The Horror. Oh. The Horror.

Due to our class schedule, we are having a nice four-day weekend. So Friday, I headed to campus not to work or learn, but to swim.

As you come out of the women’s locker room, at first you can only see a corner of the pool. I saw an almost perfectly still surface and thought whoo hoo! I’ve got the place to myself (which is usually the case... I’ve never been in the pool there with more than one other person).

As I rounded the corner, however, I saw there were two long, lean men doing laps with such ease that they made barely a ripple. Okay, I can deal with that. There were still three lanes wide open.

The men got to the far end of the pool and stopped to chat with each other.

That’s when I heard them speaking German.

Suddenly, the familiar voice of one of them rang out through the natatorium (yeah, that’s what they call it): "[Pirate]! You haff come to train, ya?"

Oh. Crap.

There I was, in my swimsuit and no makeup, like a deer in the headlights as der Brotmeister and one of the other superfit German chefs looked on.

Those of you who know me well, or who just read this blog closely, know that I have Body Image Issues, and those of you who read the old blog may recall my intense love-hate experience with der Brotmeister, one of my most demanding and yet endearing chefs.

I don’t think the guys reading this will understand, since in my experience, even guys with incredible guts flopping over the waistband of their Speedos (shudder) seem oblivious to their bodies. But I know most of the women reading this, especially my friends who would probably rather die in a burning building than escape wearing just their underwear, right now are saying "oh honey, I’m so sorry for you."

I mumbled hello and got into the pool as quickly as possible, trying not to die of mortification. He swam over.

I heard myself snap "Aren’t you supposed to be sleeping, Chef?" (The day before, I ran into him coming out of his class, looking exhausted, and he told me that after working a double shift for the last three weeks, which means 5 a.m. till 9 p.m. every day, he was going to spend the weekend sleeping.)

He said he had slept in, and then napped after breakfast, and starts to tell me about his day and then asks "Vat’s new?"

I muttered "nothing" and started swimming. He swam beside me for a while and then, I think when he realized I was going for the world record in "Not coming up for air due to intense embarrassment," he finally peeled away.

I would have preferred an actual shark in the pool.

The other chef (a culinary chef I don’t know by name) left soon after, but der Brotmeister hung around, chatting with the lifeguard as he stood there and freakin’ watched me. Go away! Leave me alone! To pinch a line from The Princess Bride that seemed appropriate, "Leave me to wallow in freakish misery!" Arrrrrrrrgh...

I just kept swimming, head down, not even doing the occasional backstroke which I do as a "rest" length.

Ugh. It’s one thing to be prancing about in my swimsuit at the actual triathlon, when I’m surrounded by thousands of other women dressed in equally small outfits, women who are shorter, taller (well, not usually), older, younger, fatter, scrawnier, droopier and so on, all of us sporting hideous swimcaps. It’s another thing completely to have naught but a flimsy piece of spandex between me and the watchful eyes of a naturally athletic chef whom I like.

I would say well, it can’t get worse than that, but that to me sounds like an invitation for more meddling by Fortuna.

If nothing else, I was able to swim the distance I’ll be doing at the triathlon, plus at least two extra laps (I lost count), in less time than I swam the actual course back in 2004, all without getting winded once (I’m a very slow but very steady swimmer) and without being at all sore today.

As to how much therapy I’ll need to recover emotionally from that particular workout, well, that’s another matter entirely.