NO SWIMMING ALLOWED by Peter Nolan Smith

The weather forecast predicted a sultry summer day for September 9, 2001. My friend Alia had transported a Porsche Boxer from the UK and her high-octane convertible had been cleared by US Customs. The British diplomat asked me to accompany her to the Newark docks and I agreed on the stipulation that we drove the two-seater north along the Hudson.

"Where to?" The blonde mother of six had left the children with her ex-husband for the day. Alia was up for most anything.

"I know a place." I extolled Lake Minnewaska Park. "I've been going up there since the 70s. Once I jumped off the cliff into the lake."

"How high?"

"Sixty feet." It felt like a hundred.

"We won't be performing any death-defying feats today."

"No, those days are over."

I was nearing fifty. The gravity transformed the water to semi-hard mud and the soles of my feet were very tender.

"We're going to Lake Awosting. Its slanted stone beach bears the scars of the Ice Age Glaciers before disappearing to the lake's blue-emerald waters."

"Fabulous, it will be my last swim before autumn." The slim blonde diplomat loved hot weather and we taxied over to the Port of Newark. Her last posting had been in Dar Es Salaam and she conversed in Swahili with the Tanzanian taxi driver.

At the entrance to the docks the Customs officials treated the UN under-assistant with the utmost deference. Oxford was her alma mater. Her family dated back to before the invention of sliced bread. The process of retrieving her car lasted about seven minutes. She beamed a smile of thanks to the officials and we sat in her Porsche Boxer. It bore green diplomatic plates.

"I bought this from my mother's inheritance. Sitting in it reminds me of her." Alia pressed a button. The top folded into the rear. She gave the engine some gas.

"The car sounds fast." I settled back into the leather seat and appreciated the growl of Teutonic power.

"The 2.7 liter engine has a top speed of 152 MPH."

"Speed limit in the USA is 55."

"I had it up to 100 in England. The speed limit there is 70."

"I 0nce drove 220 KPH in Belgium, driving a VW GTI." It hadn't been the fastest car on the road.

Wait until we get on the road." Alia shifted into first and released the clutch, shedding her mother of six status for the role of a woman on the run.

The Porsche had diplomatic plates, but she ran the car below 90 on the Palisades overlooking the Hudson River. She kept the car below 90, except for the uphill runs on the Northway. State troopers only post downhill speed traps. we made good time listening to her collection of 80s hits. Our friendship dated back to London. Leicester Square. 1986. She had arrived at the Cafe de Paris in a rubber dress. I let her in immediately, never guessing that this sliver of blonde was a diplomat for the shards of the English Empire.We listened to loud 1980s English Pop on the stereo. Conversation was impossible at this speed, although when we hit a deserted stretch of the Northway, Alia floored the accelerator and shouted, "No police anywhere set up uphill radar traps."

Seconds later we hit 130 on an empty road.

The wind ripped through our hair.

Exiting at New Paltz Alice switched to the radio. NPR was reporting on America's pulling out of the South African conference on racism. The delegation contested the vote on Israel's mistreatment of the occupied territories.

"That's not good." Our new president was born-again. Israel was always right in their eyes.

"Israel has a right to protest any accusation as does the countries opposing it." Alice was 100% on the side of compromise to achieve peace.

"Stolen lands." I felt the same way about the north counties of Ireland, but said nothing more. It was too beautiful a day.

The Gunks were crowded with rock climbers. People come from around the country to attack the ascent routes. We drove by these cliffs to the park. The lot was half-filled. Throwing towels over our shoulders and carrying bathing suits in hand Alice and I set out for Lake Awosting. Few hikers were on the trail. Unusual for such a lovely day. The path had been built for vacationers at the Lake Mohonk Resort. A carriage road designed to offer panoramic vistas of the Hudson Valley. Alice and I enjoyed our walk and soon Lake Awosting came into sight.

Boreal blue water surrounded by evergreen pines.

No one on the granite beach.

A ATV rolled up the trail. “Where you heading?” She was a hefty female. Thirty and thick of limb.

“Lake Awosting.” I had been coming here since the 80s. Once I had jumped off the cliff into Lake Minnewaska. A good drop of seventy feet. Once was enough.

“You’re not going swimming there?” Her voice adopted a tone of authority.

“Why not?” I was dumbfounded by her interrogation. This was America. The Land of the Free.

“Because it’s against the law to swim in the lakes after Labor Day.”

"My friend has been saying that Lake Awosting is the best swim in the Catskills. We thought that we might test his theory." Alice's accent was sheer Oxford. The language of command.

“There are no lifeguards.” The ranger stood, as if she had been instructed to enforce this mandate by GW Bush himself.

“I can swim three miles. What’s the problem?” I knew that the problem was that lawyers were waiting for some drunk fool to jump into the lake and break their back, so they could sue the state parks for several million dollars.

“It’s the law.”

She touched my arm. She had diplomatic immunity. Also tact. I had neither. Only a sense of outrage. Explanations were a waste of breath. Law was the law. We turned away from our destination. Swimming in the crystal water was a forbidden pleasure.

"It's a stupid law."

Alia touched my arm.

She possessed a diplomat's gift of knowing when to say nothing.

"Thank you, officer."

The park ranger drove down the road.

"You still want to go swimming no matter what she said?"

I shrugged a 'yes'.

"The law is the law and as a guest of your country I am obliged to obey them."

"Drat."

We turned away from the forbidden pleasure of Lake Awosting's crystal-clear water.

"This America has become the Land of No."

"It's the times. Not the country."

"More like both. Let's go back to New York." The City was the last bastion of the Free.

On the trip home the radio announced that the USA bailing out of the Racism Conference in South Africa in protest of a nearly unanimous condemnation of Israel for their occupation of Palestine.

"Another thing I hate about America."

"What?"

"Nothing." Anti-Zionist talk was as legal in this America as swimming after Labor Day.

I needed a drink.

Alia and I stopped at a bar in New Paltz.

Three beers later I was ready to resume our return to New York.

Alia was sober. She never drank liquor and the Porsche hit 140 on the Freeway.

I sat back and enjoyed the ride, because speed was a rare freedom in America and Alia could drive fast. All I had to do was watch the wind adn be free with the wind.