One More Time!

In June, I made plans for all of the exciting things we’d do during the summer. In July, we did a few things, but there was no sense in cramming things in since it was a long summer. In August, we mostly stayed inside because everyone was sick for much of it. Plus it was too hot for fun in the sun.

Now that it’s September, I’m panicking. Temperatures are dropping, and I only scratched our to-do list. We only visited the zoo a couple times. The local baseball season is over. Our swimming pool sat unused for almost the entire summer except for the occasional frighteningly large spider that turned up floating on the top.

The pool’s lack of use particularly bothered me. This monstrosity sits across half our backyard, depriving us of valuable real estate for tee-ball, and we hardly touched it. The kids would use it everyday from thaw to freeze if I let them, but we don’t have time to watch them. Since all three kids are too young to swim on their own, mommy and I must both be available to supervise them and protect them from unexpected deep patches and marauding siblings. Mommy works a lot, though, and life takes over when she’s home, so we just didn’t make enough time to swim. I probably could’ve taken the kids swimming one at a time while mommy worked; the child in the pool would’ve had fun, though the other two children would’ve been screaming at the fence.

I’d kept the pool running even though the temperatures were dropping and no one had used it for a month. When we had a couple of 60-degree days, I realized it was time to close the pool, but I was determined to not let that last month of pool filter usage go to waste. I wanted one last dip in the pool.

I checked the weather over the weekend, and discovered that Monday might be the hottest day until next May. The skies would be sunny. The temperatures would be in the mid-80s. The humidity would be disgusting. Perfect.

I checked the pool yesterday morning to make sure it was ready to go for our final swim. The cover was off. The leaves were deposited discreetly behind the shed. The scariest dead insects were skimmed off the top.

When mommy arrived home from work we sped through supper, determined to give the kids an evening swim in the waning daylight. As I finished with supper, mommy gave the pool her once-over, and walked back in the house declaring there was no way she was climbing in that pool.

I sat emotionless. I knew what the potential objections were, but I didn’t want to give her extra ammunition to keep us out of the pool. Was she protesting the chill of our unheated pool? Or was she aghast at the layer of algae that coated the sides of the pool while I wasn’t dumping chemicals in the water over the past month.

It was the cold water. The pool thermometer said it was 74-degrees. My body said it 33-degrees. I agreed that it was cold, but we owed Abbie one last swim. Mommy agreed that I owed her one last swim, but there was no way she or the boys would get in the water.

So Abbie and I hopped in the water last night. Actually, only Abbie hopped in the water. I slowly climbed down the ladder, letting the cold water gradually freeze my nerve endings into submission so my entire body wouldn’t be simultaneously screaming, “hypothermia!” I spent the evening carefully tiptoeing through waist-deep water so I didn’t splash anything on my upper body. Abbie spent the evening jumping into the pool and splashing water on my upper body.

Abbie had fun in spite of the chill. I had fun because Abbie had fun. When it was time to climb out, Abbie didn’t want to leave. She sensed that this was her final swim for the season, and wanted to extend the moment for a few more minutes. Either that, or her muscles had stiffened to the point where they couldn’t lift her out of the water.

I pulled her out of the water when she drifted close to the edge, and threw a towel over her. Even though the air temperature was still in the upper-70s, she was shivering fiercely. We pulled off her wet clothes, dried her, and gave her a warm shower. We capped the evening with a cup of hot chocolate. She enjoyed the toasty treat, so we’ll have put that on the list of things to do this winter.