Drowning Fish and SOS Swimsuit

What is the Minnow Paradox?

Take a guess. Give it a try. No? Okay. It refers to a fish that can't swim.

First in Chicago, then in Hong Kong, next in London, and finally in Hipsterland, NYC, swim coaches on three continents have confirmed the scientifically impossible Minnow Paradox.

Back in Chicago Minnow had to decline the college swim test and courageously took up "novice swimming". Halfway through the second class, Minnow disinfected her disgestive tract with so much chlorine that Coach Kevin lifted her by the gills and dragged the half dead fish back to land.

In Hong Kong - what happened there? Her chlorine-bleached memory is fuzzy.

In London, she spent weeks swimming on a styrofoam board alongside four and five year olds who quickly outswam her without any aids.

And finally in Hipsterland, NYC, the 17-year old Polish swim coach declared, "You are the first fish I know whose fins naturally sink in water."

"I am skinny with hardly any blubber. It's hard for me to float!" Minnow protested.

"That's nonsense," the young amphibian retorted, flexing his impressive biceps. "My body fat is only seven per cent, and I am teaching you - a fish - to swim."

Ever since that definitive debate nine years ago Minnow decided to remain a fish out of water. (Perhaps that's why she is never quite in her element.) Every now and then, however, she still fantasizes about swimming freely in the ocean and taking up a few water sports. A year or two ago she surfed (online, not in water) and found a former Olympic swim coach from Kazakhstan who claimed to specialize in teaching adult swim retards. This was before "Borat" the movie and after Minnow had some nice encounters with a few Kazakhs at work, but somehow, despite the country's access to the Aral and Caspian Sea, and despite the sizable Lake Balkhash, Minnow could only connect Kazahkstan with the Silk Road but not swimming... At one point Minnow also considered going to the Dead Sea, where you don't need to be a Dead Fish to do a perfectly still, horizontal back float...

In the end these all remained wild thoughts.

Recently Minnow came across a swim school in California that employs a radically different approach to teaching hopeless souls like Minnow. The founder is a lady who calls herself "Melon". Minnow watched Melon's DVD and flipped through the 316-page swim manual (can you believe it?), and suddenly, she sensed a ray of light beaming down on her in the deep, dark ocean: Everyone floats differently!
Your perfect back float can mean your knees are bent! For the first time in nine years Minnow finally summoned enough courage to sign up for another novice swim class/ gut bleach session. No, she actually signed up for two, back to back.

This brings us to Minnow Paradox II:

Minnow is a Veteran Swim Novice

There is no assurance that Melon's class will take place in August, because it needs a minimum of five students. But Minnow already got fired up and was ordering swimsuits online this evening. As she browsed through the web someone suggested that she purchase an aqua-colored suit with floral prints. It looked nice, indeed, except that the hue was a "camouflage color", very similar to the pool's. So what if Minnow drowns and people don't notice her because of the aqua suit? As the saying goes, one should prepare for the worst and hope for the best.

So Minnow ordered an aqua suit for swimming, and a fuschia suit for drowning.