I Calculate My Figures

There's something going on around my middle that I'm trying to work out. One of the workings out I am doing is swimming. A recent trial membership offer at the Quarry Swimming Baths meant that I swam five times in ten days and this worked out at £1 per swim.

Four of those swims happened on workdays before work. It has come as something of a surprise to me that I am able to swim 660 metres, half of them towards my desk, half of them in the opposite direction, and still arrive at work on time, albeit with damp hair.

Based on that experience, I have signed up to a year's swimming membership. So far, the swims I have swum under membership terms have worked out at £95 each. If I swim 188 more times in the coming year, I will get the cost back down to £1 per swim.

Whilst I'm swimming, I try to remember the number of the length I'm on. This helps me to arrive at work on time. If I say to myself  "TWELVE" (never out loud) as I start length 12, it's somewhat confusing, as I've actually completed 11 lengths. There's something about this that feels like cheating, but equally, I can't get my head around the idea of length zero. If I think about all this too hard, I lose count.

So far, according to the tightness of my jeans, my motivating central concerns are not yet worked out. I carry forward other benefits into my days, however. A fuller sense, after one of those early baptisms, that my life is mine, and everything in it. And the whiff of chlorine emanating from my skin.