I had more intelligent things to say about the new season of Ally McBeal than the ten-meter tower competition. My college swim team was only nominally division one-once we lost to Swarthmore. My freshman year, when my legs were covered with welts and bruises, and my skin smelled antiseptically of chlorine, I would tell people I was a diver before I'd tell them my last name. Today, my voicemail password is still the diving code for a double twisting somersault, but I haven't jumped off a board in three and a half years. My career as a diver began accidentally.
Diving is generally a sport of injured gymnasts.
Tumbling experts already, they seek the thrill of hurtling their bodies through the air, despite stretched ligaments, torn cartilage and dislocated shoulders. I had neither their skill, nor the trauma on my body. Mine is a family of musicians, artists and disgruntled lawyers. I wanted to be an athlete, one of those highly revered gods and goddesses who strutted around the courtyard of my high-school, wearing brilliant crimson Varsity jackets, carrying Lacrosse sticks, cleats, or baseball mitts on the way to class. I read their names in the Berkeley High weekly newspaper with envy and reverence.