Can you really jam out to music while underwater?

Sometimes, parts of your life – usually isolated or compartmentalized – accidentally collide.

I went lap swimming over the weekend, something I need to do more. I’ve not been in the indoor lap pool much since the Michigan weather led to the closing of my holy outdoor pool paradise in September. It’s been hard to get an open lane, my schedule has been crazy, and yeah, just a lot of stuff getting in the way.

I cut the crap and got back in the pool, and man, it was perfect. One hour of lap swimming heaven, and I threw down my mile. (Yay me!)

The wrinkle, this time, was my new gadget, which yes, I was lured into buying by a Facebook ad blitz (sorry, not sorry). An underwater music thingy that uses Bluetooth. Wait – like really listening to my Spotify or whatever moves me, while I am swimming? Yeeeeessss.

It’s a thin headset that wraps around the back of my skull. The little pads, flat like little Junior Mints, rest on the outside front part of my head – right on the zygoid bone. I threw on my goggles, ear plugs and Northwestern purple swim cap underneath the headset. I set up the little Bluetooth transmitter, put it by the pool, fired up Spotify, and went with a mix of music. A little classical, a little from my workout mix of hip hop, EDM and assorted stuff. Welcome to my random brain, which apparently gets even more musically strange underwater.

I have been known to sing songs in my head while swimming, letting my mind skip through a playlist of my creation. Like a subconscious DJ remix by Jam Master Jay-CG. (Hee hee.) Having the music coming into my head with decent sound, while I was pounding my freestyle reps, was lovely. It made swimming even more fun, and my splits were faster.

I stopped for a small break, to hydrate and loosen my shoulders when I hit 30 laps and make a quick adjustment to the headset. The older man in the lane next to me, somebody familiar from the summer spent in the lap pool but yet anonymous, asked me about the royal blue headset. I told him it played sound, from music to an app that relays swim workouts. He was intrigued and asked if he could try it out.

I said sure.

I put it on him, and he took off doing a lap of breaststroke. About a minute later, he was back, with a goofy smile on his face.

“That is wild!” he said, as he took it off and handed back to me. He really liked it, and we started discussing price, features, etc.

Then he added, “But I gotta ask, I could not understand a word of the music you have playing. What is that?!”

I popped the headset on to see what he was talking about.

Paradise lives in my Spotify high rotation.

My fellow swimmer scrunched up his face when I gave him this explanation. He asked me why I would “bother” to listen to “foreign” music I cannot understand. Adding, “no offense”.

No offense taken. But it begs a bigger question: why can’t/shouldn’t I enjoy things I cannot natively understand? Does it have to be American/English for me to access it? What makes Korean, or Puerto Rican, or German music any less worthy of my ears and mind?

Yeah, I know. Too deep of a thought bubble to throw down poolside to a nice-enough guy who didn’t get it. Enjoying things not in English challenges me. If it is in languages I understand, such as French and German, it expands my capabilities. If it is in languages I want to improve, such as Spanish, Italian, and yes, even Korean (A BIG CHALLENGE – WHOA), it makes me fire other parts of my brain.

Watching subtitled movies or TV shows are no biggie. Good is good. I know things go to another level if you can understand them natively, as some phrases, inside jokes and intent cannot translate well. Or I don’t get the idioms or cultural callbacks. That is my limitation as somebody not 100 percent immersed. I didn’t need to know Korean to madly get into the movie Parasite, down to wanting the Jjapaguri (ram-don) recipe.

The biggest benefit to me is being open to other parts of the world. I fully admit my ignorance about Korea was not good. My base of knowledge was weighted towards China and Japan, thanks to school, and to Vietnam, thanks to my dad being an Army veteran. Korea slipped through the cracks.

BTS has exposed and taught me so much, just from being themselves, expressing their thoughts, and showing their lives in Korea. They’ve also opened the doors for me to explore Seo Taiji, Lee Hyun, Epik High and other non-English performers to work their way into my perspective. Their stuff is sitting alongside some Bad Bunny (PR), LL Cool J, Megan Thee Stallion, Eminem, and Mero (Germany) in my Spotify.

We’re flooded by online, global content, meaning exposure isn’t something that’s too hard any more. You don’t need to go to the funky art house theatre or the indie record shop that smells like stale incense to find this stuff. YouTube, Spotify, Netflix, etc. can be utter rabbit holes to experience new things well beyond the U.S.

What constantly runs through my mind is the concept of influence. We can see the influence American culture has had on the world, especially in the genre of rap/hip hop. Working the line “and we don’t stop” in J-Hope’s rap roll in 2021’s “Butter” is a clear call back to the Sugar Hill Gang’s seminal 1979 classic “Rapper’s Delight”.

So yeah, there are things floating in my head while I am swimming that are not English. My fellow swimmer seemed a little confused that I was allowing something “not American” to be in my life and ears. I am really O.K. with learning and being entertained if it is not in English. Doesn’t make me any less American. It also doesn’t make BTS less Korean if they are performing in English – which they have been doing more and more lately.

I think it’s good to have some reflexive influence and be open to solid beats.

Maybe one person, in a pool in Michigan, swimming laps listening to music in English, Korean, Spanish, and German…is a sign of some progress in this world.

See what happens when I get into the pool…

See you Friday.