Making Waves. Chris EptingЧитать онлайн книгу.
I’ve swam with over the years, all over the world in hundreds of competitions, I don’t think I’ve ever been prouder than I am of the three girls I walked out on the deck with today.
I’m the last in this relay. If I can hold this lead, then we will achieve what many considered to be impossible.
Here she comes. Okay, Shirley. Don’t leave early, be careful, and don’t be too anxious.
Winding up, I see Jill’s final stroke as she’s about to touch the wall, and I explode into the air. I’ve never left with such force in my life. Every ounce of my body, every muscle in my system is dialed into this moment. It’s never felt better.
But in the back of my head, something is wrong. The second I hit the water, I think to myself, I left too early. In my zeal to achieve the perfect start, I cheated the clock just a bit.
Her fingernail.
My toenail.
My entire world now comes down to whether or not I waited long enough for her fingernail to touch that wall before taking off.
But as I hit the water, I also think to myself, it doesn’t matter. They’re not going to stop the race. If I did in fact leave early, then once I finish the race and look up, I will see the little red dot by my name on the scoreboard. That will mean I’ve been flagged for an early start.
But that’s not important right now. All that’s important right now is that I just put my head down and go. Just go, go, go, go, go, go. Everything else will sort itself out in the end.
Right now, I’m in the water and I need to hold this lead. Almost instantly, upon impact, the roar of the crowd is back in my head.
Only now, it’s louder. My start has caused the crowd to erupt even further, and I can hear them with each breath—thousands of people screaming like maniacs for me to hold that lead. Thousands of people who seem to know that there’s been something very wrong at these Olympics. Thousands of people who want me to finish this thing the right way.
It’s so weird where life takes you. I was a skinny little girl that no swim team ever wanted. My mother would actually use me as a bargaining chip when teams wanted my brothers instead. You have to take Shirley, too, she would tell them. And so, begrudgingly, they did.
I wonder if any of those coaches remember me?
Are they watching me on television right now?
Are they here, cheering for me?
You will never have another moment like this, I keep thinking to myself. This is a sprint, one length down and one length back. This is what I’ve worked for. I can do this. God, I can do this. I have to do this.
Swim, Shirley, swim.
Listen to that crowd and let them feel you.
You know how to do this. You can do this.
You’re going to beat these cheaters.
You have to.
CHAPTER ONE
Growing Up
I can still smell that old army tent in the backyard. My father, who had taught swimming while in the army in Hawaii, had rigged one of his old tents into a makeshift swimming pool behind our modest house in the Los Angeles suburb of Norwalk. It was musty and oily and really sort of rank. Its odor was distinctive, especially when the tent was filled with water. It could hardly be called a swimming pool. It was just a place where my two brothers and I splashed around.
Our house in Norwalk was located in a fairly typical blue-collar neighborhood for the 1950s—a three-bedroom, one-bathroom, single-story suburban dwelling. Any person coming up the walk to the front door would see the dining room table with open bibles and a Russian samovar. The people living here must have been moral and upstanding, right? Wrong. At least, not the parents.
My brothers and I rode a bus to school, which wasn’t that far from the house, but there was a busy street and two cow pastures to pass by. The house was in a relatively rural area (today, like a lot of Southern California communities, the area around the neighborhood has been heavily developed).
I always hung around my two brothers—Jack, one and a half years older than me, and Bill, two years younger. I always felt like Bill was a burden, but I’m sure Jack thought the same of me. We would mostly explore the neighborhood, riding bikes, skateboarding, digging in the dirt, and, of course, fighting. But our parents fought a lot, too, and we were terrified that they would get a divorce. At night, Jack would say, “If they get a divorce, we’re all going to have to go live in a foster home and those places are next to hell.” So we would huddle together, scared, and ride out the storm of their arguments.
Given how gray and shapeless our family life was, I suppose that little pool in the backyard was actually pretty important. It was a chance for us to have a little fun at home, a respite from the usual dreariness and sometimes outright misery that defined my earliest years.
My parents, Jack and Vera Babashoff, were of Russian heritage, and they were true to the stereotype. They were cold and stoic and never really communicated with me or my brothers. It was not a loving, warm, and nurturing environment. On the contrary, it was cold, distant, and, at times, quite destructive.
They were part of the Russian Molokan Church, a strict and unforgiving faith that was taken very seriously in our household. If my brothers or I ever spoke one negative word toward each other, punishments were swift and sometimes cruel. I’m talking about basic disagreements between siblings. None of it was allowed. Understanding the rules early in life, the three of us tiptoed through our childhood, trying not to upset our parents.
My mother was the daughter of a strict preacher. She never really had anything nice to say about the man, only about how he really had nothing to do with her. She grew up on farms in Northern California and in Oregon. I remember her telling us that she had to walk miles in the snow just to catch the school bus. I know that’s like a joke today, but when she said it, she wasn’t being funny. It was real. After she finished high school, she and my dad were married.
When my mom was pregnant with my younger brother, the doctors found a growth in her neck. They removed it, but her health was never the same again. After that, she became addicted to pain pills and whatever else she could get the doctors to give her. From that point on, it was as if she lived in a big, puffy cloud. She was always kind of out of it, and pill bottles were always scattered all over the place. I think it was partly her addiction that prevented her from really being much of a parent.
My father was one of seven boys who were all born in the 1920s. He grew up in Los Angeles and started working as a machinist at Bethlehem Steel when he was just sixteen years old. He never finished high school, but always lied on his résumé about his education and age. In fact, he rarely told the truth, it seems.
My parents spoke Russian when they were hiding things from us. My brothers and I were never taught the language, so we never had any idea what they were talking about. I remember once in the sixth grade, all of the kids were discussing their heritage. Most of the kids in my class had hybrid origins—Swedish-German or French-English or Irish-Italian. I was all Russian, and that was horrible. Once, all the kids in my class called me a “commie.”
At home, being Russian was hugely important to my mom. We went to a church that only allowed Russians on Sundays. On Mondays, we went to a Boys and Girls Club for Russians only. At home, we were forbidden to eat anything that was not kosher. We would pray before dinner in Russian. On family holidays, we spent time with all of our extended Russian family members.
An aunt and uncle of mine had some money, and their home had a beautiful swimming pool that looked like something out of an Elvis Presley movie in Palm Springs. The pool was surrounded by beautiful palm trees, and her home was a classic mid-century modern design. I just loved going there. My family also frequently took short and affordable trips either to local beaches