Time Lapse

I'm thinking about my grandmother. That's because I bought a swimming cap as well as a pair of rubber slippers to wear poolside. When I tried on the slippers, I asked the man at the sports store if I had to keep on my socks  "Naw," he said. "If you were a man I'd say keep them on for sure. But since you're a lady and have delicate feet, go ahead. Ladies keep their feet clean. Men, no way."

Suddenly I felt like my grandmother, even though the swimming cap I bought was just a utilitarian blue Speedo, unlike the elaborate flowered caps she used to wear. But when he treated me with the courtesy and respect so fitting for a woman of my age, vivid memories of my grandmother came to mind. "Young man, I seem to be having difficulty getting my car to fit in properly between those two white lines. Would you mind parking it?" And the said young man would leap gallantly to do her bidding. The car was an antiquated over-sized Cadillac. My grandparents were also the proud possessors of a swimming pool, though they hardly ever used it. But when they did, it was quite a sight.

My grandmother and her friends all wore those fussy little-old-lady caps in the pool, crowned with absurd plastic flowers that wobbled as they swam. They also wore flowered one piece suits with frilly skirts to disguise their broad hips and protruding stomachs. My grandmother floated serenely down the middle of the lane like royalty, doing a combo breast stroke/ dog paddle, comfortable in her matronly attire. When she emerged from the water, my grandfather would make some flattering, flirtatious remark, edged with a tinge of sarcasm: "Aha! Venus emerging from the sea." She'd smile, nod regally in his direction, don a straw hat and settle herself in a chair in the shade to keep her skin unblemished.

My mother and her friends were more glamorous. They all had deep tans that they worked on assiduously until their skin looked liked dried up old leather. They wore one piece swim suits with bold abstract patterns, or pastel florals reminiscent of Monet's lily ponds. They rarely wore bathing caps. Their hairstyles were their bathing caps, lacquered constructs stiff with dye and hair spray. They stood in the shallow end chatting with each other as they smoked their cigarettes and sipped their drinks (alcohol, iced tea or diet soda) which were lined up at the side of the pool along with their packs of cigarettes and tubes of sun tan lotion. They emerged lazily from the water, pulled on their paisley or terrycloth shifts, stretched their long legs out in chaise lounges and shook their gold-bangled wrists as they fumbled around in their huge tote bags for sunglasses and lipstick.

My generation was all about French bikinis. A row of giggly sunburned girls on beach towels pretended to be Brigitte Bardot, fantasizing about strolling down a beach on the French Riviera, the Caribbean, Hawaii or even Florida, for God's sake -- anywhere but the drab Midwest.

I don't know what the current styles are. I'm sure there are frilly floral ladylike suits or sexy suits with slashes here and there to reveal body parts and tattoos, but mostly what I see at the gym is the pared-down look -- like we're all supposed to be Olympic swimmers in our tank suits, goggles, and Speedo caps.