By Ryan Wichelns

 

The question: if your house was burning and you could save one thing from being destroyed within it, what would that one thing be? When the question came up as a speaking assignment for her COM 202 class, Kelsey Lynch immediately knew the answer. A pair of swim goggles from when she was 7 years old. She wore them in her first swim meet, winning her first race from behind their clear lenses. Ever since, she’s kept them for good luck, as a tangible reminder of her beginnings in the sport that would go on to define her. Except one thing. Those goggles never existed; she made all that up. 

 

Born in Seattle, Wash., Kelsey, 20, and her family moved to Cape Cod when she was only 3 years old. She is the younger sister of two brothers, Daniel and Kenneth, and the older sister of one more, Aidan.

 

It was around the time of her move east that Kelsey first got into the pool, and at age 6 she was already swimming competitively. “I actually liked it then,” she said, only to quickly correct herself, clarifying that she still enjoys the sport but in a different way. She walked on to the squad at the University of Rhode Island as a freshman and quickly made her way to the “travel team,” the top 17 of the programs 35 swimmers. Predominantly a distance event swimmer, she describes herself as being an avid eater and talker.

 

Kelsey, a journalism major, was looking forward to coming back as a junior at URI more than most students this year, describing the summer as being the hardest of her life. Her brother Daniel, 25, was deployed to Afghanistan with the Army at age 18 and returned affected by post-traumatic stress disorder. As if witnessing her brother’s hardships weren’t enough, this summer Kelsey was forced to watch her parents go through a difficult divorce. “This summer was definitely really confusing for [Aidan] and I,” she said, “I felt like I needed to protect my younger brother.”

 

Kelsey, the first in her family to attend college, also couldn’t help but

feel partly responsible for the economic hardships her parents faced

as a result of the divorce.

 

But during those difficult summer months, even though she wasn’t

swimming at URI, Kelsey kept busy by working as a lifeguard, and

of course swimming on her own, though more casually than she

does at school. “When something bothers me I just try to keep busy

rather than worry about it,” she said.

 

For Kelsey, swimming is more that having the ability to eat

continuously to balance the calories burned during her eight pool

sessions per week. “They’re like a separate family,” she said,

referring to her team. According to her, swimming has become an

escape from all of what she describes as her personal problems,

anything from the homework she has due the next day to her

parents divorce. When she’s in the pool, her mind is dominated

either with the pain she has to force her way through or, not  

surprisingly, “what Im going to eat for dinner,” she said. Her team

has become her second family, lifeline, and her go-to support both

in and out of the pool. They’re “someone to talk to,” she added, especially at the times she needs it most.

 

So when asked what she would save from her enflamed home, Kelsey’s mind immediately went to the pool. Instead of picking car keys or jewelry like other students, she imagined and created a story of her first pair of goggles, the beginnings to what would become a lifelong passion. Instead of picking something real but meaningless, she decided on a metaphor for her passion, her escape and her best friends. But Kelsey made sure to note that even though those non-existent goggles were what she spoke about, they still would never be a priority. Referring to that fictional house fire again, she concluded definitively, “as long as my family is OK, then I don’t care about anything else.”