Swimming pool closed? Are you kidding?!

Swimming Pool Closed. SWIMMING POOL CLOSED! What the heck! That’s the sign on the apartment pool after we mounted our expedition to my daughter’s apartment pool this morning.

Some of my gentle readers may be thinking, “What’s the big deal?” Those are the readers who are my age or older. When we took our kids swimming in Washington State nearly 30 years ago, it was simple. We grabbed four towels, took our kids by the hand, walked down to the inlet, disrobed, and went swimming. That’s not the way it works now. Not by a long shot.

Nowadays we have learned that the sun’s rays will kill you. They will store up their evil effects over the years, eventually eat your skin off, give you cancer, and (worst of all) degrade your beauty with wrinkles, giant freckles, liver spots, and hideous moles. And, you don’t just expect today’s kids to play in the water when you get to it; you need toys to play in the water…lots of toys. This is how it goes when you mount a family swimming expedition in 2012.

First you have to wait for the right time. Nobody can be taking a nap or be in a bad mood and nobody can be due for a nap in the next two hours. Everybody has to be sufficiently fed to not have a hunger attack in the next two hours. Then you have to prepare everyone’s skin. My daughter has thoroughly researched the ingredients in sun block products and has selected a special suitable product that is about SPF 400, has no known carcinogens or allergens, and has the color and about twice the viscosity of lithium brake grease. Today I drew the task of having to smear it on the granddaughters. Every exposed square centimeter of the granddaughters must be generously covered and rubbed in because if my daughter detects even one tiny exposed pink spot after the solar exposure, I will be a dead man. Of course they are wiggling like crazy (especially Yaiza the toddler) and much of the product goes into their hair or eyes, which is a serious mess. Yaiza’s swimwear begins with her “Little Swimmer” disposable diaper, which is purported to trap and retain any accidents during the swim. Ha ha, fat chance. After that, both little girls must be inserted into their swimsuits. Their life jackets are mandatory so they are added to the two strollers that it takes to carry Yaiza and all the gear. The other gear includes two plastic floating tubes, which first must be topped off in air pressure. Then there is the diaper bag, acres of towels, and lots of toys including many cups, and pails and toy horses with rainbow-colored mane and tails that need to be washed and rewashed if we ever reach poolside.

So you should be able to understand now, that when daughter and I wheeled the expedition the 300 yards to the pool and found it closed, we were ready to kill somebody on the apartment staff, or at least hold them under water until they were blue. I stayed outside to keep cool in the heat while daughter went in to demand an explanation of the staff. The water had too much chemicals in it (medicine she said to our preschool age granddaughter) in case she didn’t yet know what chemicals were. TOO MUCH CHEMICALS!? I thought chemicals were what you were supposed to put in the water to kill the germs and make it safe. My friend who is a chemist says chemicals are good for you and you should embrace them without fear.

The irony of all this hyper preparation is that you still cannot remove all danger. Two days earlier on a successful granddaughter swimming expedition Ayla the elder (at age 4) was standing on a bit of smooth wet concrete safely outside the pool near the ladder. She was well prepared with a quarter pound of sun block and a snug well adjusted life vest. Suddenly without warning her feet shot out from under her and she smashed down on her face. She wasn’t wearing a helmet and face guard. I strongly suspect some of that lithium brake grease on the bottom of her feet was a contributing factor but I can’t prove it.