Getting back on track: fitness

Since I've moved to Australia, my fitness or lack thereof has caused me to not be able to fit into my summer shorts. The horrors of all horrors, a pair of shorts that were very loose around my waist is now not suitable for buffet dinners. I mean, is that a reality slap or what. I knew being older meant having slower metabolism but I truly wasn't ready for this!

So I took Friday off, went to get swimming gear and headed to the pool. I didn't want to over exert myself because it had been a good 4.5 years since I last swam laps. I choose swimming as I've always enjoyed the sport. It's an individual sport (read, no letting team members down!) and being in the water means the probability of me injuring myself is far less than other non buffered sports. Also because my fondest memories of swimming is heavily tied to my mother. She is no olympic swimmer but I always remember her being there in the pool or pool side. My mother got me swimming lessons when I was quite small, I think it was on the recommendation of my doctor for my asthma. My earliest memory in HK is my mother with her arms open, in the pool and encouraging me to splash my way to her. She was always there, be it in Malaysia at the Golf Club swimming with my aunt or on the benches at the Howick swimming pools. She was always watching us, splashing around and it must have been so bored for her. Actually remembering that makes me sad because my dad was never involved so I could only imagine how heavy her thoughts were. When you're a kid, you don't take notice of things like that though, we just swam.

So swimming for me, was a natural choice. I didn't suck at it and I find quite a nice kind of peace when all I could hear under water was my own breathing out.

I did 20 laps on Friday and I went back for more today. It feels great. It probably helps that we've somewhat gotten rid of our winter and summer has made it debut!