Certain Power

My body feels good in the water. It feels strong there. It feels like power. Certain power.

Writing about feeling powerful in this body, using this body to be athletic, isn’t special. It isn’t special except that I am a woman. I am a curvy woman. I do not look particularly muscular. I do not look particularly strong. I actually look and feel, when I’m being touched, soft. Soft.

I’ve been a swimmer as long as I can remember. I’ve been in water my whole life. I was raised on, bathed in, and left to wander the banks of the Tygart River. So was my mother. My father journeyed to the banks at the peak of his life. He wasn’t quite 30. HE was an athlete. Athlete. He journeyed to the banks of the Tygart River in Arden, WV and he spotted my young mother. Or maybe he was introduced to her. I don’t know, I wasn’t there.

He spotted my young mother, not even half his age, and she made him her predator. That’s how he always told the story. She pursued him so aggressively that he couldn’t resist. Athlete.

She was a child.

But I’ll bet she didn’t look childish in the water. Or on the banks of the Tygart. Or stretched way out on a worn-out towel on a big smooth curve of sandstone.

She probably looked strong. Powerful.

My father was an athlete. He was a boater. Whitewater. He was also a cyclist. A mountaineer. A sailor. He did 1000 sit-ups a day. He ran 10 miles a day. He was an athlete. But I’ll bet he never looked or felt as strong or powerful as my mom did in that water. That water.

I’m tangled up in that water.

He could never own his power and strength and so he tried to own my mom’s. And then he tried to own mine. And then I learned that men are supposed to own female power. So I found a few men who had learned the same and I let them own my power too. My power.

And then, after a really long time, I unlearned that men are supposed to own female power. I unlearned it as hard as someone can unlearn something.

And then I started looking for men who didn’t learn they should own it and that was a much more challenging search. But then I found one and I knew so quickly that he would not own my power and I would not own his. I knew that he didn’t feel the need to own it and neither did I.

Instead, we fed the powerful bits. We fed them and now I’m afraid of almost nothing.

I’m especially not afraid to say that in the water, I feel so strong. In the water, I feel powerful.

Certain power.