On cold rainy nights when I ran drenched and corpse-like through the dimly lit neighborhood streets, that questioning voice would return: Why are you doing this to yourself? I wish I could say I had the answer. Compensation for my awkward youth perhaps? An effort to manifest swimming dreams unrealized? I’d like to think I was taking middle age to the mat and pinning it into submission. Taking a stand for myself to live intentionally for the first time. Maybe it was all these reasons. Or perhaps none. The only thing I knew with clarity was that a voice deep in my heart continued to chant, Keep
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