The Swimmers

by Julie Otsuka

And if you swim for long enough you no longer know where your own body ends and the water begins and there is no boundary between you and the world. It’s nirvana.

others of us, however, feel strangely relieved. The terrible thing we have been waiting for has finally happened. A weight has been lifted. A shadow has passed. The uncertainty is over. This is it. The end. No more fun for us. And now we can move on.

And with each memory shed you will feel lighter and lighter. Soon you will be totally empty, a void, and, for the first time in your life, you will be free. You will have attained that state of being aspired to by mindful meditators across the planet—you will be existing utterly and completely “in the now.”