Gym Rat/Nightswimming

 Sometimes i'm amazed at how everything i thought ends up completely backwards... if someone would have told me which of the boyos would be more of a handful when they got older i would have easily said my boy Disaster would be the one i have to worry about... and while it's still early doors in the high school years for Nick Disaster i can say that he will be hard pressed to top the Imac when it comes to being a royal pain in the ass... to say that the last few years have been challenging with the Imac would be selling it short, it's been a shit show, one where his parents have been at a loss many times when it came to dealing with an emotional, impulsive and tempermental kid... the worrying part comes with that impulsivity and doing incredibly stupid shit... i've become a bit tired of getting a call from one of his friends and having to pick up my trashed son... 

Then there is Disaster... there are times when i think i got the names wrong as it's his brother these days who is very much the disaster and not my youngest son... of course with every kid you worry about different things... whereas the Imac is the ultimate social butterfly, hanging out with whoever whenever just to be making the scene, Nick Disaster is quite different, much more self contained, more disciplined, able to be by himself where his big brother is not... even when he Imac is by himself he's glued to his phone snapping or texting or whatever the fuck the kids like to do these days... in fact where the Imac and i used to have some great conversations, on car rides, we barely speak anymore, i having given up due to being fed up with repeating myself because he's too busy tapping away or taking selfies... Disaster on the other hand is the opposite, now we have conversations in the car that we both quite enjoy... i'm keeping my fingers crossed they don't dissipate like those i used to have with his elder brother... 

At the beginning of the summer Nick Disaster had his first girlfriend, he was hanging out with a bunch of kids that spent their days at the basketball courts behind one of the elementary schools and near a small strip of local shops... they'd play hoops and get pizza, they'd go back to the one kid's house (near our place) and swim and hangout.. it was awesome watching him spread his wings so to speak and while there was a worry he would follow down the same path as his brother those worries quickly dissipated... many of the kids Disaster was hanging with were football players, not all, but a good chunk and when the pre-season workouts started Disaster wasn't hanging out as much anymore... we (the BW and i) sorta chalked it up to the workouts and the two a days that football has but then it became apparent that those kids were still hanging out at the one kid's house, the ringleader so to speak with the pool, it's just that Disaster never went over... i knew the ringleader had a catty way of exiling kids from the group and i worried that Disaster had now incurred his wrath though he was always one of the most well liked kids in said group... 

Nick Disaster is not anything like his older brother when it comes to divulging information... where the Imac will tell us way more than we need to know about everything, and i do mean everything, Disaster keeps shit close to the vest, one has to let him give information when he feels comfortable and any attempt to get it out of him results in him quickly shutting shit down... he reminds me of his father in that respect (funny i know coming from a guy who has spent the last 17 years posting shit online) but when i noticed he wasn't hanging out as much and particularly with the crowd he had spent the last six or so months with i began wonder what was up... there are moments when one finds themselves immensely proud of their kids... as it turns out Disaster mentioned that his old group was "kinda beat", the ringleader had started vaping nicotine, smoking for all intents and purpose and Disaster wanted none of it, it also turns out the ringleader would make fun and pressure kids into doing it as well and my boy distanced himself from them, he wasn't into that shit and i told him it takes a lot more courage to walk away from friends doing shit like that than it is to give in to doing it, as i told him these kids don't know what they're getting into and will be fucked when they think they can stop, it ain't that easy... but fucking hell was i proud of the kid and let him know it, that he had made the right decision even though i could tell he was bummed...

A few weeks back, after school had started, the BW had mentioned how Disaster said the weekends were boring especially if his friends weren't around, he had been hanging with some different kids, one he sorta goes in and out with, but on this night there was a big football game and i asked if he was going, he said probably not, he was playing video games and i could tell he was a bit down... i walked away wondering what i could do...  to quote Mr. Marley "my heart can be hard as stone, yet soft as water"... when it comes to Nick Disaster it is soft as water... and so i paced and thought and then walked back in and said, "do you want to go to the gym?"... his face lit up... really? he asked... yeah, i said, it's open til 9, we can go and you can get some shots up and work on stuff, he jumped off the couch and grabbed his bag, ready in a flash... 

The boyos have heard the stories from their old man, how most of my Friday nights from 7th until 11th grade were spent at the local junior college playing pick-up basketball, usually against older players until the young bucks got so good the older guys just laughed because we'd kick their asses (little did those guys know they were playing against what would become some of the best high school talent in the area)... Disaster wants to play hoops in college, he has also heard his old man talk about the sacrifice one has to make to get there, his older brother had the potential to play high level soccer in college but that has fallen by the wayside, it takes discipline and desire to get there, Disaster has shown he has both and so i drove to the gym fully expecting to rebound for him except when we got there the gym was full of older guys playing... Disaster has played with some of them before and many will talk to him and teach him things, so now, just like his old man, he has a place to play every Friday and work against older players, in fact he's the youngest player there and i've told him he has a standing invitation, i'd take him any and every Friday he wants and i can tell he's stoked... as i explained to him someday all this work will pay off if he keeps his head on straight and keeps working at it... the boys becoming a regular Gym Rat as it's called and i love it... that and his smile because it's awesome to watch him grow and get better and i can tell he likes his time with his old man... the feeling is mutual... 

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Which brings us to the second part of this post... Nightswimming... that first Friday as we walked into the gym i noticed how empty the pool was... i usually swim during the day when it can be more crowded (and usually is) so when i saw nothing but open lanes and then discovered they ran games on Friday nights i told Disaster this was perfect... he could go into the gym and play, i could get in a swim and then a soak in the whirlpool after which i'd come in and wait for him to finish playing, no matter what time... 

The pool is on the corner of the building and has huge floor to ceiling windows on three sides... some of the lights are burnt out in the ceiling which gives it a beautifully tranquil feeling and as i sauntered over to a lane dusk was settling in... i love my swims... usually they are a mile or more depending, always varying the distances of my sets from swim to swim to keep my creaky old body from settling into any routine... my mind floats in and out of thought much the same way it used to when i was running, except now i don't crash from sore knees and an aching back, instead the body feels beautifully worked, the lungs feel expanded, the mind feels at ease... going back and forth, catching glimpses of the sky when taking breaths, thinking of Disaster in the gym playing hoops, i'm sure if there was a camera under the water it would catch this tall goof swimming with a smile on his face... Friday nights back at the gym with his youngest son... funny how the universe works... 

There is that old saying about things coming full circle... my boy Disaster in the gym just like his old man used to do, the old man in the pool back to working out on Friday nights... it's funny to think where i'm at in this existence of mine... there was a time, decades in fact, where my Friday nights involved nothing but drinking and drugging... usually from the time i walked in the door after work until sometime around Sunday afternoon... the various incarnations of Kono so to speak, from the heavy boozing, weed and psychedelics, to the dabbling in the powders and pills (sometimes more than just dabbling)... moving smoothly through the water i'm amazed i've made it this far... thinking about the boyos and my father, my cats both past and present, the thoughts of a lifetime played out to a four count rhythm as the hands hit the water and my legs kick along... and of course the best part... walking out of the locker room and into the gym to watch Disaster play... grinning at how he's improved and all the things he can do now... he has the makings of an excellent player... i know i made mistakes with his older brother which i'm hoping to correct with him... but the real treat, the beauty of it all... the time we spend... it's more important than anything i've ever bought him and i know that someday when his father just a memory that he will think of these nights and smile, the same way i do when i'm gliding through the water and thinking about Pops... 

Then there is the drive home... we hit the drive thru and Disaster gets a couple of burgers, his favorite mango lemonade, we talk about how he played, he asks to put on his music and i say yes, (Disaster is currently into drill rappers and once again full circle as i remember my dad letting me listen to punk and hardcore bands back in the day) he's relaxed and talks about school, maybe his friends or a girl he likes, it's pure fucking gold... and worth even more... and i know this will not last, that he'll get older and do his own thing but for the time being it's pure beauty... fleeting moments that ultimately stretch out into infinity... these things that i will keep...