With summer upon us, we’ve been spending a lot of time in the pool. We’re lucky enough to have a community pool nearby; we can see it from our windows and it’s just a quick walk away. One of our neighbours, however, is currently using a pool construction company to build his own pool, so maybe we’ll get to use it when it’s all finished!!
I think I have always known that Zoom would love to swim.This might be what some call maternal instinct. It’s more than that, I KNEW. He would flip and flip and turn around again and again when he was in the womb. Always moving.
The first time we took him swimming, it was sheer joy. We were in Tucson. My own mother was there and got to see him, wide eyed, joyous, laughing, kicking, free. I was so glad that she got to share in the joy that he embodied in the water. He smiled an impossibly large smile. He squealed with delight. He had found something that made his soul sing.
I’m so glad that we live so close to a pool, and that we can go swimming whenever we want. Over the last week, we’ve been three times. Zoom has two swimsuits now, one with dogs and lifegaurd rings and matching hat, the other without a nautical theme. Very preppy. We get ready, Sean throws little Zoom on his shoulders, and we grab towels and his floaty toy and we go. Zoom smiles bigger and bigger, knowing where we are going. Sometimes we see a dog on the way and he laughs. He is so happy.
We get in the pool and the kicking, the laughing, it is the same as the first time we went. His eyes squint, he smiles so big that his five teeth show. He puts is face in the water, blinks his eye rapidly so that he can see again. All the while, his eyes are saying all he ever needed to say,”thank you momma, thank you, this world is so good and so big and so amazing. I am swimming. Swimming! Do you see? We have a pool and we are lucky.”
And all I can think is that yes, little one, you are right. We are so very lucky.