Annabelle (Phoenixville, Pennsylvania) attended the Outer Coast Summer Seminar 2022 between her sophomore and junior years of high school. On her last day of the Summer Seminar, she wrote this story.
Our first swim was at Sam Sing. Sam Sing Cabin is a little structure in a cove about a twenty-minute boat ride from Sitka, and it’s our second day of orientation here. We’ve already spent some time exploring the coast, finding crabs and abalone shells, and teaching each other to skip rocks. And we’ve been discussing a very theoretical idea of swimming, but always losing our courage upon dipping our fingers into the frigid water of the Pacific Ocean.
Emily, a friend and intern here at Outer Coast, convinces everyone to go for a quick plunge, so we all change out of our layers of jackets and sweaters into swimsuits and towels before walking over to the chosen dip spot. The first splash of cold water on our feet is startling and excites squeals and a string of curse words from us all. But since we’re holding hands, we stay in, wading deeper til the water’s up to our stomachs. Emily tells everyone to take a deep breath and I realize I haven’t been breathing. “Look at the mountains!” Everyone looks up and there’s a collective exhale as we remember where we are and how stunning it is. Mountains and spruce trees, big rocks with ripples of color and algae on them, the heavy clouds covering the sky, which I’ll come to love so much. With nods of encouragement and apprehensive looks, we take hands in a circle and count down “3…2…1”. Everyone is underwater! We come up sputtering, laughing, yelling. After spending a bit of glorious time in the water, we walk back together to warm up by the fire staffulty made while we were away.
Since then, swimming has become an integral part of our time here. After coming back to Sitka and settling into campus, at least one person swims every day, usually in the ocean, occasionally at Swan Lake or on Indian River Trail. A Swimming Committee, or “SwimComm”, was formed, and I eventually took over as president, a role that is comprised mostly of spreading the word about when swims are happening, recruiting people to swim, attempting to navigate the fine line between consent and the constructive courage that comes from peer pressure, and generally hyping people up and being hyped myself about all things ocean- and swim-related.
Last night, a big group of us went down, some to swim, some to watch. We round the corner to see Rachel, a beloved Outer Coast intern, wading in fully clothed, jeans and button-down and sneakers, a figure we can barely make out in the dark. Confusion and delight. Once the rest of us are in the water and have dunked, Emily loses their glasses. It’s all dark and a circle of people gathers to help search or learn what’s going on. Those of us without shoes carefully feel around with our feet, distinguishing rocks from barnacles from driftwood (which happens to feel meditative), and the shock of excitement when — there they are! A pair of grippers pulls up the round wire-rimmed glasses (OC signature style). Cheers and “Slayyyy”s break loose in celebration.
Every morning at Community Round-up, we learn a Word of the Day in the Tlingit language, the language of the people indigenous to where we live and learn. Last week we had one inspired by our frequent swims: Dashooch. Dashooch means “to bathe for strength.” It’s the practice, long held by Tlingit people, of going out to bathe in the cold ocean water before doing something that will take courage. It’s amazing because that’s what the dunks feel like: bathing for strength. And people have been doing this here, in the same place, maybe coming to the same stretch of shore. It’s a comforting thought, thinking about this experience that’s spanned such a long period of time.
One of the things I really love about swimming is that I surprise myself every time. Especially on cold days when I first put my feet in, I think, “No way am I going to get in past my knees. It’s just too cold.” I always do though. There are many repetitions of “Yee gu.aa yáx̱ x’wáan!” (Take courage!), which help me go further in. Also, any given day you can’t guess the mix of people who will be swimming. Sometimes I’m alone, sometimes there are two or three others, sometimes we’ll get staffulty in. I spent the first couple weeks describing to Lizzie, one of our professors, the many pros of dipping in the ocean. It was a good exercise, getting to think through the things I love most about the water, and it was spectacular when, after so many days of convincing, Lizzie came. And afterward, she declared she’d enjoyed it. You connect to people in a different way on equal footing in the water.
It’s Friday morning. Commencement starts after class today, a whirlwind of activities and packing and goodbyes. There are lots of things that have brought us together as a cohort and a community: late-night, impromptu dancing at the pier, truth-or-truth jenga, HugComm, volleyball, cuddling, endless games of chess, group crying, questioning together our place in the world, hiking, pillow fights, Indigenous Studies class, the weather song, bathroom cleaning, and of course… swimming, when you’re all in a common experience of chilling water, clinging on to each other for warmth and strength.
I’m going to miss the ocean. And (cheesy, I know), I’m really going to miss the people I’ve been in the water with. Swimming has been scheduled into every evening leading up to our departures, and it’s hard to imagine not getting to come dancing at the pier and searching for starfish at low tide. My wish is that SwimComm will continue on as a thriving, integral part of the OC experience.