The swimmer

When you start your day off by saying, "I drank too much last night" and then you crack open another bottle, it is usually a key indication that there is some kind of problem going on. Alcoholism is no joke, “It takes away free-will, rational thought and the ability to appreciate life in and of itself. Alcoholism is a slow form of suicide and it is painful for everyone around to watch as it progresses toward death” http://immortalalcoholic.blogspot.com/2012/09/live-til-you-die.html. This is exactly what I believe John Cheeze was trying to portray in his story, and he did a very good at it too. It destroyed Neddy’s ife, it caused him to lose his house, family, friends, and even his mind.  He swam pool to pool trying to live in the moment and forget about how miserable he had caused his life to become. He used his friends to get what he wanted and felt as if it was owed to him, because people once enjoyed his company. People felt sorry for him.  When old friends tried talking to him about it, he would ignore them, selectively chooses which memories he wanted to remember. “Whiskey would warm him, pick him up, carry him through the last of his journey, refresh his feeling that it was original and valorous to swim across the

County (8).” Neddy needed the alcohol, “he needed the stimulate (8),” to wake up. It was the only way he could gain enough strength to wake up every day to the life he created for himself through his addiction.

Personally, I have seen what alcoholism does to people, it changes who you are and at a certain point there is no getting the “person you once knew” back. They live in a selfish world where they think everything is owed to them or the pity themselves. Addicts lie, cheat, and steal. Neddy Merrill is an addict and these unfortunate things caused him to be a person that he might not have been before. It turned his perfect world upside-down. The swimmer is a fabulous story about how “water” can drown a person.  

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The "Untamed"

One interpretation of the pools vs. river debate surrounding The Swimmer comes up when you think about what he wanted to name his "discovery".  The Lucinda River, named after his wife we know so little about - in fact, Ned doesn't seem to know much about her either.  There isn't much discussion on their marriage until towards the end when you meet his mistress and start hearing more about his transgressions.
It is a common masculine trope of man discovering land, invented something new, just being the first at something.  This becomes particularly hard in more modern literature because the idea of charting new terrain is almost impossible in the modern world.  It is still however a very attractive dream.  Ned gets the bright idea in his head that he's going to discover these uncharted waters, that he's figured out a route not used before, and he'll name it after his wife.  Choosing to name it Lucinda seems more on ceremony rather than any real respect, like naming a ship.  He acts like he's taming the wild river and when really he's flopping from backyard pool to backyard pool.  I see a man who expected a lot from himself and his life.  What he got was an upper middle class suburban lifestyle with a woman who was a person, not a goddess, and a home that was a house, not a palace.  He liked the idea of Lucinda (representing what his life was "supposed" to be) and the idea of charting the unknown river.  What he got was something most of us do, but he couldn't accept that.  

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The Swimmer

I thought there were a lot of interesting things going on in this one. I've seen a few other people on here talk about the passage of time, but I had a few ideas other than that too that kind of go along with that. Time seems to be moving at an irregular pace throughout the story, but I almost wonder if it's actually time moving differently, or his perception of it. He has a drink most places he goes, so I was wondering if it he'd maybe spent most of his adult life drinking, and just woke up one day to find his life completely different than he thought it was, not paying attention or being sober enough to comprehend how much time had actually passed, and that maybe he wasn't as young as he thought he was anymore. That maybe his house had been abandoned for years and the alcohol was preventing it from sinking in. So I also wonder if Cheever was also getting at wasting youth and life on being selfish and irresponsible with your time.

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Neddy the swimmer

Neddy was the swimmer and his name alone seems to represent a privilege class of successful men. Neddy decides to swim home and imagines he is swimming the Lucinda River. The story starts off that he and Lucinda are at a party but Lucinda never makes an appearance at the original pool party. Was she really there? Neddy at the beginning of the story is described as youth and summer combined. He defines himself as an explorer. He is a strong confident swimmer and dives into the water. Neddy hates men who don’t dive head first into the water. This to me is a clue to how Neddy slowly evolves into a different older man at the end of his journey. Neddy acts as if it is his god given right to trespass and swim in public and private pools. Gradually he starts to tire and he longer dives in a pool but slowly approaches the pool. It is now getting colder and twilight is approaching. The people Neddy meets along the way are surprised or angry to see him. Neddy does not seem to think it inappropriate to swim at a former lover’s house. He appears at one house and is accused of being a gate crasher and a money seeker. Has Neddy borrowed money and not remembered it? And at every pool Neddy seems to ask for a drink. Is he an alcoholic? Neddy reaches one pool halfway from his home and it is empty and there is no water. What does this empty pool mean? Finally Neddy reaches home to find that his home is boarded up and empty. Neddy obviously has suffered from some mental break from reality.

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The Swimmer by John Cheever

It all started on a midsummer Sunday afternoon when the Westerhazys had a few friends over and they where sitting around the pool.  They was talking about how they  dranked to much on Saturday night.  Among them was Neddy and Lucinda Merrill.  Neddy was a slender man as youthful as his younger years, but he was far from being young.  He must have been still tipsy from Saturday night when he got out of bed and slid down the banister just as a kid would do for fun.  Then he decided to jog toward the aroma of fresh brewed coffee coming from his dinning room.  At the Westerhazys Neddy sitting on the edge of the pool with one hand in the water and the other hand he had a glass of gin.  Neddy wasn't a joker of any kind but he consider his self as a legendary figure who is always trying to make discoveries or have good ideas.  He decided that he was going to swim and in the town it seems like everyone had a pool or there was a public pool around.  When his wife asked him what he was doing, that's when he decided that he was going to swim all the way back to Bullet Park to his home.  Even though everyone   knew that was not a good ideal for him because  of his age and the way he was breathing in the pool, he did it anyway.  His only plan that he had was by memory or imagination  this is not a well thought-out plan.  He swam through neighbors pools and public pools as well, crossed over yards and trails.  Lancaster is a town where it seems like everyone knew each other.  As Neddy stated out on his journey he made some amazing discoveries along the way.  Some of the people in town was treating him different they where not please to see him.  The rumor was out that his wife and family had lefted him and he didn't pick up on it. Some of the neighbors had moved and he didn't even know.  Neddy and Lucinder had not been in the lamplight for awhile.  Maybe it was due to his affair he had or things was just rocky in their life.  when he foundly reached his home he saw that there was some damage from the storm, but as he approached the door he couldn't get in, so he called out and know one heard him, he looked in the window and found out that his house was totally  empty.  His wife and children packed up and moved.  What was it from  the cheating, the booze, or just signs of old age? 

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The swimmer--A Journey through Life

The Swimmer, by John Cheever, is I believe, a metaphor for Neddy Merrill's journey through midlife to old age. As the story opens it is mid summer and Neddy is compared to a summer's day-particularly the last hours of one.  The weather is clear and warm and the neighbor are welcoming and friendly up until he reaches Route 424. Route 424 stands for his fall.  It is never clearly stated what has happened to him.  It could be alcoholism or the affair he had or both, but he feels committed to his journey and unable to turn back even though he is being laughed at and jeered at.  After he crosses the street he gets to the public pool, where he is swimming with the public--people below his social standing and he is chased out by the lifeguard for not having an identification disk.  He has lost his social standing and his identity.  As he leaves the public pool, he heads to the Hallorans'.  He notices that their beech hedge was yellow, the weather is changing to fall.  This is signifying he is grower old, he is in the "autumn" of his life. Mrs. Halloran mentions how sorry she is to hear about his misfortunes. Neddy does not know what she is referring to. His memory is clouded and confused. Neddy also notices how loose his swimming trunks are when he puts them back on.  He wonders if he could have lost weight from earlier in the afternoon.  Another reference to his aging.  He is having more and more difficulty remembering things about his friends' lives. Also, he is talking about being cold and unable to warm up.  The water is getting colder.  The next two houses are not welcoming. At the Biswangers' house he expects to receive a warm greeting but Mrs Biswanger calls him a "gate crasher".  He has always considered them to be beneath his social standing and now she is snubbing him.  Neddy overhears her says," They went for broke overnight-nothing but income-and he showed up drunk one Sunday and asked us to loan him five thousand dollars...." Another reference to Neddy demise but he does not seem to realize she is talking about him.  The next pool is one of his former mistress.  She greets him with distain.  She tells him she will not lend any more money.  Referencing once again his financial problems. As he swims through her pool his strength is gone and he smells the fragrance of autumn and the constellations of fall not summer are in the night sky.  At the next pool, he is struggling to swim having to stop several times before he reaches the end.  He then heads for home only to find it dark and empty.  He is a man who has gone the last half of his life in an alcoholic haze and has lost everything that he imagined was part of the American dream. His family, his money, his social standing are gone and he is the "autumn" of his life with nothing. Why did Neddy feel as though he had to continue his journey through the pools? Why not turn around and head back to the Westerhzys' where Lucinda was?

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Ignorance is Bliss

Ned begins his adventure slightly buzzed on a warm summer day. He decides that he will make a trek across his neighborhood by swimming through each pool. This journey makes him feel as though he were an explorer discovering a new place and slowly but surely we realize he is discovering something but it isn't about his location. Ned begins to see something a miss when he comes to the Lindley's property. Despite each person he encounters mentioning something to him that doesn't feel quite right he doesn't seem to take notice until the Lindley's. Noticing the over grown lawn and that the horses were no longer there makes him wonder what has happened, where have they gone. Then arriving to the Welcher's he notices their For Sale sign and wonders when this all happened and how he hadn't noticed. He mentions that he doesn't pay attention to bad things in his life and this just becomes more and more apparent the farther his journey takes him. It isn't until Ned reached the Holloran's that we start to realize just what happened to Ned and why him and his wife haven't been seen or heard from in awhile. We learn that they had money trouble, had to sell their house and something happened with the children and yet Ned still remains oblivious to what is happening around him. Even in his own personal life. At the Bisswager's we get a feeling of what kind of people Ned and Lucinda were. Blue blooded high society folks, his comments of on the Bisswager's being a "different set" reminds me of Tom Buchanan view of Jay Gatsby and all other's that came from new money, this idea of aristocracy that the time line of your wealth determines a great deal more about your social standing than the amount of money you have. Ned is confused, at the end of the story Ned is cold and locked out of his home, the doors and windows shut and the inside empty, he looks to the sky to see the winter constellations and realizes that this journey was more than topographic and was a journey of self discovery, of what happened to him, his children and his wife. Is Ned's response to his life's evident collapse understandable? Is it okay to just block out unhappy memories in order to cope with life? Should Ned continue on the path of this delusional reality or should Ned come to realize what happened to him and possibly slip into a deep depression?

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Neddy, the Swimmer

This story had a very deep impact on me, unlike most stories do. The entire story to me, represented the passing of time. In an interesting way, Cheever creates this big metaphor for time moving forward, but instead referring to it as "swimming the county," in Neddy's words. It begins with him with his wife, at a friend's pool. When he embarks on his journey (to swim the county), this is where I feel it starts to get heavy. At first, Cheever makes it out as Neddy is just on this silly little endeavor, but  overtime, begins to incorporate more information about Neddy's life. He went broke, something happened with his children, and he has no idea. The reason I believe Cheever had Neddy so lost, so confused on what had happened, signifies that time passes without us. Things inevitably move forward, there is no stopping it, and that is hard to grasp. Neddy is a man in a crisis. So much has happened, so much life has slipped through his fingers until he was here, cold and locked out of his former residence. I felt so bad for Neddy because I think this happens to all of us. I recently turned 23, and truthfully, I feel like I was just turning 20, or turning 21. The passage of time is relentless, and we're all victims of it. That's what I think Cheever's message was. 

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Week 3- Neddy the Swimmer

When I read the Swimmer my idea of what was going on changed quite a bit throughout.  When he started out on his journey to swim the county and got to the river he named Lucinda after his wife he seemed coherent and able.  Quickly when he constantly was showing up to different houses having parties and swimming the pools it became apparent that this was only happening on the same day in his mind.

I believe he lost his family, job, and house and he was a drunk that couldn't remember a thing.  He started out on his journey in the middle of summer, maybe soon after he lost everything he had.  Next it became fall, then winter, and over and over again he was going through the motions still thinking it was the same day because of mental illness or alcohol, or both.  By the end of it I felt bad for him and his family, or the idea of his family since we never meet them.  

I wonder if he was just a drunk who never got help or if he was mentally ill.  Either way he ended up alone, probably right around the holiday season, with no money or family or home. Regardless of why he became the way he was, it is a sad situation that made a family man with a house and career end up broke, drunk, and alone.

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The Life of Neddy Merrill: Dissociative Amnesia

To what degree can the mind assimilate lies into the invert reality ultimately desired?

As described by WebMD, “dissociative amnesia is one of a group of conditions called dissociative disorders. Dissociative disorders are mental illnesses that involve disruptions or breakdowns of memory, consciousness, awareness, identity, and/or perception. When one or more of these functions is disrupted, symptoms can result. These symptoms can interfere with a person's general functioning, including social and work activities, and relationships”(webMD). Dissociate Amnesia is, simply, enslavement in a false perception of existence. To become ensnared by fallacies within, one must first experience such a trauma that the being begins to accede into a delusional state. Neddy Merrill, unbeknownst to the reader, had begun to assimilate into delusion before the short story had even commenced. After finding the Welcher’s home to be uninhabited, Neddy began searching deep within the confines of his own mind. “Was his memory failing or had he so disciplined it in the repression of unpleasant facts that he had damaged his sense of the truth?”(“The Swimmer”) He became callous to the world around him. Neddy began to mitigate his surroundings subconsciously to protect his own vitality. His mind evolved into a state of aberration. Mr. Merrill was not a well man. It appeared as though his expedition on the “Lucinda River” was nothing more than a pursuit of truth within himself. Was Neddy Merrill rectified in his quest for answers? Is dissociate amnesia the cause for his awakening? Can someone overcome delusion and effectively transition back into society? 

Shutter Island depicts many of the ongoings Neddy Merrill was, too, encountering. It is a great basis for discussion and reflection. It is interesting that the lead character, a man with dissociative amnesia, was named Teddy as, similarly, the lead character in "The Swimmer" was named Neddy. Is this a coincidence or did the director intend to disinter the life of Neddy Merrill? 

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