Saturday morning swim Part Deux: Rhythms

There are three of us in the pool, each making our steady lines back and forth, back and forth. Our breaths, in and out, bubbles to the surface, a gasp inwards, and again, and repeat, 1-2-3, 1-2-3, (in my case); But we all have our own rhythms. For a moment, all three of us are resting and the surface of the pool slowly returns to calmness, we all breathe in and out together, at three corners, and the surface slowly settles, as though our collective calm were calming it too. I set off first, into that calm, smooth water, but slowly, reverently. I break the surface with my hands, but gently, stroke, stroke, stroke, and then another person joins in, adding their rhythm to mine and we are making music, dum-dadumdum, dum-dadumdum, and on top of that dumdumdidum, dumdumdidum, and then a third beat joins in and we are a symphony of watersounds, rhythmic, polyrhythmic, complex and yet simple, a human aquatic harmony.

I had a dream...

We were visiting somewhere in North Wales. There was a festival on, lots of singing and dancing and a really fun atmosphere. I couldn't understand any of the words, and most of the people dancing were Ethiopian. I asked some people what was going on and they said it was a traditional festival of the Ethiopian people, who had been long established in the area since coming there to work in the mines. When I woke up I thought, firstly, how this didn't seem unlikely at all, except it hasn't happened, yet. Secondly, I thought, how wonderful if it did happen, and a real cultural diversity would start to show and become part of Wales and Welshness. Someone I know from my department has a quote in his email tag that says: "Can we imagine Wales as consisting of a plurality of experiences, cultures and identities? Can we rethink Welshness as heterogenous, as inclusive of difference?" (Jordan, 2005) I'd like to think we can, not least because, if I can't say I belong here, where I was born and brought up, then where can I say I am from? Three generations at least on my dad's side were born and brought up in Wales. None spoke Welsh, so does that make us always and inevitably outsiders? If I spoke Welsh would I be Welsh then? Part of me thinks identity comes about through our inhabited spaces, and the more time spent in them, the more we connect to them and the flow between our selves and our spaces becomes richer and we become our places more and more. We can still carry other places and cultures in our hearts but they will always be shaped by the place where we dwell. So we always belong in some ways, we are all global citizens, we belong wherever we are.