Yesterday my mother emailed me and reminded me that one year ago to the day I was toiling my way through the English Channel.  Funny I didn’t even remember it.  I did wake up and think hmmm September 22nd, why does this day seem like something important.  It was sort of the same feeling that I get on September 11th and remembering something big happened.  However, unlike September 11th I could exactly put my finger on what “IT” was.  Until the email.

One email and my emotions took a major roller coaster ride.  The huge ride of the exhiliration of achieiving a dream, the sadness that it is over, and the calm that comes with knowing that I went after it.  I guess in a way I found myself in that inky black water.    There were parts of me that I found that I really liked as in the part that found my passion.  And there were the weak points too, but I found that I can overcome those with some determination, a little grit, and some good support thrown in.  That and I’m so glad that I just tried. 

Funny to think that I couldn’t remember the actual day, but every day I wear a small rock from France that I’ve had fashioned into a necklace.  My own little rock.  I believe that it is the Greeks that have a superstition that you collect a rock from those places that you want to return.  Maybe it isn’t the Greeks but that has stuck with me.  I have rocks from all over the world, but somehow this small one around my neck seems the most important.  

I’m rambling.  I know, but I think I’m just not sure what to say.  The feelings are so strange.  Some days I pinch myself to know its true.  Other’s I sit there and think while I’m in a conversation “I bet you don’t know you are talking to one of the few Channel swimmers.” (Forgive me I know that is very egotistical) Most days it is life as usual, but with the added ritual of hooking my rock around my neck as hopefully a reminder to GO, PARTICIPATE, and LIVE.  

That’s all for now.