"God, this is cold"

Dateline: July 13, undisclosed Lake Michigan beach front in Chicago

The shivering t-shirt-clad kid floating a few feet away from me in Lake Michigan was right. Granted, at the time he was being splashed and friendly attempts at capsizing him were being made, but his proclamation was just as true for myself, who moved slowly in waist-high 68° (if clear) water. At the time it struck me that he might have just submitted his entry for the Understatement of the Year award, but perhaps it would be better stated that he was serving as a spokesman for that (isolated moment in) time, voicing at calm decibels the thought that kept shrieking through everyone's head as they stepped into the water or, the poor souls, ventured deeper still. I wasn't brave enough to completely duck under the water - maybe I'll save that for later in the summer.

One thing that Lake Michigan certainly has going for it is its clarity. For many reasons that I won't go into here, I'm not generally a fan of what I call "live water," that is, water that is not chlorinated to the point of eye-stinging sterility and predictability, water that contains living...stuff, for lack of a better word. Why bother with water at all, then? Simply, I love to swim, and I do like the idea of ocean beaches and of frolicking in their waves. I just also have to swallow an irrational fear along with it as a sidecar. In any case, lakes also fall under the category of "live water." As with oceans, I am much happier and find it much easier to deal with this fear if I can see the floor of whatever body of water I happen to be in at the time. One still encounters random flotsam, to be sure - threads of algae or other unidentified flora passing by and bearing far too close a resemblance to mucus. Quick and jerky reflexes take over when unscheduled points of contact occur between this mucus-y biological effluvia and any given appendage of mine. Fortunately, no one was hurt as I interacted directly with triggers of paranoia and overall creep-outitutde. Perhaps I can successfully reintroduce myself to the native environment again later.