a swimming pool, a cesspool

I have started going to a gym in that has an indoor swimming pool.

This is an interesting development in my life as- heh- 

I don't swim. 

At all.

I was never much exposed to water culture as a youth. The few times I was in water, I was not instructed on the basics of swimming. Perhaps it was as if I was supposed to just figure out how to operate my body in the water- by osmosis, or something. It certainly didn't seem to matter to anyone else if I acquired the skill or not. 

So, I never got accustomed to being in water. 

After my illness, just being in water is a lot for me now: I cramp at the drop of a hat, I deal with unusual muscle weakness / twitching, my back pain can be spectacular fun to work around, and I am easily overwhelmed by the sensory input of... everything. 

When there is a lot of people in the pool the overwhelm happens even faster. It is more akin to being at a nightclub than one would first imagine. If I had to put my head in the water I would certainly have a panic attack, like particular rhythms at high volumes certainly drive me to panic. Or rage.

Oh- how inexorably small I have become since the universe graced me with six years of repeated hamstring cutting- Oh-

I am relearning how to own being a freak in public again. I mean, I'm this thing walking laps in a pool, stretching my miserable body while these dolphin people glide and splash by me.

I am grateful the experience is helping me build up my physical and mental fortitude again, the elusiveness of the swimming part notwithstanding. 

Also, the pool is space insulated from the news out of the increasingly third-world, mind-blowingly hypocritical cesspool that is the United States of America.

All countries have their issues but... damn son, damn... this one is so jacked from all the mental gymnastics it does. It thinks getting gold for it's little flag waving uneven bars ≠ routine is a good thing.

Egh, I wish I could say more meaningful things right out on social media. 

I wish I did not have such problems with social interactions so that I could engage in conversations and appropriate debates more easily. 

I know that I am not very good at having a VOICE, however, even without one- I exist.

And by my existence, I hold as some kind of (unfortunately flimsy) barrier against the racist, fascist, authoritarian, pseudo-theocratic, rampant capitalistic, dick-ville being... *coff* erected.

But... I spend most of my energy on trying to stay alive and heal. I don't don't have the extra amounts of oomph needed to effectively deal with... large scale shitshows.

Last month ended with me in passive suicidal ideations for a few days. 

I could not write about that. Not while spiraling into it, or coming back out of it. I just yelled at the universe to pay artists! Let artists live!

I want to feel like I am worth more than the little birds brought down into the dark mines or the roses planted near the grapevines.

That imagery has nothing to do with pools. I don't care. 

This ending doesn't wrap things up- in a nice, fluffy towel. I don't care.

Support the vulnerable.