The Only Holiday Teenagers Really Care About

Okay, here's the thing: April 20th is a very big deal to the teenage culture.

Although I happen to be one of the few students out there who doesn't participate in the act of smoking pot, I'm very aware of this day.

Wednesday, April 20th, was a very celebrated holiday around the town of Park City and places around the world. My friends and I where honestly just making fun of the whole thing because of the people who were clearly on Cloud 9 and trying to make it through the school day. It was especially hilarious because of the fact that there was increased security on Wednesday as well. And for good reason.

It is a pretty old occurrence for people to take pictures at 4:20 pm (or am, for the night owls out there) and joke about drugs and pot and other sorts. Again, my friends and I, being the ironic idiots that we are, take these photos and send them to each other as a joke.

But what some people might not understand is that April 20th is a huge deal. You don't have just two minutes a day to grasp this photo worthy opportunity, but you have a whole day.

4/20/16 also happened to fall during our schools "Drug Awareness Month" which I find hilariously inconvenient. After laughing about that at lunch and finishing the day of school successfully, it was time to go to swimming.

As I arrived at swim practice, I made a few jokes about the date as I had all day and then my swim coach walked in and screamed, "Happy 4/20 Everyone!" He then explained our sets for the day, in which he had successfully snuck in multiple sets including mentions of the date.

During one of our first sets, I realized it was around 4:10 pm and I looked to my coach and asked, not really expecting much, "Hey Mike, do you think we can take a team picture at 4:20 on 4/20?" He just smiled at me and shrugged. I didn't know how to interpret that, but when he stopped us and told us to crowd around our swim lane he said, "Everyone say 4/20!" Which resulted in this beauty of a picture.

Can you spot the drowning Lucas? (Taken by my swim coach, Mike Werner).

Truly a golden shot right there.

And even on the one day Elise couldn't make it to practice because she was at the donut shop for a Spanish project, she left us with some wise words. "Why blaze, when you can glaze?"

Anyway, carry on.
xx Em

P.S. How hilarious would it be if this was 420 words. I checked it's not. What a shame.

The End of an Era

Okay, here's the thing: I'm a bit over it.

"It" being swimming.

I've been swimming ever since I was nine years old, and now, nearly six years later, I feel like I'm drifting away from it.

When I was younger, I had this bizarre dream of going to the Olympic Games for swimming. I realize now that my dream was far fetched.

I've never been a super fast swimmer, but I've never been super slow either. I'm kinda just the person who floats around the swim deck and swims their races.

During practice I feel fine, but, a lot of the time, I feel like everyone is going fast and it's hard for me to keep up.

After I finished my first season of high school swimming, I realized how much more I liked that than club swimming. It was a different environment and I had a lot more fun there than I did on club.

That doesn't mean that I never had good moments on club though. I have had plenty.

All of our snapchat stories were up to date
 with our insanity.

This past weekend, I was at my very last Age Group State Championships with my club swim team. In the past three days alone, I have made so many new memories that I will remember for a long time.

For example, there was this one coach that was stationed close to our coach. I don't remember what team she was coaching for, but everyone on our team knows of a girl on that team. I don't know what this girl looks like or exactly how old she is, but I know her name. Her name is Eve. Her coach, who could easily double as her own mother in this situation, was always extra enthusiastic about Eve's races. She would use exaggerated hand movements and clap her hands as she screamed, "GO, EVE! COME ON, EVE! GET IN THERE, EVE! LET'S GO!" It became an ongoing joke throughout our team and I finally witness it in action on the very last day. It was seriously the most bizarre thing I have ever witnessed.

Another thing that happened at state, occurred during the relays each night. I understand that relays can be stressful. There are four times as many people in the back hallway than there are normally. One lady was in charge of lining us all up before our heat was insane though. She would continually ask us what heat and lane we were in and asked us to line up first to last. She kept doing the same up and down motion with both of her hands and had this crazy look in here eyes. She had definitely seen some shit behind those extremely large glasses she had on.

This weekend was one for the books, whether or not I actually swam well. I'm happy I was able to end the last state meet as an age group swimmer with the people I ended it with. I'm proud to say that our team helped each other throughout the few days of torturous chlorine burns and tight suits. I'm happy it ended on a good note.

Anyway, carry on.
xx Em

Wishful Thinking

Okay, here's the thing: I've spent my whole life wishing. 

Most of this wishing has to do with my location.

I think that everyone has had that feeling. A feeling of slight disappointment and feeling like they want to be anywhere else but where they are.

If the person reading this post is one of my close friends, you have definitely seen me at this point. Nearly everyday I say something about not wanting to swim, go to school, etc.

I think that one of my issues is that I tend to think about too many things at one time and it builds up too high. When I have too many things on my mind I start to complain about it and then it comes out in a rumble of negativity. After I spit it all out I begin thinking about it even more and it's always just sitting in the back of my mind, ruining my mood.

I sometimes wish I was back on this road trip. 

For the past few days I have actually had a lot on my mind, and it has proven what I just explained above. This  week is the week before the quarter ends, and I am missing Thursday and Friday of school due to a swim meet, the state competition. This has been looming over me since sometime last week, when we really started to work on racing during practice. While I was at practice I was thinking about the homework I had to do and the tests I had to study for. While I was doing my homework, I was thinking about the swimming competition.

Last Sunday, when I was scrambling to finish an essay that was due that night, I was having the hardest time focusing. I was trying my best to get all of my thoughts down on the paper, but I began to think about swim. I hadn't been feeling very good since High School Swim season had ended, and the meet was approaching so fast. I remember staring at a sentence on the computer screen that I had been rewriting over and over while I thought about how poorly I would do at State.

At this point, I began freaking out and every little thing was distracting me. I was so on edge that one small thing brought me to my breaking point.

I laid face down on the ground and silently cried. It seems dramatic, but it's what I had to do. As I was on the floor, I tried to collect my thoughts and finish my essay, but I'm not too sure it worked (I'm very sure that my essay was horrible).

One thing I know for sure, however, is that all of these troubles will help me in the end.

I stay in shape while I swim. I learn more every day at school. All of the places that we wish we could erase are actually something we should look forward to.

I can't say that I'm just going to flip a switch and be positive all the time, but I'm surely going to try to be better. And I hope you can too.

Anyway, carry on.
xx Em

The Time I Was Truly a Salty Stressball (Part Two)

Okay, here's the thing: read Part One first.

"Swimmers, please stand. Lane six, step down."

When I heard those words, the man behind the lane helped me down from the blocks and a million thoughts were running through my head. I thought that we might have been disqualified because of our tardiness to getting up onto the blocks. I was just

wondering why this had to happened to me on my very first meet of the High School season.

My thoughts were only partially answered when the kind man behind the block told me that my coach said that my relay wasn't swimming in this event.

I was extremely confused at this point, but I saw Kelly's hair out of the corner of my eye, and looked at her with a questioning expression on my face.

"This is the 200 Free Relay not the 400 Free Relay."

My brain's first instinct after hearing these words was to cry. So, I did.

I burst into tears right behind that block.

This is probably what I looked like as I cried.
Courtesy of Love Beach Blog

I was shaking as if I was in Antarctica, I had the most pounding headache I've ever experienced, and, in front of multiple strangers, I cried.

My friends came to comfort me, but I probably looked like a maniac because, honestly, I had no idea why I was crying, but, no matter what I did, I couldn't stop.

This for some reason was funny for me, so I was laughing hysterically, while also crying about something else.

I guess it was the pure terror of being disqualified at my first meet, the extreme stress that the thought of that brought, and the relief that followed after hearing that I didn't actually have to do that was what made me cry.

This experience cycled me through the stages of a breakup, in a way. Maybe not quite in order, but I went through them all in one way or another.

First, I was confused what was going on, and I had too many questions that needed to be answered, but weren't quite being answered in the way I needed them to be.

Second, I kept telling myself that "this couldn't be happening." Instead, I was just having nightmare that was giving me a heart attack from the stress. 

Third, when it actually didn't happen, I collapsed into despair, and cried. Whether it was from relief or something else, I would be the only one to know, but I couldn't answer that if I tried.

Fourth, I was pretty dang salty (and not from the tears I had just previously shed). I was pissed. I didn't know why, but I was so frustrated with, not only Kelly, but myself for putting myself through that confusion, stress, and sadness.

Finally, I met acceptance with the fact that it was a mistake, and it was going to be okay. 

I even thought of it as a learning experience, and even though I left an entire three-fourths of my relay behind in the chaos, I was able to get the the blocks in time before they left.

I don't think I will every feel like I did that night ever again. Well, at least I hope not.

Anyway, carry on.

xx Em

The Time I Truly Was a Salty Stressball (Part One)

Okay, here's the thing: pay attention.

This past Friday, November 6, 2015, was my first High School Swim meet.

I have been swimming for quite a long time, so I was used for a certain type of meet set up, but High School Swimming is completely different, so I was pretty confused the whole night.

At the beginning of the meet, I found out that I was in the 400 Free Relay at the very end of the meet. I knew that the 200 IM Relay was at the beginning, so I thought that the whole night only consisted of the regular individual events and those two relays.

When I thought my relay was coming up, I asked my coach, Kelly, how much longer she thought I had until I had to swim in the relay. She checked and told me that I had around fifteen minutes or so, and that my relay would be in lane six.

What I didn't know is that Kelly thought I was talking about the 200 Free Relay which was a couple of events before the relay I was actually in.

I felt like this guy while I ran to my block.
Courtesy of Looney Tunes

All I knew about my relay is that it was right after the 100 Breaststrokes, so that was all I was looking out for.

For the next couple of minutes, I was talking to a couple of friends when all of the sudden, I hear someone yelling, "WHERE IS THE 'B' RELAY?!"

I didn't even think about what was going on, but when I made eye contact with Kelly and could clearly tell she was pointing directly at me, I dropped everything I ever thought in my entire life and ran.

I ripped the sweatshirt off of my body and grabbed my cap and goggles as I ran for my life to the block behind lane six. I threw my cap on, not even caring where the rest of my relay was (I didn't actually know who was on my relay). The rest of the teams were already up on the blocks, so my first instinct was to get right up on the blocks with them, even if the rest of my relay wasn't even there yet.

The man timing for my lane realized that I was the only one there, and asked, "Where's the rest of your relay?"

At that moment, I didn't even care. I knew I was supposed to be swimming the first leg of the relay in the first place, so I thought, I might as well show up and swim the first part of the relay than have our entire relay miss the race completely.

My heart had never beaten so hard, and I was so stressed out that my bottom lip actually started trembling as I was up on the blocks right before I was about to leave.

"Swimmers, please stand. Lane six, step down."

To be continued...

xx Em