My Swimming Instructor

When a mother is afraid, it’s up to her child to coax her into finally taking the plunge.

- Kathleen Burge

THE HEATED water splashes against my shoulders,but still I shiver. My son has been gliding along the bottom of the Holiday Inn pool, a playful otter circling my legs. He surfaces, his wet blond hair shining in winter afternoon light.“I’ll show you how to swim underwater,” he says, grinning.

An only child, he likes to teach my husband and me, reversing the usual order of his life. He has tutored us in knowledge important to an eight-year-old: how to multiply numbers,sketch animals, play the violin. Usually I’m a willing student.But this lesson I’ve avoided for months.

At Kieran’s age, I learned to fear the water. I whip-kicked my legs and wind milled my arms adequately during swimming lessons, but I couldn’t trust my body to float. My anxious mind would not let go. Fear pushed me down. Again and again, I slipped beneath the surface and breathed in water. It burned like shame.