Summer of Swim, day 13

We stayed overnight and went to visit Will's dad in the hospital today. He apparently has a hole in his colon, and they are siphoning out all the junk it is dumping into his body through a tube that goes from his reopened surgical wound to a machine that collects it. It's pretty gross. They are hoping his colon will heal itself, but at some point they will decide to remove it if it doesn't heal on its own. We had to wear gowns and gloves to go into the room, and it is really all pretty alarming. We stayed for 30 minutes or so, but then he seemed tired, so we took the kids back to Sea World to swim before I had to be back for a meeting with my principal (more about that tomorrow - Mahala is sitting at my shoulder asking me worriedly about whether the Sandman is going to come.)

I have decided that I prefer the afternoon shift at Sea World to the morning one. This may change as the weather gets progressively hotter, but for now, I would rather go at about 4 pm than at 10 am. I went ahead and bought Mahala a season pass (it was only $5 more) in case we go back this week before she returns with the grandparents.

Summer of Swim, day 12

So. We got back from Vernon last night, and we brought my little neice, Mahala, with us. She is four. She loves Merlin. She wants to do everything that Merlin does. It is quite comical. Today we went to San Antonio to see William's father, who is back in the hospital, but we got such a late start that we ended up not going to the hospital. We got to Sea World at about 6:45, went to Lost Lagoon to swim and then caught the "Summer Nights" Shamu show - which was marginally better than the "Believe" show if you completely disregard the sappy, overdone salute to "our heroes" in Iraq (which is in both shows, but seemed somehow stronger in the evening show.)

I don't know.

I have family in the military. They took the job because it was attractive to them. I hope the people who are serving now took the job because it seemed likely to benefit them, and not out of some patriotic notion of defending me. I work in an industry that is prone to characterizing its employees as martyrs (that would be teaching), and I don't think the image benefits teachers. It encourages people to think that what we do should be provided practically free of charge without complaint or consideration for the cost of living. It encourages new people entering the field that they need to sacrifice their personal time and money to make things work for their constituents - and that tends to burn people out quickly and cause high turnover, which, in the long run, is detrimental to the institution.

So, if you are serving in the military, I hope you are doing it because it will pay for your college, or you wanted to travel, or you wanted to learn to fly a jet, or some reason like that. Because the idealistic reasons that people give for being in the military alarm me - just a bit. I am glad that there are people who are willing to take the risks associated with defending our country (even if I am uncertain that our president has led them to the best course of action), but I hope that they are doing it for their own reasons (just as I am teaching children for my own reasons) and not with some sense that they are owed more than the pay and respect that should be accorded to anyone who does their job gladly, out of a sense that it is the right action to take both for themselves and for society.

Summer of Swim, day 11

The kids swam today for about 2 hours in the backyard pool while I only got in a couple of times to gather things up before the trip home. Swim toys always seem like such a good idea until you have to hunt them down. I will say, though, that both kids seem to be doing a lot more underwater swimming - probably a consequence of their getting older and back into the swing of being in the water every day, but I like to think the dive toys are providing some incentive.

Summer of swim, day 9 - night swimming

I would never have my own pool - not living in Austin where you can't throw a rock without hitting a nice, inexpensive or free, publicly maintained and lifeguarded pool. But I love the little above ground pool in my mom's back yard. The kids are all tall enough to stand with their heads above water now, which is nice, and it offers one of the features that I like best about a private pool - night swimming. Though I haven't taken advantage of it much this trip (I crashed last night at about 7 o'clock, I think.), there is something especially fun about sliding into the water at night, seeing the moon reflected in the water, the water holding you up while the dark sky and stars cover you. Maybe next time.

Summer of Swim, day 8

I took a break from the water today, owing to my six and a half hour drive to Vernon to pick up Merlin, but both kids swam in the above ground pool in my parents' back yard. I'm sure to be getting in myself tomorrow.

Summer of Swim, day 7

Today we swam at Barton Springs Pool - the swimmin' hole that Austin is famous for. It is a constant temperature year-round (a brisk 68 degrees)because it is spring fed from the Edwards aquifer. I took a group of 12 ESL students to swim after their Spanish clep test, and Gavin and William met us there. It was a beautiful day in the high nineties, and the water felt divine. All-in-all, an excellent idea on my part. There is an admission charge ($1 children, $2 teen, and $3 adult), and it really is incredibly cold, so we wouldn't go there every day, but it is - pretty much without fail - a good time. After I returned the students to school, we went over to Adam & Melissa's to cook out on the grill. A very good day, indeed.

Summer of Swim, day 6

Today we went to Dittmar pool. It is about 3 miles from our house, and it is currently in the running for my favorite free pool. Why? It has an entire section of the shallow end shaded. There was a hugely mixed crowd- from a tiny baby napping on his floatation device to this huge Mexican guy who had tattoos running from his chest all the way down his arm (Gavin tried to fool him by pretending to throw the water ball to him, but pushing it under the water instead of releasing it as a toss, and it was quite comical from my perch to covertly observe his game with my son.) - and everyone was friendly. I sat in the shade trying to learn Spanish from a book for almost two hours while he played "monkey in the middle" with two little kids. Then he flirted with a circle of women who were congregated around an infant that could not have been more than a month old. Then he conned me into tossing rings for him to dive for - and three, then five other kids joined in. I spoke in some of my seriously fragmented Spanish to the mother of two of the ring divers who had come to sit down beside me to watch her boys.

Oh how I love the south side.

Summer of Swim, day 5

Today we went to Sea World San Antonio and had a marvelous time. We got to the park about 3:30, and Gavin wanted to go straight to the penguins, so we headed that direction and stopped to get wet at the little splash playground. Then we saw the new Shamu show (Not bad, I guess, but I kind of miss the old days when they just told you interesting things about the animals. All the emotional music and stories just kind of leave me - blah.) We spent the last hour and a half swimming at the Lost Lagoon in the wave pool (which always reminds me and William of Budapest, since that is where we first encountered a wave pool)and the Spash Attack playground. We left at 7:30 and went to Will's parents' house for dinner. A very satisfying day.

Summer of Swim, day 4 - bringing diversity to the East Side

Today we went to Metz neighborhood pool because we heard there was a water playground. It turned out to be not much of a playground, and the Metz pool was closed because they didn't have chlorine. So we drove about 3 miles over to the Martin neighborhood pool and swam. The only thing I didn't like was that there was nowhere to sit in the shade and the pool at the same time. It was a pretty high-energy crowd, not too crowded, though. Many random kids used William as a shield in games of water tag. It was quite funny to watch them grab his arm and duck behind the only large white Mexican in a sea of brown bodies. (It kind of reminded me of one of the tenets of the Monty Python skit "How Not To Be Seen" - Don't choose an obvious hiding place.) I think there is corrido material in there somewhere. Hope to get off my ass and post the pictures soon.

Summer of Swim, day 3

Today we swam at Marble Falls. We didn't stay in long, though, because the water was pretty murky. Gavin asked to go swimming as soon as he woke up, but I stalled for a couple of hours and tried to negotiate waiting until we got back to Austin to go to the pool, but he wouldn't have it. So I got in for about thirty minutes and then got out on the pretext that I liked to be able to see my legs when swimming. He said, "Why do you want to see your legs?" I responded that it made me uncomfortable for parts of my body to disappear when I knew they were still there. He said he couldn't see his hand, but he felt great. This is the tenor of many of our conversations.

Summer of Swim, day 2

Today we swam at Dick Nichols pool, a very cool, totally free pool that is about 6 miles from our house. Gavin and I went alone as William was in a meeting and Merlin was at my mother's. There is a playscape - which we didn't have time to explore - and a large 3' section that made it fun for both of us. They also had a wading pool that Gavin spent quite a bit of time in while I worked on a potential YMCA schedule - if we join. I think it could be pretty cool.

Summer of Swim, day 1

We didn't swim today because it was raining. William and Gavin, who is currently complaining because he is named after a knight and not a wizard, were in San Antonio for most of the day helping Grandma move into a nursing home. I was there yesterday packing up boxes, but today I had to go to the Blanton Museum for a training that was pretty cool.