.you've got to help me make a stand

I've always loved to swim. When I was a kid, I'd play this game in the deep end of the pool with coins. Basically, the game was that I'd throw a coin into the water, dive after it, and go pick it up.

Not terribly inventive, I suppose, but I used to like to watch the little glint of silver tumble down for the twelve or fourteen feet, acertain its position, and jump down after it, so I could spend as much time down at the bottom of the pool as possible without having to waste time searching for it. I wouldn't pick up the coin immediately. I'd find it, rest my hands against the bumpy white floor and sunken bandaids, and examine the coin at every angle possible. The way the president's face would be magnified by the light refraction down fourteen feet. The ridged edges. Sometimes I'd pick the coin up and follow the watery circular shadow it would make against the wall. Sometimes I'd read the year, just to see if I was older than the coin or if it was older than me, and do some math to see how much older or younger it was. Sometimes I'd ponder the "In God We Trust" inscription, and why we had to have faith written on our currency. Just to give myself something to do at the bottom of the pool. After all, I couldn't stay down there for long, but underwater is a good place to think. Quiet. Nobody's going to swim up behind you at the bottom of the pool and ask to borrow a pencil or what the time is. You can look at a coin for as long as you damn well want at the bottom of the pool.

This is my game right now. I have tossed the coin, and I'm at the bottom of the pool simply looking at it from all angles. I am not picking it up. I am not looking upwards with dismay at all the depth of water I have to ascend before I can breathe again. There is nothing but the coin for however long I can manage to stay under. At some point I'm going to go hurtling back toward the surface again for air, but for now there's nothing but water pressure and a dime laying next to some lost hair elastics and drowned insects. Not bad. Not biologically comfortable, I suppose, it's not the place I was meant to be for all time, but there's something to be said for it. For whatever reason I've always liked the bottom of the pool.

Yes, I do spend all of my time thinking of esoteric things to relate my current situation to, thank you very much.

I'm also distracting myself with material things. Like, just yesterday, I bought myself a pepper. It was yellow, and delicious. I also managed to find some spinach at the bazaar, and I ate stir-fried spinach and pepper last night with onion, garlic, and rice with no remorse whatsoever. I also bought new sponges, which is exciting. And a second bucket, because we haven't had running water for about a month now, and rinsing out my garbage bucket so I could tote water back from the pump was a bit digusting, even for me. Today I am going to buy some more mixing bowls and cutting boards. Later this month I am getting a new stove, since my old one exploded. And probably a hot plate, as only one burner on my gas range works.

I wouldn't say I am not materialistic, but I am quite good with money, surprisingly. Mostly because I'm good at making do with what I've already got and being mostly content with it. I can eat reasonably well without a stove, and I've been making do with a single cutting board and a single burner, but it would just be nice to have these other things. I want some nice things right now. Like bowls and produce.

Today I am also paying my host family for another month's rent. This is important to a certain extent, because it means that I am staying for another month. I will pay for my living space, and thus I will live there. I am staying at the bottom of the pool for a little while longer. Breathing regularly above water is a definite luxury and something I enjoy, but there's a lot to be said about the bottom of the pool and it would be a shame to leave the coin without getting to know when it was produced just because it would be nice to breathe again.

The surface will always exist. I will return there soon enough. But if you've already dived fourteen feet deep, you might as well stay there as long as you can stand it.