by Yanichka Ariunbold, staff reporter

After the 2012 Olympics, Michael Phelps firmly declared his intention to retire, stating that he had no desire whatsoever to swim competitively past the age of 30. Well, he disproves this statement as of today, June 30th, 2015, which marks the thirtieth birthday of the swimming icon and my longtime personal hero. Phelps has been a major subject of contention since his return to swimming last year as well as his September DUI arrest that prompted USA Swimming to suspend him from competition for 6 months (the ban was lifted just last month in May).

At the age of 30 and equipped with waning, but not entirely diminished, swimming abilities, Phelps still remains a prominent figure in the swimming world. When someone’s almost single-handedly contributed to the recent popularization of swimming as a sport, that kind of influence just doesn’t retire. And then they make a disappointingly unsuccessful comeback that causes you to reevaluate the authenticity of your self-proclaimed idolization of hi-, I mean, it, in turn making you feel ashamed of your own fickleness as a fan.

Or something like that.

Ever since the 2008 Beijing Games, which is when, in case you forgot, he achieved the unbelievable, otherworldly, incredible, *insert strongly positive adjective* feat of winning a staggering eight Olympic gold medals (essentially a gold medal in every single event he competed in), I worshipped Phelps, the way an impressionable 8-year old novice swimmer idolizes the person who makes your sport seem, well, exciting. And believe me, swimming is painfully boring most of the time, so to see it on TV, amidst all of Phelps’ glory and narrow victories (like his defeat of Cesar Cielo in the 100 fly by a mere hundredth of a second), renewed my interest tenfold.

The 2012 London Olympics and his subsequent title as the most decorated Olympian of all time only served to further fuel my veneration of the Baltimore Bullet. I remember coming back to school after the 2012 games, proudly wearing this rather unattractive shirt I had made for the sole purpose of showing off my dedication to Phelps (not like I didn’t already do that on a daily basis…). With my T-shirt design skills unfortunately still in the making, the shirt bore a strikingly grainy, low-quality picture of Phelps swimming on the front and the words “Phelps Phan” on the back. I had thought the term “Phelps Phan” both hilarious and original, only to discover years later that it was, in fact, neither (I learned that it had been featured in an AT&T commercial in 2008). To my credit, I was, like, 12. And in middle school. We all make bad decisions in middle school.

Anyways, my obsession didn’t stop there. Without fail, I would vengefully defend my boy Mikey from any weed jokes other people would dare make about him. Not to mention, my locker was completely decorated in Michael Phelps magazine clippings as well as, I write with great shame, potentially some fan-art. My fellow classmates dubbed it a “shrine,” which, despite my protests, it very possibly was; all that was missing was some incense.

My seemingly steadfast feelings, however, came into question with Phelps’ re-entry into swimming. You see, it had been fairly easy to be his number one “phan” during his prime years and, unexpectedly, his retirement, when my last memory of him– Phelps clutching the trophy inscribed “The Greatest Olympic Athlete of All Time”–still shone brightly. The thing was, I wanted that memory to be the final and only way I remembered him. I wanted to preserve him like that in my mind, his career ending on that amazing high note, untainted and untarnished. Seeing him get older and lose to younger people that he had beaten so easily in the past saddened me indescribably, and I couldn’t accept it. The song “Bassem Sabry” by Of Montreal comes to mind: “I just watched my hero fail / And now I’m in a dark and violent funk…”

But it’s so strange and selfish and wrong to think that way, to expect your idol to always emerge victorious, and if they can’t, to never emerge at all. It’s singularly hypocritical to depend on someone so much for inspiration but to not support them back unconditionally in the process. Truth is, Michael Phelps isn’t a god, or someone to be worshipped on a shrine. He’s just a person, an incredible, magnificent athlete that may have somewhat fish-like tendencies, but a human being nonetheless. I think that’s what I need to realize, that that’s what he’s always been, even while breaking world records, even on the Olympic podium, even while carrying out his probation for his DUI arrest. None of that changes the level, however, to which he inspired and motivated me in my childhood and still does now even when swimming isn’t such a huge priority to me anymore.

Despite what swimming news says, there’s really no such thing as a “post-Phelps” era–he changed the sport so completely in its fundamental perception to the grand public and, especially, to young swimmers (like me) and non-swimmers alike, that Phelps’ authority will forever, or at least for a great while longer, be a part of why age group swimming has had such major increases in participation, why the very swimmers that have recently started to beat him are the ones that call him their hero, and why the general population knows that swimming’s a competitive sport. Honestly, along with the likes of Ryan Lochte and other national swimmer celebrities, he’s the actual reason why people would ever watch televised swimming that’s not the Olympics.

So maybe it’s time to unearth my “Phelps Phan” shirt and, although I won’t make a shrine this time, dust off those magazine clippings. After all, we have the 2016 Rio Olympics to look forward to next year. Once a Phelps Phan, always a Phelps Phan, never a fake fan.