Adventures at the Pool

Summer has finally come to Seattle, which is nice since its mid-July, and we’ve been spending a huge amount of time at the new aquatic center in Renton. Basically, the City of Renton built this amazing outdoor water facility with a two-story, curvy slide, an aquatic play area for the kids, a lap pool, a wave simulation pool, and anything else you can imagine.

The funny thing is that all of these other cities with better reputations don’t have anything that holds a candle to this place, yet they are so quick to pooh-pooh Renton as if it was some low class, hick filled, crime-ridden shithole place to live. Classism is amusing especially when it works in your favor in terms of cheaper housing prices, and better quality of life.

The season membership we purchased to the pool has been great, and as the mother of a bonafide water baby, I’m relieved that I don’t need to join a gym or hang out in our backyard hot tub to satisfy her aquatic addiction.

After repeated visits to the pool I have noticed a few quirks about the overall experience. First off, if you give a teenager a whistle, red swim trunks, and a floatation device that says “Lifeguard” on the front, you are asking for a major powertrip attitude especially from the head lifeguard with the bullhorn. Sure they may be younger, expert swimmers, and have trim waistlines, which are a few things up on me, but they still work this summer job for a touch over minimum wage.

In fact, these lifeguards kind of remind me of a few of the shift managers I worked with at my crappy, teenage, fast food job in high school. They had jobs that were mediocre at best, yet walked around as if they were the shit on a complete power trip. Most of the time I just look at them with the desire to say, “Go for it kid! Be the man, because when you get out into the real world you’ll have to do a hell of a lot more than look authoritative in designer sunglasses.”

The pool is mainly a family facility which is a good thing, because there are tons of kids, and I’m not the worst looking person in a swimsuit. In fact, I don’t look bad in comparison, which leads me to wonder where are the women we are supposed to look like? I’ve been to the pool a few times, and I’ve seen the “ideal” body on two women, and they weren’t really women, but girls about the age of 15. Most of the ladies in my age range were like me. We could all use a few spirited days at the pool, and many of us have pasty skin (a Seattle thing), but even the women who were thinner were just average. The great thing about it is that none of us seem to care about how we look in the suit; we just want to have fun with the kids.

I’m not letting the guys off the hook either. The bulk of the men my age have the signature Seattleite pasty colored skin, and are already working on that potbelly. There are the attractive young bucks with G.Q. looks, perfectly ripped abs, and full heads of hair, but they are in their teens or early 20s, and always call me “ma’am”. Not that much of a turn-on, but they are really fun to look at.

My experience at the pool is mostly positive except for those selfish bastards who spread their crap over four or five pool chairs and don’t use them relegating my stuff to a vacant area on the grass. I also get annoyed by those bratty little boys who are about 8-10 years old and completely oblivious to little kids. They pounce through the wave simulation pool mowing over everything in their wake. Thankfully, the teenage lifeguard with the bullhorn is right on their case with a verbal reprimand that would put any teacher and most pacifist parents to shame.

My husband figured out that we would have to go to the pool at least 13 ½ times to make the purchase of the season pass worthwhile, so every weekend for the next two months, and some weekdays we will be visiting our local aquatic center, and all should be well, unless one of those lifeguards decides to turn the bullhorn on me. After that, I can’t make any promises.