My clock says it’s a few minutes before 6 AM. I said I would arrive at 5:30 but I miscalculated my morning and now I’m late. It’s also cooler than I expected for a July morning. I dig for a sweater as I remember to also grab my mask. I walk along the cool grass of the park towards the south side of the Point, a man-made peninsula that curves into Lake Michigan in the Hyde Park neighborhood. The wind whips as I walk up to a group of seven to ten people all congregating on the rocks. A few dive in when I get there, and several already head toward the grey horizon. All I can see are their inflatable buoys shining pink, green, and yellow in the water. I know these people as the Point swimmers and I know them only from a distance.
“A lot of them are master swimmers,” says Travis to me as we sit on the rocks. He points out swimmers by name and tells me about their skills, where they are from, and how often they come out. “It’s the best place on the lake to swim,” he says, something I agree with, but the sound of the wind and waves causes my voice to drift and I’m unable to audibly agree with him. I just nod eagerly instead. The south side of the Point is protected from north winds, which makes it less choppy and wavy for swimmers. Travis points out another swimmer in the water. “She swims for the whole year.” In February, she can be in the water for ten to 15 minutes. “I act as a valet,” says Travis. When swimmers exit the water after four to ten minutes, Travis hands them gloves and clothing. Travis tells me about the time one swimmer got into the water for three minutes with gloves on and the velcro fasteners froze shut. Travis and the swimmer had to work together to pull the gloves off of his hands. “There’s no explaining it. I just say they are different mammals,” he says. Once the water temperature hits 50 degrees in November, many swimmers begin to fall back and retreat for the year. However, some of these athletes brave the Chicago weather and swim through the ice and negative wind chills. Lake Michigan waters don’t typically drop below 32 degrees, which allows for swimmers to jump in, swim for approximately ten minutes, and hop back out. Travis even tells me about a swimmer who swam a circle through a thin sheet of ice one year, leaving a path in the frozen water. “God,” I think to myself, “Will you make me a Point swimmer when I grow up?
Several folks say good morning to Travis as they walk up and strap on their buoys and goggles. Almost everyone asks him what the water temperature is. It’s a bit cooler on this July day than earlier in the week—70 degrees. “It’s been up to 76 degrees,” he tells me. The temperature of the lake depends on the wind coming from Michigan or Indiana. Travis explains, “When you get a southwest wind, which is usually a warmer wind—anything coming from Louisiana—it’s always warm.” The warm water is typically blown out to the middle of the lake and an undertow coming up from the bottom will drop the temperature ten degrees overnight where folks swim. Our conversation is interrupted again when someone asks Travis what the temperature is. The swimmer shimmies into her wet suit after hearing the answer. Everyone’s preference is slightly different. “70 degrees?! That’s too warm for me,” says one swimmer. Some like it hot, some like it cold.
“Here’s my big message,” says Karl, walking over to me as the waves thrash behind him. He says that the seawall will change the water quality as it has the rest of the lake. “The waves come in and they bounce off and you get all of this chop. It’s gonna suck. This is our one natural resource.” When you swim on the north side of the Point where a seawall was installed, he says that the water quality has definitely changed. “The only people who care are us,” he says. Plans to alter the Point, and surrounding seawalls, have been in flux for years with no real concrete resolution.
