Hurry Up And Wait

I was told, get your times down and your grades up. Finishing my last school exam in November I moved to live in Palmerston North soon after that to train more. First with my Granny and Grandad and then into my own one bedroom flat. This cut my travel down from an hour each way to pretty much five minutes there and back. 8-9 times a week was a step up and having to cook my own meals, do my own washing and all that boring grown up stuff was a big change, but only a taste of what was to come.

I think Mum and Dad thought I would be cooking my own meals every night, little did they know I was to be adopted by a second family.I would go to Granny's on a Monday for meat, potatoes and veg (always with dessert of course) and to my second family, the Reardon's on a Thursday. In exchange for a pick up from school and a ride to swimming Mumma J would cook me tea, let me hang out at their house and play candy crush and watch funny cat videos on youtube. Thanks heaps for accepting me as daughter number 3! (The favourite daughter)
So I kept training and racing and waiting, and training and waiting. On the 24th of February I got an email from Coach Lemley in Alaska. He said he would love to have me on his swim team, but did I realize how cold it was in Fairbanks Alaska? To be honest I had no idea. Check out Wikipedia, convert -40 Fahrenheit to Celsius and this will give you an idea. It is dark from 3pm to 11am on the shortest day. Population: 30,000 + a few moose.

It took a few weeks for me to come around to the idea of living in a place that has more snow in a week than I have ever seen in my life. I checked the school's website again (www.uaf.edu) and liked the business program. Coach referred to the university as 'Harvard of the north' and with a few offers from other schools the best vibe came from Alaska. Talk about an adventure! A team that needed a distance freestyler and a coach that only wants the best for all his swimmers. I accepted the scholarship offer and got some new friends on Facebook from the girls already on the team, wanting to help me out and answer any questions I had, and there was a lot.