling…I said all I know is you like to hit people.

My mom doesn’t want me. Veronica’s face was full of disgust and disappointment when she closed the locker room door behind her. My swim team friends think I’m some kind of … I can’t let myself remember their faces. The shame it brings is too sharp; it cuts me up on the inside.

Whether we are Republicans or Democrats, the ultimate goal should be holding our leaders to the positions and objectives that best fit our aims for a better society. People are dug into their own corners. Right and left. Blue and red. We’re more separated now than ever before, and the gap only continues to widen as technology allows us to create more and more ponds where only like-minded fish can swim: the cable news we watch, the websites we gravitate to, the people and groups we follow (and block!) on social media. The idea of a Democrat and a Republican sitting across from each other for a balanced, or even civil, discussion almost sounds impossible anymore. Perhaps the first step in that direction is to start holding our own party accountable. We may demonize the other side a little less once we start looking at our own team with a more honest eye and realize we’re not perfect either. Before I could admit (shudder) that the other side had any good ideas that might advance my core values, I first had to accept the fact that my side sometimes has some bad ones. That alone could be a big step toward both sides truly working together and unraveling some of the issues that both want resolved. Issues that are at the core of who we truly are beyond classifications and political tags.

Everything comes so easy for you, doesn’t it, Maya? School, boys, friends, sports. Even your precious animals. You can’t just take care of them like any normal person. You have to be some kind of animal whisperer. Magical healer. So damned special. Like Serena, captain of the swim team and the best singer on the freaking island, and how much does she practice? Sings in the shower. Paddles around the lake. Do you know how hard I work? It’s never enough. You two get the trophies and the solos and the As and the boys.” You’re crazy, I thought. Did they do this to you with their experiments? Or is this just you?

Part of him wanted to tell Nath that he knew: what it was like to be teased, what it was like to never fit in. The other part of him wanted to shake his son, to slap him. To shape him into something different. Later, when Nath was too slight for the football team, too short for the basketball team, too clumsy for the baseball team, when he seemed to prefer reading and poring over his atlas and peering through his telescope to making friends, James would think back to this day in the swimming pool, this first disappointment in his son, this first and most painful puncture in his fatherly dreams.

I felt like I had no more stories, no more speeches, and no more “rah-rah” in me. I decided to level with the team and see what happened. I called an all engineering meeting and gave the following speech: “I have some bad news. We are getting our asses kicked by BladeLogic and it’s a product problem. If this continues, I am going to have to sell the company for cheap. There is no way for us to survive if we don’t have the winning product. So, I am going to need every one of you to do something. I need you to go home tonight and have a serious conversation with your wife, husband, significant other, or whoever cares most about you and tell them, ‘Ben needs me for the next six months.’ I need you to come in early and stay late. I will buy you dinner, and I will stay here with you. Make no mistake, we have one bullet left in the gun and we must hit the target.” At the time, I felt horrible asking the team to make yet another big sacrifice. Amazingly, I found out while writing this book that I probably should have felt good about it. Here’s what Ted Crossman, one of my best engineers, said about that time and the launch of the aptly named Darwin Project many years later: Of all the times I think of at Loudcloud and Opsware, the Darwin Project was the most fun and the most hard. I worked seven days a week 8 a.m.–10 p.m. for six months straight. It was full on. Once a week I had a date night with my wife where I gave her my undivided attention from 6 p.m. until midnight. And the next day, even if it was Saturday, I’d be back in the office at 8 a.m. and stay through dinner. I would come home between 10–11 p.m. Every night. And it wasn’t just me. It was everybody in the office. The technical things asked of us were great. We had to brainstorm how to do things and translate those things into an actual product. It was hard, but fun. I don’t remember losing anyone during that time. It was like, “Hey, we gotta get this done, or we will not be here, we’ll have to get another job.” It was a tight-knit group of people. A lot of the really junior people really stepped up. It was a great growing experience for them to be thrown into the middle of the ocean and told, “Okay, swim.” Six months later we suddenly started winning proofs of concepts we hadn’t before. Ben did a great job, he’d give us feedback, and pat people on the back when we were done.

Listen to yourself,”Dad said. “You’re about to burst into tears. Stop this nonsense right now.” “Get your hands off me, I said!" When his hand reached for me again, I punched him in the mouth. Dad took a step back, blinking at me and touching his lip, staring at the blood that his only son had somehow drawn. He looked more startled than hurt or even angry. It was the expression of a man who’d just been informed that, effective immediately, up was down and black was white. Neither of us said a word. “Two things,”I said. “First, when I get back to school I’m joining the swim team again. Second, if you ever cheat on Mom again and I find out, I’m going to beat the living shit out of you.” Dad’s high forehead creased with the tiniest of frowns. “Are you still on that?” “You lied to us.” “You don’t know the details.” “I know I can’t trust you,”I said. “What else do I need to know?” “I don’t know, Perry. I don’t know who you are anymore.” “Yeah, well, that makes two of us.

In the Trident hills Panchkula, they are many accessible ambitious which are planned according to the people's requirements. This highlights the project as brought up by the builders. The builders are highly skilled on their platform, where they have the eligibility to develop their talent according to the present recruitment for their people. The builders understand the needs of the people, so with their team, they have designed the plans from the master to floor structures according to the highlights of what the people need to leave their life in the destination. Each ambitious work in the residential was worked out by an expert builder, which offers people a green and warm atmosphere for their families. Ambitious facilities like a swimming pool, clubhouse, walking path, skirting Court, kids' playground, and other facilities have also been developing in the residential.

I once met a young woman who had dreams of swimming for the U.S. Olympic team. The reality was that she had to get up every morning at four o’clock to swim for three hours before going to school. She did not party with her friends on Saturday night. She had to study and keep her grades up, just like everyone else. When I asked her what fueled her super-human ambition and sacrifice, she simply said, “I do it for myself and the people I love. It’s love that gets me over the hurdles and sacrifices.

While a student in McCollum’s class, Jobs became friends with a graduate who was the teacher’s all-time favorite and a school legend for his wizardry in the class. Stephen Wozniak, whose younger brother had been on a swim team with Jobs, was almost five years older than Jobs and far more knowledgeable about electronics. But emotionally and socially he was still a high school geek.