It’s slowly becoming a tradition borne from the limitations of scheduling and the necessities of an otherwise-sedentary life. Almost every Monday evening, we head to the local YMCA around seven to swim some laps.

We’ve been doing it for a few weeks now.

I swam in high school and find that although I’ve lost most of my strength and cardiovascular fitness, I continue to have a decent stroke and make decent progress through the water. Still, my lack of fitness means that I can’t swim the distances I used to. About eight laps — 200 yards — is my limit at this point, and I usually keep it at four-lap segments. So I work my way, 100 yards at a time, through at least 1,000 yards of swimming over the course of forty minutes or so, which was not even the distance we swam in high school as a warm-up and more than double the time it took then.

“What can we say — we’re getting older,” is K’s refrain. I refuse to believe that, though. It’s not age. It’s lack of fitness. It’s lack of movement over the last fifteen years. It’s lack of swimming: I haven’t really swum any since I finished high school over thirty years ago.

The best thing about regular exercise, though, is the progress you see over time. Our first time out in late summer or early fall, I couldn’t even swim 500 yards. In a few weeks’ time, I’ve doubled that.

Next, 2,000 yards at a time.

The Boy has experienced similar improvement. Today, he swam 300 yards in 100-yard segments. Once he was done, he decided to do one more 50-yard segment.

Next goal, 500 yards.