Red's Wrap
Happiness. It's relative.
The Perfect Ballet Leg
Our synchronized swimming coach’s name was Mrs. Hoffman. She wore polo shirts and khaki pants with a belt. She had brown hair in a short pageboy and wore a whistle on a woven lanyard around her neck. To my seventeen-year old self, she looked gay. But I didn’t know the word gay then and she was a Mrs. It was a long time ago when it didn’t take much to be different, to stand out. Now no one would think twice about her or wonder why Mr. Hoffman never showed his face.
Mrs. Hoffman was the coach of the synchronized swimming club. It wasn’t a team because a team would have competed. We didn’t compete; we put on shows. Girls didn’t compete back then but it was good for them to have activities all the same. It kept us healthy and built character, all that swimming with our heads out of the water, our arms stroking like a bird’s wings might, elbows high and bent just right, fingers straight to slice the water with no splash.
It was never good to splash. This was water ballet. We were to be delicate and lithe. Pool nymphs. We were also to be synchronized. Each of us stroking with our right arm on the beat, then our left arm on the beat, the beats from the music played on a record player and blasted through speakers so loud the thrumming could be heard when we were submerged. There in the deep, there would be a girl’s feet holding my neck, my feet holding another girl’s neck, and so on until there were twenty of us connected in a human chain, making a circle so that some of us would come to the surface and take long, wet breaths while others would be underwater, staring at the bottom of the pool and praying they wouldn’t break the chain and suffer Mrs. Hoffman’s wrath.
We had costumes for performances, not just swim suits. I wore a long-sleeved, tan leotard and tights with fringe sewn along the sides for a Davy Crockett number with seven other girls. The music was straight from the Sunday night TV show. Davy, Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier! We had hats, too, but threw them off before we side-dived into the pool one by one. At least I think we side-dived but I can’t imagine knowing how to do that. Maybe we just slid into the pool and started swimming.
The highlight of our performance, the one aiming for loud applause from our parents and boyfriends in the stands, was when we formed a circle and performed synchronized swimming’s signature move – the ballet leg. Mrs. Hoffman had coached us endlessly. Stretch out, keep your hands sculling low to your sides, bend your right leg until your toes reach the knee of your left leg and then – all together in one perfectly timed move – extend your leg, keeping your toes pointed like the arrow on a compass. I aspired to this and saw my ballet leg in my mind’s eye, my leg perfectly long and straight, a flag pole rising from the water. But I sank, caved in the middle despite my frantic sculling, so that my ballet leg was really a ballet foot. My companions did no better save for one star who’d been put with our group for inspiration. Her tights gleamed in the spotlight.
I didn’t love synchronized swimming but I loved having done it. I loved going home every day after practice, exhausted and smelling of chlorine. Everything about me felt clean and deserving. And so the temporary humiliation of the ballet foot meant little to me as long as others failed along with me. That there was one star was fine; I never expected to be one and I was never disappointed.
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The Daily Post: Synchronize
Photo by Mike Wilson on Unsplash
13 Comments on “The Perfect Ballet Leg”
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I just happened upon this, and I love your storytelling style! Plus when I was little I used to watch the sycronized swimmers on the Olympics and dream of being one. I thought they were so glamorous!
I can picture this perfectly. Great piece. On a barely related side note–Fess Parker, who played Davy Crockett, was a second cousin to my Studly Doright whose mother was Parker.
I have a grown up friend who does this, of her own free will (I think she was trying to escape an unsatisfactory relationship at the time). I enjoyed your description of your experience.
Oh the endless variations of the chorus line for pretty girls! I was never pretty enough or wanting to be thought girly enough or frustrated athletically enough to try, and the whole doing exactly what others are doing bewildered me. Thanks for helping me see it a little differently.
I also twirled an umbrella in a ‘Singin’ in the Rain’ number in the junior high musical revue. In the back row, thankfully, behind the better twirlers.
I used to be on the swim team in high school – up before the dawn catching a ride to the Y, swimming till we puked, getting out and doing more laps. We were competitors, but your description of the pool took me back. I would have preferred synchronized swimming had it been offered. Great post.
I also thought that I wanted to be a competitive swimmer but then watched my kids on teams. Hard work. The throwing up business – that’s real. Synchronized swimming isn’t easy (unless you do it the way I did, kind of half-heartedly).
You sound like me with books – used to own 2 books stores, so I had accumulated a lot! They have gone to good homes. I listen to books on audible now. Life changes. I will look forward to following your adventures, knowing we are not alone.
When I saw the prompt I IMMEDIATELY thought of synchronized swimming. My mother was on the synchronized swimming team in high school, and as an Alaskan child, I didn’t even believe there was such a thing. 🙂
There was and still is. Now it looks amazingly tough. We were more the Esther Williams type. BTW, headed to Alaska in a few weeks – going on an educational trip to Nome.
That is great! I have never been to Nome. Not on the road system, but of course neither is the town I live in. Have a great time.
I’ve often wondered how synchronized swimmers keep from plugging their nose. I took swimming lessons as a kid but today I cannot go under water without plugging my nose. My husband tired to teach me to dive. Forget about it.
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