self torture

I have taken to a new torture. While playing squash I had hurt my back and it seems to have never completely recovered. So to strengthen it I started swimming. The only window I could fit into my schedule was after dropping Jispa to the bus stop. I rush to the gymkhana at 8 for a quick 15 minute swim and then out, shower and hit office by 9. It was fine when I started this in around end November. These days with the temperature dipping I find myself the lone ranger in the pool at 8 in the morning. The water is nice and cold. I figure the best way is to dive right in and get your whole body wet as fast as possible and then furiously start the swimming. Then for some reason, (probably the breeze) after a lap or two, the water is warmer than the air outside.
For someone like me who has bath only with hot (really hot) water all through the year, even in summer, this is unreal. Earlier I never liked swimming as I hated cold water, but now I realise that the reason was that we hardly swam. It was just a place to laze around and do precious nothing. One lap and then relax for ten minutes. Now in the pool I like to get in, swim swim swim, and then get out. Unless of course it’s Goa!
Also what has helped was the really ridiculous looking swimming cap my wife got for me. When she first got it, I refused to wear it but then I slowly came around to appreciating it. This cap was shaped in a way that you cover your ears while you wear it, making you entire head water proof. With ears and head covered, the coldwater is much more bearable.
Since two days the swimming pool attendants are looking at me as if some real hard core nut has come to swim. Today she was wearing a sweater and her assistant had covered her ears with a 70‘s style muffler. If they thought that would psyche me out … they surely did a dam good job about it. But I put on my trusty ear covering cap and blanked out all the noise around me. Splash, swim, away we go.