Just Keep Swimming

12×36″, oil on canvas

            At the swimming pool the other day, someone mentioned in passing that I wasn’t really a swimmer.  I know, this sounds particularly harsh, and she wasn’t being intentionally cruel or anything.  It was more in the context of “here’s something you’d understand if you were a real swimmer.”  Nonetheless it’s been on my mind a bit.

            Don’t get me wrong; I know what she meant by the comment.  I’ve never been a swim-team kind of swimmer.  I’m not very fast, I prefer the back crawl to the regular crawl stroke, I’ve never accomplished a dolphin kick, and I don’t do those flippy things at the end of each lap.  Yet I do swim three times a week and, while I’m swimming, I think about my form and how to improve it, and work to become an increasingly efficient swimmer. 

            I’m also 5’4”, and my shoulders are a bit narrow from “normal.”  If I were able to work with a real personal trainer / swim coach kind of person for a period of time, would I improve?  Undoubtedly.  (By the way, if I ever have the money for such a personal trainer I will totally do this.)  Would I ever be on the Olympic swim team, (pretending here for a moment that I’m not 42 years old)?  Absolutely not.  I don’t have the build for it and I don’t have the drive for it.  I love swimming, I’m a bear when I don’t get to the pool often, but it’s not my absolute passion.

            Painting is. 

            I cannot begin to tell you how many times I’ve heard “Oh I can’t do that, I’m not a real artist.”  “I’d try, but I’m not an artist,” and any number of comments along the same thread.  Sometimes these statements are made by emerging artists, or even established ones.  Somehow, the notion of being a “real artist” is so unimaginable to us that it can’t be used in reference to ourselves.  Only masters of the past, or those smart folks on Art21, or maybe even the person in class next to you are the real artists.

            Art may not be your main passion in life, but if you create art, and think about creating art, and work to improve your form and technique, or even think about it, you’re an artist.  A real artist. 

            In the meantime I’ll keep going to the pool, then to the studio, and trying to improve my techniques to the best of my abilities.

            Keep painting, keep swimming, and follow that passion!