When I was a kid I remember my mother taking me to this woman’s house who had a pool.  She was a certified swim instructor but I remember not liking her very much.  Two things really stand out in my mind.  The first was I remember a sign she had that said, “We don’t swim in our toilet, so please don’t pee pee in our pool.”  The second was far more traumatizing:  I remember that in order to pass I had to swim all the way down to the drain.  I can still feel the grip she held on my small wrist as she pulled us both all the way down to the bottom.  My father had polio as a child and never learned to swim, so it was especially important to him that I learn.  My mother loved to swim but with her red hair and fair skin she really needed to stay out of the sun.  For years after that I was terrified to go underwater and, if truth be told, I am still afraid to even snorkel — much less scuba dive.  I consider myself to be a good swimmer and was on the swim team in both junior high and high school.  But that feeling of being underwater and fearing when you will finally rise to the surface has never left me.  When I had my little girl the vital importance of learning how to swim had long been ingrained upon me.  But things and times are very different now.  They have indoor pools and different swim classes going in different lanes.  In the school my little one attended each kid got a check once they’d mastered a certain skill.  I feel she could save her own life now, after passing this particular class, but still I want her to be a stronger swimmer.  So she will continue to swim once a week to build stamina and really learn the different styles.  I snapped this picture of her when she graduated at a significant level.  She was so proud holding all her ribbons.  The British philosopher Alan Watts once said:

“To have faith is to trust yourself to the water.  When you swim you don’t grab hold of the water, because if you do you will sink and drown.  Instead you relax, and float.”

It seems that so many things in life one is not simply able to grab hold of … instead one must relax, and float.

In summers when I was a kid my father went to work and my mother used to tell me not to come home until the lights came on.  I ran wild with total freedom and yet safety.  I played tetherball, I scaled the monkey bars, I rode my Big Wheel absolutely EVERYWHERE, I climbed our apartments’ fence and walked along the top of its six foot length like a squirrel.  We lived across the street from a giant field of wildflowers and I would pick some for dinner every night, leaving tons to spare.  I played in trees and I caught cicadas (and let them go.)  We made mud pies, and played “hot lava.”  Looking back I was a real tomboy and I was the only girl in our rough and tumble pack.  But it was OK.  Summers smelled of freshly mown grass and were full of endless possibility.  I grew up so much on my own then, being allowed to roam freely.  Dear God my parents didn’t always know where I was AND I was left in the car (willingly) while they went in the grocery store!  They just rolled down the windows and I played with my toys.  If my child did practically any of the things I have mentioned fondly they would surely call Child Protective Services.  That is sad in many ways.  I developed a sense of independence and confidence in those “alone” times.  Now helicopter parents are everywhere and, if they aren’t, they often get reported.  I suppose I was lucky in that nothing bad ever happened to me.  I have since learned to question everyone — from the ice cream man (if he even still comes around) to people working in our home — with a suspicious eye.  I had a friend who was an attorney tell me the most dangerous place for young boys to be was at the bathroom in the mall — with their mothers right outside the door.  Times are simply not what they used to be.  Hence, I suppose, the advent of “play dates.”  Kids can no longer play freely so dates have to be scheduled.  Rather than use this as free babysitting time, Burk and I have always viewed it as a family time with another family.  So the kids can watch a movie in the other room while the adults talk.  In that respect, we don’t mind play dates.  In fact, we actually look forward to them.  We know the kids are safe and we get some time to speak with grown-ups.  I came in from our porch and snapped this sweet pic of our little one and her oldest friend sitting on the floor, eating berries, and giggling.  I remember all too well what it was like to escape the yolk of parental tyranny.  So I pretended not to notice them as I got all of us parents another drink.  Nia Vardalos, the Canadian-American actor of Greek descent, most notable for her Academy Award-nominated film My Big Fat Greek Wedding, said:

“My favorite part of any playdate comes later when I get to carry my exhausted and sleeping daughter to the car.  Is there anything more trusting than a sleeping child completely and utterly leaning into your body?”

That IS one of the best parts of a play date — a thoroughly passed out kiddo.

Some time ago I decided to switch to mostly using my husband’s things.  I realized I had already been commandeering his undershirts for years, and then I took to using his shaving cream.  It costs WAY less than womens’ and it works much better.  Recently Burk came home with a new two pack of shaving cream and when I pressed the top I was thrilled to see it was this deep dark blue — my favorite color.  Our little one came in (because I never have any privacy,) saw the color, and exclaimed “COOL!”  “It really is,” I said, grinning.  So I wrote it out on my leg, to her delight.  “Mama, you should blog about it” she said.  And so here we are.  When the mundane turns unexpected it is a little burst of joy.  It’s just shaving cream, but it went from having a manly kind of scent and ick looking color to smelling crisp and coming out in this glorious shade of blue.  The English poet and theologian Samuel Taylor Coleridge once said:

“The happiness of life is made up of minute fractions — the little soon forgotten charities of a kiss or smile, a kind look, a heartfelt compliment, and the countless infinitesimal of pleasurable and genial feeling.”

So yes, dark blue shaving cream made me very excited and happy today.  I will always try to seize joy and happiness wherever I may find it; time is too precious not to.  I hope to possibly share some of that joy and happiness with others when I am able.  Sometimes it’s the little things.

I am still behind on my posts, but today I saw something that made me smile.  As I was standing there smiling broadly, fortunately the car’s owner came up.  I then proceeded to ask if it was OK to take a picture and she graciously consented.  The first thing that comes to my mind still when I think of false eyelashes is the iconic television star Lucille Ball and her show I Love Lucy.  Lucille Ball is a woman whom I have always admired.  She was beautiful, but she was not afraid to laugh at herself.  She joked about coloring her hair and wearing false eyelashes and made hilarious faces.  Her show to me remains nearly timeless even after over 65 years.  So here I was looking at this car, grinning, and I asked the woman why she decided to put eyelashes on it.  “So my son would not want to drive it,” she quipped dryly and I found myself laughing out loud.  “And does he still?” I asked.  “Yes,” she replied.  “I even tried to put something on the back to embarrass him,” she said as she pointed out pink high heels and pearls encasing her license plate.  I remember not driving a car until my twenties and not caring WHAT Daddy had; at least I could drive!  So it was no surprise to me her measures were not really deterrents.  I thought the whole thing was hilarious!  Lucille Ball herself once said, “I’d rather regret the things I’ve done than regret the things I haven’t done.”  This woman driving around town with the giant, silly eyelashes on her car seemed to me to have that kind of pluck.  I want to take more chances with my life and loosen up.  When I was younger I cared so very much about what others thought.  I find it very freeing now that I don’t nearly as much.  So here’s to Lucy who, for me, started it all, and to fun women who have cars with eyelashes.  And here’s to having tried more things with no regrets.