This Kind of Perfect

So much swimming—literally and figuratively 🌊

Day 5 of consecutive swimming over here: lakes, creeks, beaches, pools, waterparks. And I’m not even on vacation—just trying to squeeze every last drop out of summer with these sweaty, glowing, fierce little humans I get to call my daughters. 💕

I’ll admit, I sometimes watch—maybe even envy—the glam women drifting lazily around the pool on floaties or stretched out with a paperback at the “adults only” pool. 🍹 Meanwhile, there’s me—in my “mama” cap, streaked with baby sunscreen and berry stains, high-waisted swimsuit pulled over my post-two-babies umbilical hernia tummy, saving my 23-month-old’s life every 30 seconds as she brazenly hurls herself into the pool. 😅

And the swimming isn’t just literal. I’m swimming in work priorities, swimming in back-to-school to-dos, swimming toward the next big push as the academic year and another grant season looms.

There will be a season for lounging and looking glamorous. I work hard to carve out moments of calm even now. But this season—the chaos, the laughter, the sticky hands tugging me into the water again—is its own kind of perfect.

Here’s to swimming, in all its forms.