Throughout the story, John Cheever uses the literary device of symbolism to illustrate the theme of a cyclical human experience that erodes each day. Throughout the story "The Swimmer", Cheever uses this device to represent a plethora of symbols. For example, the main and initial symbol perceived in everyone's mind is water pools. While he wastes the day drinking at the neighbors' house, he has the epiphany to swim in all the pools on the way home. Before this, however, the main character, Neddy, laments the days when everyone complained about drinking too much last night. The day is boring and nothing extraordinary happens on the horizon. Neddy's journey turns out not to be much different. This is why in every pool in which the stereotype of the suburban bush swims, there is only a period of time and monotony. These pools are all the same, and when he walks out the other side of one he doesn't even realize what just happened. The analyzers of this poem murmured: “He swam in the Westerhazy pool. And what do you do swimming in a pool if not repetitive laps? Even the line he uses is repetitive” (Blythe & Sweet). This is supported by Cheever's writing: "He swam at walking pace, breathing with every stroke or every fourth stroke and counting somewhere in the back of his mind the one-two one-two of a fluttering kick" (Cheever ). Cheever's intentions along with Blythe and Sweet in these quotes are that nothing is new, everything is the same. This is why many can identify with this idea, and this is why everyone is a swimmer in their own way. Swim steady strokes in similar pools of lost time and repetition. It is evident that nature manifests the passage of time. The eroding mountain... middle of paper... His family and friends turn away from him because he has disappeared from their lives. Blythe and Sweet state that "time, despite Neddy's attempts to stop it through repetition, did not stand still." He visits each house, greets the husband's wife in the same way and does the same swimming style to leave. As time passes, he realizes that people are becoming more and more hostile to his gestures of love. He reaches a new level when he "visits the Welchers, only to find the pool drained, the furniture folded and stacked, the bathhouse locked, and their house for sale" (Cheever). Neddy wonders "how his friends could leave without telling him." When he comes home cold and tired, all he wants is to be greeted by his beautiful wife and energetic children. The opposite happens when he looks out the window and sees a cruel darkness. When his loved ones leave his life, so does his sanity.