If you live on an island, not knowing how to swim is not an option. At least that's what we've always thought in our area and in the rare case that we met someone who couldn't swim, we found it impossible!

Since I can remember I've always been in the water, first with a life jacket but only for a very short time, because I learned to "float" early on, or as we say "swim like doggie" and go underwater at the same time. I think I was 4 or 5 years old.

But the best thing was looking for a spot on the rocks where you could dive. It didn't have to be high, but it had to be deep in the water to be safe. So, since I was a little girl with my cousins we did nothing but diving competitions, whoever did the most splashes won!

What a disappointment then to discover that in swimming pool diving competitions splashing is considered a penalty and in fact the winner is whoever manages to enter the water with very few splashes.

Sure our dives weren't fancy, but they sure were fun! In fact we were forbidden to dive with our heads because it was considered dangerous, so we dived putting our feet ahead, or we tried to hug our knees in flight, but the bravest were those who dived on their bellies, or maybe they were crazy?

In the end our skin was completely reddened, as if we had been slapped!

The Little Ant

One summer night I discovered that the weak point of the body was another. I woke up with a shooting pain in one ear. I must have been about 12 years old. A pain never felt before, it was as if something had stuck in the ear and I was convinced that an insect, perhaps an ant had entered inside. I was desperate and cried in pain.

But the doctor didn't find any ants... it was the impact of the ear with the water and the difference in temperature between the ambient heat and the cold water that caused the earache, the result was no more diving and ear drops for the rest of the summer. So I entered the water slowly and without putting my head in it...

Getting Older...

Then I started diving again, but it wasn't as fun as before. It is clear that I have never won a race with my cousins! Even now I like diving and swimming, but first I have to get used to the temperature of the water slowly, almost like my grandmother did when she cautiously entered the water and I called her: “come on, why don't you dive? “, “because the water is cold” she told me.

And in any case, after about ten minutes, I seem to feel a strange discomfort in my ear and so I get out of the water, I don't want the little ant to visit me again...