Back Flips and Bloody Noses

Teaching small children the fine art of the underwater backflip is not for the faint of heart.

First, you must put your Water Retaining Belly Pouching Over The Edge Of Your Bikini clad body in the water. The freezing cold, just filled from the well water. The water, hovering at a brisk 62 degrees. Mind you, it’s blisteringly hot and humid out, which is akin to wearing a wet, furry dog around your entire body, all day - so part of you wonders if it will be refreshingly wonderful to nip into the deep end, executing a gracefull backdive off the board. You hitch up the suit. (ahem. the very suit that is rolling over itself in an attempt to get away from your tummy) Delicately balance on the edge of the board. Survey the water.

Get down off the board, and kindly skim the water, as it’s so kind of Jack to loan the pool out, you don’t even have to call! You can just show up, with screamingly excited child in tow, and jump in. Or about. Your choice.

Which is about all the stalling you get, when an antsy five year old is splashing and whining from the shallow end.

(pay close attention to the words shallow end)

Oh, I tiptoed around a bit, and dug out more bugs, rescued a frog. Got back up on the board. Bounced a few times, to get the feel of it, you know, and finally, plunged off, only to come up wondering if I’d capped my nipples in steel, and was going to use them to gouge out holes in the driveway. Every last hair on my body stood on end, and I swear, this is the exact feeling that Ted Williams felt right as they lowered him into that cryogenic chamber.

Once the teeth chattering came to an end, I embarked on the task of teaching H to do a backflip. And underwater one. I demonstrated how to hold our breath, and we practiced, bobbing up and down in the water like a couple of loons, out looking for a meal. And then. It happened.

I showed him how to do it. Lean back. Place your head in the water. Kick off the bottom.

Discover that the shallow end really is SHALLOW only after smacking my face on the bottom of the pool. I came up, completeing the form in excellent shape, to mass hysteria and genereal screaming on H’s part.

The bloody nose and teeth do not, evidently, inspire confidence in the pre-K set.

Christ Almighty. I thought I’d been hit by a mack truck, which I suppose, isn’t far off. The bottom of a pool, placed in concrete weighs about the same, I’d say.

I’m now sporting two bruised lips, and an ouchy nose.

All I can say is, this swimming day is flipping over.