They are the only ones who give me pride. I am the only one who wears them. One hundred gold medals with silky ribbon and shiny faces. One hundred who silently watch over me. One hundred memories of years past. From my podium I can feel them around my neck, but no one else understands that feeling.
Their warmth is magnificent. They send determination and pride through my body. They wrap up and they hang down and rest their polished faces on my chest and grab the sun with a fierceness no one, not even myself, can comprehend. This is how they work.
Let me forget my reason for being, they’d all collect dust in a box under the bed, never mentioned or remembered, their ribbons all tangled. Swim, swim, swim, the medals say when I start to give up. They push.
When I am too old and too busy to keep swimming, when I am just a small city on the map of the world, then I will still remember. When there is no drive left in me. One hundred who were worn with pride. One hundred who push and do not forget to push. One hundred whose only reason is to boast and brag.