I Should Have Listened...

As I limped into the Jordan YMCA this morning, I should have listened to the whipper snapper at my side.

I'd been telling her that while I would swim with her, she couldn't bully me into trying to swim like her swim team instructors make the team swim.

With our annual beach vacation fast approaching, I'd stepped up my own, age-appropriate workouts all week, reduced my food intake and had practically forsworn liquor (except for Book  Club.) My FitBit tells me I approached 100K steps in the past seven days.

So I was justifiably sore, hungry and a little cranky. I was thinking that a water workout would help me keep active but with less stress.

I'd also just introduced Alison to an Indianapolis institution when we tagged along with most of Team Ogden to Acapulco Joe's. We had attended the YAT play, Anne of Green Gables, which included a performance by Hannah Ogden on Saturday afternoon. The play was awesome. The food that followed included some stuff we'd not had in a while or, maybe ever in Alison's case. We weren't half way to Kroger when our gastrointestinal systems started growling a similar song.

But I digress. As we headed to the indoor pool, I said, "OK, Ali. I'm going to swim, but there's no way I'm keeping up with you."

"It's OK, Mom. You're old and you're in pain. I won't push you."

Turns out I didn't need her to push me. Before 30 minutes had passed, I was done. My arms were lead pipes. My legs were wobbling like Auntie Jen's Christmas Jello Salad. I could barely drag myself out of the water. I laid there for a few seconds. Up popped my red-headed otter.  "You OK?"

"Yeah," I said. "I might puke, though."

"That just means  you're doing it right," she said, pausing for a moment to be sure I didn't collapse in her lane. "Uh, you know you can't just lay there, right? You're a fire hazard."

I couldn't even muster the energy to look at her. "It's fire hazard or puke hazard. Pick one."

I took swig of her water and grabbed a float she uses to focus on leg muscles. I used it that way, too. In no way was it a life preserver as I paddled up and down a couple more times. Here's how dazed I was: As I struggled out of the shallow end, I hallucinated that my friend Carol Dellinger, a medical doctor, was in the far lane. I'd just seen her at my Book Club, so I was sure it was her. She must have been sent there to save me, I reasoned.

"Carol?" I said.  She didn't flinch. That's how I knew it was an illusion and once again, I'd have to save my own sorry ass.

So I dragged myself upright and headed to the locker room. I got into the hot tub thinking that would help. Nope.  I was even more lightheaded when Ali came in to check on me.

It was later, when I was sitting in the handicapped stall of the women's locker, bathed in sweat and soaking up the coolness of the bathroom tile when I sort of came back to myself. Actually it was the sight of neon pink sneakers in the stall next to me that made me think I'd better get up before they sent someone in after me.

In the locker room, I saw  Carol again. This time, she saw me too and even spoke. That perked me up a bit. I wasn't as far gone as I'd thought. We got out to the car and Ali remembered she'd left her swim bag inside. I kind of passed out again in the car while I was waiting on her.

When you've worn yourself out swimming, a stick-shift Mustang isn't really the car  you want to be driving. But there we were. I'd let Alex Ogden drive the Subaru from the play to the restaurant the day before and I longed for him to wander by the YMCA lot. No such luck. Not even as a mirage did he wander by.

Somehow I got us home without killing anyone -- including the white cargo van driver in front of me who had forgotten that he/she had a gas pedal. Or had ever learned how to maneuver that beast through the narrow, cars-parked-on-both-sides streets of Broad Ripple.

I collapsed on the couch -- still wet -- and slept for two hours. Ali revived me with gourmet Ramen and hard boiled eggs.

We're on tap to attend a swanky Oscars party tonight. Neither of us should be in our best fighting shape. I had Book Club on Friday. Jeff had a craft beer tasting party that went past 2 a.m. last night. Last week I was making fun of my coworkers, a handful of whom were comparing weekend warrior stories that all began with, "So I was drunk in an Uber and..."

This week, I think I'll just put my head down and work.

Random pics from the past several days.