Nothing a little chlorine and a sugary drink can’t fix

As a child I spent many a summer in the community pool at my grandparents. As I got older we moved to a house where the next door neighbor also had a pool. I was a swimmer in high school. When I quit the swim team I spent as much time as possible at the (not yet) trusty husband’s school pool at his swim meets. I’m surprised my hair isn’t green from the amount of chlorine it has endured over my lifetime.

For nearly our entire married life we’ve lived in apartments, also with pools, but I didn’t spend much time at them. I had better things to do by that point. Probably a good thing or else you’d probably be getting a whole ton of skin cancer posts. Needless to say it’s been a while since I’ve been in a pool.

Our neighboring snooty suburb happens to have a toddler wading pool at the community center. It also happens to be right across the street from the park we frequent. So while Kathou and I were checking out the community center yesterday I talked to one of the worker guys. I asked him how much it was to get into the wading pool for non-residents. He said that they have resident only hours for really hot days, but other than that it is free. FREE!

The weather today was perfect. Upper 70s and sunny. I thought instead of hanging around the house we should go to the pool. I loaded up the boy and a couple of towels. This little pool is the coolest thing. It is about knee deep at the deepest part and there is a ramp that goes down into it so kids don’t have to jump in or walk down stairs. In the “deep” end there is a big fountain. And best of all… it’s heated! We could have spent the whole afternoon there, but dumb me didn’t bring our lunch. The boy is also in need of some floaty devices.

As we drove home the smell of the chlorine filled my car and made me smile. It reminded me of summer and of fun. I needed that little pick-me-up.

We also had the high schoolers over to our house Saturday night so the trusty husband was sent on an errand to Costco to buy BBQ essentials. When you are hosting minors one essential is soda. Of course, much to our disbelief, the kids didn’t drink all of the soda so there is some sitting around our house. I have a bad habit of drinking Coke when I am stressed. Given the choice of a glass of wine or a Coke when I’m having a really bad day, Coke will always win. I gave up most caffeinated beverages when we were trying to get pregnant. Second to Coke is Orange soda. I prefer a Fanta, but when push comes to shove a Costco brand Orange soda will do the trick. Lucky for me there were two left.

So here I sit still smelling like chlorine and drinking orange soda… and I have a smile on my face. Oh yeah… and I refuse to cook tonight.