Thursday, August 23, 2012

The ocean is gross . . .The seal-quel

Last March, I ran for the seals. Last Sunday, I literally swam with seals, rather, they swam with me. My friend AC and I went down to Pacific Grove to take the triathlon course for a test drive. On the swim course, there were seals hanging out everywhere - probably 30 or more chillin' out by the rocks, enjoying the day. Apparently seals are quite curious; every once in awhile we saw a gray head with HUGE black eyes staring over top of the water as us. Seals don't come too close, and they swim faster than me. But, every time I crawled over some kelp I wondered if there would be a seal hiding under there. And it kind of freaked me out. Also, remember the ocean is their toilet.

I'm going to start referring to the ocean as the "groscean."

Seriously though. Through this whole training process I've had some major inquiry into, "Why the hell are you doing this?" both personally and from others. I've decided that doing things that completely freak me out is good for my soul. That's why I keep doing that terrible Splash and Dash event. I'm not sure why, but I really don't like that swim in Steven's Creek Reservoir at all. The reason I hate the Splash and Dash is not based at all in logic: I know I can swim, the water is fine, the other competitors are nice/supportive. It's completely unfounded why I don't enjoy that event, but I made myself do it again this year - THREE TIMES!

There are things I don't want to do, but I'm finding that I'm not really scared to try new things much anymore. Once you've taken off your swimsuit to find duck poo inside of it, your sense of "ewww gross" changes pretty dramatically. In the same way, once you've experienced the difficulty of trying something new and realized it's not going to kill you, it doesn't seem so difficult anymore.

I heard a pretty good quote lately:

"It's not getting any easier, you are just getting stronger." I like that.

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