for your consideration.

For all the frustration experienced since becoming the women's auxiliary to team boy-stank, there are moments when they almost redeem themselves. The first of these occurred the very first day, at the swim eval, before I knew the evils and pitfalls of team boy-stank: during the 150-foot breath-holding exercise, I surfaced for my last breath before swimming the final length, but started coughing and sputtering, rather than inhaling to descend. Gentle giant Swedish Simon was poolside, smiling and encouraging me to keep trying, convincing me I could do it, and I did, sort of. The coughing and sputtering was a deal-breaker for that particular event, but I did actually make it to the other side. A minor miracle in my mind, considering that prior to that day, I'd never even come close to accomplishing it.

Another followed a night dive at a site called Mesa Lane, where I was forced to ditch my weights post-dive at the bottom of a staggering flight of stairs. Afterward, when I returned to retrieve them, I turned around to find one of the Joes, who'd hiked down to help me when someone'd mentioned where I'd gone (and it was awesome that he came to help- not only was I totally spooked and sketched out finding myself alone on a long stretch of beach, and sans flashlight, but I was sincerely not looking forward to navigating 200+ stairs, after a cold dive, in a wet dive skin, hefting an additional 20 pounds in awkward-to-manage dive-weight form at 1am.).

There have been other moments, intermittently, small things mostly, but generally enough to keep me from losing my mind amidst the dark haze of testosterone that permeates the MDT facility. This week, in particular, certain members of team b-s (oh, I kind of like that...) have been especially sweet:

Upon leaving for T-day break last week, Carlo and I planned to hang out that Saturday night. While at a relaxed towny-ish bar called the Press Room, discussing our mutual confusion over the objective of the game of Cricket, and watching random clips from B&W movies from the '30s, he paid for the drinks. Sweet.

On Monday, I bought a bed and frame, but had no way of transporting it to my place. I called and asked my friend Rob, who not only agreed to help, but packed everything neatly into the back of his truck, drove it from there to here, but also manhandled the mattresses up and down flights of stairs, and held things in place while I re-assembled everything. Sweet.

This morning, I decided to drive to school, as overnight temps are now in the 30s, making for cold extremities on the bike in the am. Pulling in to the parking lot, a young woman pointed out that I had a flat tire. Later in the day, I mentioned the mishap to Brendan, who offered to help switch out the tire for the spare. A few others pitched in, but Brendan did most of the work, indulging my need to contribute every so often. Sweet.

So there you have it. Proof that the stinky boys, despite being stinky and prone to topics of discussion better left to poker tables and sound-proofed garages, have their moments of seeming human-ness and normalcy. And for this reason, I love them all, just a little.