As is well documented, I am addicted to swimming job boards. Your guess as to why is as good as mine. Do I like fantasizing about barely making a living in inconvenient locations? Do I do it to torture my wife (yes)? Is the grass always greener on the other side?
Combine that with my fascination with the Faroe Islands, a place I’ve never visited but have spent approximately 75759 hours researching online, and a napping baby on a Sunday afternoon and you get this.
Naturally, I completely lost my mind. Setting aside important questions like, what the heck is happening to my friend Jon Bjarnason who had this job, I let my fantasy run wild.
I would move to the Faroes with my young family. We’d live in a thatch roofed, but modern house on the rugged coast. We’d eat gas station hot dogs. On big excursions we’d go into Torshavn and have some sushi. I’d finally learn to speak Faroese, as the locals and I connected over our shared feelings of rejection towards Denmark.
Of course, there would be opportunities to coach international teams. European Championships, World Championships, European Juniors. I could go to swim meets in the cutest pools in the world, like this one or this one.
Then solemnly, I considered reality. Even if I could convince my wife, something probably as realistic as Mark Schubert calling me personally to apologize, chances are such a move would end up with my entire family miserable. We’d be far from family and friends and isolated.
If I thought the food in Denmark was bad (I did), what would I think on the 30th time I had to settle for lambs head for dinner? I don’t even really like cooked fish, a pretty tough hill to climb in a country that still does a lot of fishing. Gas station hot dogs would get old pretty fast.
So let me make this plea to someone out there, a talented coach with a sense of adventure and a more generous palate. Apply for this job. Take this job. Go to the big swim meets, and hang out the Faroese people. Allow me to get a shred of this experience without having to break the lease here in Jersey City.
I promise extensive media coverage from Chris DeSantis Coaching, both in blog and podcast format. If only so I can inject a little bit of your adventure directly into my veins.