Genesis

In the beginning, there was water. The water was amorphous and untamed, with the darkness casting shadows over the nebulous substance, and the waves distorting the reflection of the already dimpled moon, and the eerie Petaluma hills were cosmic silhouettes paired amid the stars. And one turning day, somebody, whom I assume had much money and much influence said, "Let there be a swimming pool," and thus a pool was built, to tame the feral water into a sanctuary, a home, and a location to utilize this water to develop strength, dedication and character.

It was not a pretentious pool: today, it is still rather modest, tucked away in the outer Westside of Petaluma. Even within the high school in which it was built, Petaluma High School, it is located in the back corner, humble and meek in contrast to the grand Fine Arts building and the posh, burgundy all-weather track. The pool itself is 25 yards, composed of 6 lanes, as opposed to 50 meter pool in the Water Cube built for the 2008 Summer Olympics in China – a captivating, cuboid composed of ultramodern architecture. In contrast, our pool resembles a prison; one entrance is composed of a towering, wooden barrier, bedecked with flaking brown paint and intimidating splinters. The other entrance is a metal gate that frequently offers irritation to a person who must pry at its icy lock in the numbing atmosphere anytime before 5:00am. This person would also be under surveillance, for the pool is equipped with inexpensive, ineffective security cameras.

And yet, despite its penitentiary-like arrangement, it is, every now and then, promising and liberating. It is not enclosed with a ceiling, advantageous to the backstroker with the peripatetic mind, especially when the sun exchanges positions with the moon, and the light with the dark, and the clouds with the stars. In times like these, the dark water, lit only by the grim, green, glow from two antiquated, underwater pool lights, translates one 's silhouette onto the floor of the pool, like a timid candle's luminosity. It is a shadow puppet show, and we swimmers are the puppets, and our shadows are the products of dedication, and the pool is our stage and the darkness – that wondrous obscurity – is the auxiliary of the performance.

In the early hours of January mornings, the entire deck is monochrome and dark, with the exception of the whimsical, magenta Christmas lights still adorned charmingly upon the wooden shed, where we keep our equipment. It emits a ridiculous light in this ridiculous second of the ridiculous hour of this ridiculous day; the air, the water and the deck is not inviting, yet the lights seem to smirk wider than the Cheshire cat, as if all is brilliant and bright and blissful.

At 5 o'clock in the morning, the air itself is nothing but raw and sinister, bantering any person that moves within it. Our spectators may as well have been ghosts, sitting mutely on the brown, feebly painted set of old bleachers set facing the pool. Everything on deck is stagnant and silent; the trees planted outside the wooden gate do not dance, the water does not wrinkle, the black and purple backstroke flags do not dither, there is nobody on deck, for they have all retreated into the golden warmth of the locker rooms, which lie adjacent to the pool. The only movement against the canvas of stillness is the wistful, ethereal, white steam that trails into the atmosphere and disappears slowly and melodiously, like the ritardando of grand, multi-dimensional orchestra's pinnacle towards a final chord.

We plucky swimmers wait in the doorway of the locker room with the universe's sympathy – from Mercury and Venus, Mars and Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus – until we are called to dive. We think about the beige starting blocks: they accumulate layers of ice as the atmosphere and the displaced pool water collide, deciding to call truce upon their war and combine to form this unforgiving substance – ice – against a common enemy – me. Finally, our coach calls from the water (she begins her workouts earlier than we do), "Time to dive!" and there are collective groans.

There are seven of us that emerge reluctantly from the shelter of the beloved locker rooms, prancing on our toes like fawns (if they were bipedal) towards the starting blocks. The less we touch the deck, the better. Cold, cold, cold – I long for my sweatshirt, my pillow, the heat of my heavy blanket. We avoid the bird droppings that have been scattered among the deck the night before, and we still hear the pigeon's soft coo; they jeer at us. They are warm and comfortable, in their nests tucked in the gutters of the building adjacent to the pool, where they carelessly lay down more of their excrements.

The feeble green pool lights struggle through the midst of the rising condensation, casting a ghostlike aurora, as we approach the starting blocks. "Group one, step up," and we step up. The pool is still, and we are still. The steam curls, and our toes curl. A pigeon coos, and we whimper. "Set," and we get set.

And we dive.

And suddenly, the entropy of the entire setting modifies, as the first fingertip of the first swimmer violates the water's fine shell, breaching its surface. There are crashes of water, ferociously severing the initial silence. The water is tingling, thawing as opposed to the cold air around the pool. And suddenly, it is as if the temperate water has become my blanket, my swimsuit my pajamas, the early morning sky the comfort of my dark room, the stars my dreams, my nightmares, my imaginations. I become he who parted the Red Sea, he who had so much control over the water. I kicked, pulled, approached the opposite wall, tucked my head to my chest and flip-turned, traveling the turbulence of water. I understood it, and it understood me.

- Shin Mei