Swimmer

A short tale about meaning of life

Once upon a time, a boy woke up in the middle of a mighty river. He didn’t remember anything. Neither why he is adrift in the stream, nor how he got there.

He instinctively started to trot the water to stay afloat.

Very soon he realized that the waters are full of various creatures. Some were almost like him, some were totally different, and there was a plethora of others which were somewhere in between. As the river carried them away, creatures bounced off of each other and seemingly randomly zigzagged downstream.

Needles to say, some of those bounces were pleasant, some were painful. But there was a much serious predicament lurking in the waves.

The time was flowing with the stream, and the boy turned to a man. He was already a skillful swimmer navigating the currents like a fish — jumping from left to right, sometimes even fighting the torrent, always on the lookout for a pleasant fleeting touch, but intent on minimizing painful encounters with other swimmers all the while at all costs trying to evade rocks, floating trees, but also rafts which some creatures made for themselves.

Swimmer knew only too well what trees, rafts, or rocks can do. A full-blown encounter of either kind was a guaranteed game over. In the case of trees it was just a matter of time when one succumbed to injuries, in the case of rocks, poking ominously from the riverbed since the time the world was created, it was an instant death, and in the case of a raft it could go both ways. He also knew no one, no matter how hardened by bounces with other creatures or occasional bruises from near-misses with trees, rafts, and rocks, who, in the end, survived such a run-in.

Thus, sometimes the swimmer wondered if that is all there is — being tossed into a river by an unknown power, have a little fun and pain because fleeting touches never brought lasting satisfaction and the pain was obviously unavoidable, and, after some time, ultimately demise due to some fatal encounter or simply run out of energy and drown.

He already knew that no matter how hard he tried, the river was too vast and too unpredictable to navigate in a completely painless way. He also remembered the time when he tried to reach the shore only to find out that the last step out of the river is the first step into it. Naturally, he often wondered what is this place and why he got in there.

After all, it resembled a flight toward ever distant light at the end of a pitch-black tunnel, but in reality was just a free fall through nothingness toward always very, very distant shining place.

But there was a river legend whispered among many swimmers. It was a tale about an ideal track, one that leads effortlessly around all obstacles. It was also said that this track is the only ribbon of hope that leads to a mysterious Sea where one can find all answers about River and its secrets. However, swimmers who managed to find the ideal track, although these heroes lived in myths of their own, could be counted on the fingers of one hand.

Still, one day, swimmer firmly decided. What could I lose, he thought, I will find the ideal track, too.

From that moment he diligently searched and investigated. He followed the footsteps of his predecessors as they were immortalized in records of their heroic journeys. Although a whole new world opened up to him, soon it became obvious that he is no closer to the ideal track than he was before. He was frustrated, but continued.

The periods of concentration and frustration ebbed and flowed, and swimmer was so preoccupied with them, that he didn’t notice how he slowly, day after day, became more and more like the River itself.

Other swimmers wondered what was happening to him. Was he ill? Was he going to die? It very much looked that way to them. Some were worried, some were scared, and some were jealous or even outright hostile. But swimmer learned not to pay attention, and continued.

And then, one day it happened.

Swimmer had enough. Enough of the world without choice where free will felt like rubbing salt into an open wound. Enough of legendary heroes and their incomprehensible myths of the journeys to nowhere. He threw his hands up, as if defeated, and screamed at the invisible, “Where is this fabled thread of life of yours?”

And the ideal track suddenly appeared.

It’s hard to say what was the cause and what was the effect, if the swimmer surrendered and turned into river, or if he turned into river which made him surrender, but like clusters of golden ribbons the path around all obstacles shined clear.

He was River and all creatures emerging from it, he was dangerous floating logs of wood as well as all deadly rocks, riverbed, and the mind-bending shore. He was the mysterious Sea.

In that instant, everything has changed, and yet, all appearances remained the same. Maybe the only difference was that the swimmer finally understood why they say that until you’ve seen everything, you saw nothing.

And that was also the last time the swimmer was ever seen. Even though, in the days that followed, many would swear they met a man who appeared like him.