Jodi Hills

So this is who I am – a writer that paints, a painter that writes…

Tag Archives: swimming


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Pulling water.

It’s probably the closest I get to meditation. Swimming. The thing about water, you can’t bring anything. No phones or connections to the world whatsoever.  Just you and your thoughts. And even they can weigh you down. So I try to push them out with the counting of each lap. They are slippery though — they can fin their way in — with invented conversations, arguments even, completely fabricated. Even my arms will say, “c’mon, enough already”…wiggling fingers that urge the return to pulling water. It takes quite a few strokes, but I always get there. Into the rhythm. Soon my breath and arms and legs are in sync, and the numbers begin disappearing, so quickly I wonder if I actually counted that lap, and I do it again. I imagine it’s like a dancer, who finally learns the routine and can just let go into the dance. That’s my brain in the pool. Buoyant upon the sun-ripe ripples. Floating. Carried. Dancing between the two blues of sky and water. Weightless of what-ifs, just simply being.

I highly recommend it — this letting go. And maybe for you it’s not in the pool, but on the road, or in the garden, in a book, or within a song. It could be anywhere you are able to release the baggage. When I get stuck, dragging the day’s luggage, I imagine myself in the water, satcheled with such. And I laugh. I don’t imagine we were meant to carry any of it. Except maybe joy. Nothing is lighter. Go ahead and carry that with you. Everywhere. 

What was it all for if we didn’t have a little fun?
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Giving proof.

I don’t think I owned a watch until I was in highschool, so it was impossible to judge the hour’s wait after eating and before entering the lake. I began turning my mother’s wrist every few minutes to view the Timex. She shook me off like the pest I was being. Ten minutes. 15 minutes. “Oh for heaven’s sake, you’re lit up like the Fourth of July!” She motioned me to go in already, knowing the risk of me imploding on land was greater than cramping in the water. 

I entered the water each time as if it were my first. Every splash released my “rocket’s red glare,” my “bombs bursting in air!” Of course it was never “through the night” but it was my proof, proof that everything was possible, exciting, uncontainable! 

I didn’t have the words for it then, but this unfettered joy was my America. I don’t ever want to lose that spirit. I don’t want us as a nation to ever lose it. The risk of us imploding perhaps is stronger than it has ever been. But we are still free. We are still young, and ever hopeful. 

I saw this young girl at City Park in Alexandria, Minnesota. I had to paint her. She lives on the canvas. She lives in my heart. This is who I am. Who we are!

Hope races me into the deep end of this Independence Day and I raise my hands in all the promise of the joy that can, should, and I pray, will ever remain. Happy Fourth of July! 

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A little fun.

I have yet to be surprised by the amount of times I use it, as the Algebra teacher once promised. To be honest, I’m not sure I was even “using” it then. Don’t get me wrong, I loved school. And I think one of the greatest things it taught us was simply the art of learning. What I AM surprised by are some of the unconventional places where I was taught things that, in fact, I am still using today — like the ballpark behind the Dairy Queen in Alexandria, Minnesota.

Our summer girls’ softball league was loosely supervised by a semi-reluctant 19 year old who was either complying with his mother’s wish to get out the house and get a job, or perhaps fulfilling some mandatory community service. Either way, he didn’t seem thrilled to be spending his summer with over zealous pre-teens who could recite the DQ menu, yet didn’t understand the simple infield fly rule. Other than calling balls and strikes, he rarely inserted himself into the game. Sunglassed and uninterested, he neither coached nor encouraged. Except for one day. Of course we all went to the plate wanting a hit. We swung at anything really. After the two previous girls struck out, I was up to the plate. The pitcher continued her wild throws over my head. Nearing the dugout. I looked confused. It was then he looked at me, and said the only words I can remember from that summer, “You know, a walk is as good as a hit.” I let the next two balls sail past and took my base.

There are some days when I clean with vigor, using the proper vacuum attachments to get in and under. But there are many days, like yesterday, when covering the broad open spaces with a quick push around, I think, that’s pretty good…and “I take my base” — (which is often the pool.)

Not every victory is a home-run. And surprise! — not every lesson has to be so difficult. Sometimes, it’s simply knowing when to let go, when to give yourself a break and maybe even go have a little bit of fun! Enjoy!

What was it all for, if we didn’t have a little fun?
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Night swimming.


Night swimming.

We weren’t allowed to swim at night, for obvious reasons. I suppose they were the very reasons why we did it.

I was staying over night at her house. She lived just across the road from one of 10,000 lakes. We had put on our pajamas. Gone through the list of “have you ever”s… been kissed by a boy…stolen penny candy from Ben Franklin…snuck into the Andria Cinema… all the usual questions that we knew all the answers to, but asked them just the same. When we heard her parents turn off The Tonight Show and slipper down the hall to bed, we changed from our pajamas into our swim suits. Neither one of us would ever claim ownership to the plan, it was just something we were doing. Night swimming.

There was always talk of it late in the school year on bus rides home. The teenagers would speak softly of the magic. The lure. Still in our preteens, time couldn’t go fast enough. We felt immortal, and ready to prove it at any given moment.

Our hearts fueled with Mountain Dew and no previous knowledge, we barefooted out the back door, through the yard. Stopping dead in our tracks like spiders on a wall as one of us clinked the chain from the swingset. No lights turned on. We proceeded. We thought of flashlights after the fact. Even our hindsight was dim. Each step became slower. Each night sound became louder. And creepier. The sounds of our breathing said we were both willing to turn back if only one of us would admit it. Neither did. It was hard to tell the difference between grass, sand and water. But for the feel, all were black. Toes were dampened first. Then ankles. Our hands reached out at the same time. Grabbing tightly, we walked to our knees, sure that our heads were already under water. We grabbed the opposite hands, forming a circle now. We stood still.

There is an unexplained magic to friendship. We are given the right gifts at the right time. “I want to go back,” we both trembled the words together at the same time. “Jinx!” We laughed. Hooked our pinkies together. “What goes up the chimney… Smoke!” With linked fingers we ran on bare tiptoes back to the house.

There are a million challenges that I have gotten beyond because of friends. Through the darkest times they have been there, clasping hands. No common blood pulsing through our pinkies, just trust, just love. They have challenged me. Lifted me. Saved me. I give thanks for them, for you, every day.

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I can help.

I was never afraid of the water. My mother saw to that. Buoyed by baby fat and unweighted from no previous experience, I easily bobbed up and down in the blue. She didn’t buy float rings for my arms, or an inflatable duck to strap around my waist. No lifejackets, or flotation devices of any kind. What she did give me was the confidence to jump in the water and trust my own skills. And what’s most remarkable, she never let me see the fear she carried.

I was in my early twenties, living in my first apartment, deeply secure in my ability to navigate any body of water, when she told me. Just before entering the pool for the complex. I had seen her dip toes in Lake Latoka. Wade in the water thigh high. Even sink to shoulders. But it was here, in this pool of firsts that she told me she had always been a little afraid. We got her a kicker board from Ridgedale mall. She did laps in the pool. I was so proud of her. So very proud. She was worried it would be a burden for me. Nothing could be further from the truth. What a gift. This turning of tables. A gift to carry what she once carried for me. We filled that pool with laughter and joy!

I suppose that’s what true love is — this constant exchange. This lifting. This buoying of hearts. Taking turns in bravery. In strength. Celebrating the victories large and small. Together.

I have a memory of a cartoon. Black and white. Two little girls on the front stoop of a house. One day the little girl is crying. The other girl reaches out her hand and says, “I’ll help you.” The next day laughing, with the same response. This is the world I lived in. The world my mother gave to me. The world I want to share with you.

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Into the blue.

We’re seeing the blue of the lakes now, not the frozen white of our last visit. Both will take your breath away, but for completely different reasons.

I’m not sure that we ever heeded the warnings, or even saw them, but they were there – “No life guard on duty. Swim at your own risk.” But the lakes were always open. Maybe that’s what I loved most about them. The beaches were public. No discrimination. (Even though our diversity at the time ranged mostly from pale white to deep red.) There was no concern for money or status. The blue waves didn’t know if you belonged to the golf club. What church you went to, if at all. No question of status. The water was open. So warning or no warning, I, we, would go in. The only risk seemed not to participate. Every day was a gift. Perhaps because we new the impermanence. Those waves would soon be still. Frozen. So we raced in. Under the sun.

I didn’t know at the time how telling it was. Everything would always be “at your own risk.” There would be nothing to protect you as you went into the deep end, of love, of life. But I remember. First toes. Straight out of winter boots, feeling the cool sand. Then wet. Colder still. But my heart is saying, you’ll adapt, go further. White shins, almost lavender, walking forward. Thighs shivering. You could wait. No, I can’t wait. Up to the bottom of my suit now. No turning back. Belly button retreating out of fear, like a turtle. Arms raised to prolong it. Brain saying retreat. Heart saying Go! Feet – always following the heart. Hands coming down. Splashing. You’ll be fine. It will be great. Heart beating – go -go, go-go. Diving under. Everything slows. Free now. Am I a fish? A bird? Everything is wild and easy and light. I belong. I am free. Nothing wasted.

The sun is coming in from the window. Blue shimmers all around. There will be chance. Choice. Risk. Love. I smile. Toes wiggling, I listen to my heart as it speaks daily, “Go further. Deeper. Into the blue.”

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Further, deeper…

Before I could ride a two-wheeler to Lake Latoka, my mother would have to drive me there. Well, she didn’t have to, but she did. And certainly it wasn’t fun for her. She didn’t like heat, nor the water… But still, I would tug on her shirt, as she bent over the laundry that couldn’t be done during the work week, the laundry that ate up her Saturday morning. “Please, just for a few minutes,” I would plead. I didn’t know then that it would mean staying up hours later, when she was already tired, or maybe I wouldn’t have asked, but I’m not sure that I carried enough empathy at this young stage of life. Already sweating in my one-piece sailor swimsuit, I’d smile into her eyes, and she put down the basket. 

She placed her folding lawn chair as near to the shade of the one tree on the beach as possible. I splashed and waved and swam, as the straps of the chair made a pattern on the back of her thighs. All the youth of the surrounding Latoka area screamed, “look at me!” as their heads and feet popped up through water! The most comforting thought perhaps that I’ve ever had, is not feeling the need to yell the same. Because each time I turned, or spun, or splashed, or did a trick, and then looked up, her eyes were directly on me. She was always watching. Always there. The life-line that allowed me to go further, deeper, because she, you see, connected me to the shore.  

People often ask me, “How did you have the courage to start your own business…to dare expose yourself through word and canvas…move to another country???” I suppose the answer to it all, I always had the comfort of shore.

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From a distance.

From a distance.

When painting, from time to time, you need to take a step back. And just look. It always looks different. Or more clear. Same eyes. Different view. So close to the easel, you can miss it. Only in stepping back, taking in the full picture, can you see what’s really happening on the canvas.  Then you can get close again. Change what’s needed. Sometimes it’s just a stroke or two. Other times you really have to paint over what you had — “give up your darlings” as they say — ideas and images that we make so precious, so darling, that we can’t even see the truth of them. It’s easy to think everything we do is right… the only way… but trust me, I have been proven wrong, stroke by stroke. It’s never easy, but it has always been for the better.

Since moving to France, I have begun to see my home town in a whole new light. I guess I had to step back. From here, each blue seems a little bluer, from lake to sky. Nothing was perfect, far from darling. But things needed to be released just the same. I suppose my “darlings” were thinking that everyone could have been better, should have been better. But I was so close to my own canvas that I couldn’t see them. Maybe they, too, were having their own struggles. Everyone does. Maybe they were doing the best they could do. Maybe we all were. The buoys in the lake, after all, weren’t there just for me. Maybe we were all looking to be saved.

I am reminded of a song sung by Bette Midler:

From a distance
The world looks blue and green
And the snow capped mountains white

From a distance
The ocean meets the stream
And the eagle takes to flight

From a distance
There is harmony
And it echoes through the land

It’s the voice of hope
It’s the voice of peace
It’s the voice of every man

From a distance
We all have enough
And no one is in need

And there are no guns,
No bombs, and no disease
No hungry mouths to feed

From a distance
We are instruments
Marching in a common band

Playing songs of hope
Playing songs of peace
They are the songs of every man

God is watching us
God is watching us
God is watching us
From a distance

From a distance
You look like my friend
Even though we are at war

From a distance
I just cannot comprehend
What all this fighting’s for

From a distance
There is harmony
And it echoes through the land

And it’s the hope of hopes
It’s the love of loves
It’s the heart of every man

It’s the hope of hopes
It’s the love of loves
This is the song for every man

I take a step back today, and I see you. Beautiful.

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