AND SO WE SAY FAREWELL TO THE BLACK STRIPE UNTIL NEXT YEAR

Last day of open water swimming here in NYC. It’s goddamn sad, as I’ve grown extremely attached to this place in this moment in time. But that’s how it is, even though summer ends in almost three weeks it actually ends today.

We thought it’d be packed but the deck was primarily filled with park employees who were having a barbeque near the de-commissioned snack stand.

As the temps have dropped so has the water’s and it was noticeably chilly and almost hard to endure for over an hour, without any sun it would have been tough, but I would have showed up had they kept it open, chill or not. As long as the sun’s out it’s tolerable, at least to a few of us since the attendance seemed to drop the minute it was under 90.

The guards were goofing off, using a guard tower for a diving board. People were smoking on deck and generally getting away with whatever. The young chicas showed up, desperately wanting the boy’s attention who couldn’t be bothered during the hijinx, even if they had huge nipples submitted for appreciation through skimpy bikinis that barely covered their 15 year-old asses. It was like a microcosm of adolescent sexuality on display.

Here’s list of things I saw on the bottom of the pool the past month as I swam over or near the black stripe that indicated where the lap swim was contained, but never really meant to be a lane line:

Bobby pins, a hair extension, two dollar-bills, numerous keys, two or three white wife beaters, one half of several pairs of goggles, food wrappers, coins, pieces of jewelry and clasps, goggle straps, leaves and other detritus, and thousand of tiny chips of paint from the bottom of the pool that gathered in little piles, swirling up like a snow globe as you passed by.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Highbridge Pool
(a crappy Photoshop composite)