I swam by the cigarette butt you casually flicked into the gutter this morning; the empty Cheetos wrapper you dropped on the sidewalk; the rotting orange you tossed into the grass; the baggy that got away from you and you didn’t bother to chase; the plastic bottle top you chucked, laughing, at your friend, which then dropped onto the street.

All of that, plus the leaves from the rain gutters, the accumulated sticks and twigs, and clumps of dirt; the things invisible to the eye, which I’d rather not think about; it all hitched a ride on the river of rain from the sidewalks and the streets to the gutters to the storm drains to the bay.

Where I swam in it. 

I probably should have saved my risk post for today because all of that worried about run-off showed up this morning. I arrived between bouts of heavy rain to an empty beach at the Albany Bulb. The wind was howling, but the air temperature was pretty warm and the clouds were dramatic and I was excited to get in.

I decided to take a video of my entry, but I just kept walking and it never got any deeper, so I turned the video off and flopped in.

I didn’t swim out particularly far since I was alone, but it never got very deep, which might be partly why the water seemed so much trashier than yesterday. It was also very wavy and windy and so keeping the water out of my mouth was pretty much impossible.

All told, it wasn’t a very relaxing swim, but if I didn’t look too closely (or think about it too much) it was beautiful and, as always, it felt great.