August 11, 2005 - Monday
Harry, Jeremy, and I all went to a pool party today for Harry's friend Aidan. Jeremy wasn't actually invited, but I got the sense that parents were more than welcome for safety reasons. So, I had called Aidan's mother, told her that it didn't matter to me whether Harry came alone or not, but that if I were going to come I'd need to bring Jeremy. She knows Jeremy and said that would be great. And it was. The party was good. Harry and Jeremy and the other kids all had a good time (although Aidan, of course, got bored with the pool - the pool he can use almost whenever he wants - long before any of his guests, but that was a minor problem). I left thinking everything had gone great, and really it did.

However, when I was saying goodnight to Harry he said something about going under the water. He'd said something about that earlier and I had just said something like "yeah, I saw you go under the water. You were doing great Harry." Harry didn't have any floatation bubble on, but there was a shallow end that was up to his neck and he seemed very comfortable with a noodle and then not. I said something similar again, but then I began to realize that's not what he was talking about.

As his confidence grew during the day, he had been jumping into the water, first, from the stairs at the shallow end and then from the edge of the pool near the starts. Apparently on one occasion, however, he had jumped into the water from the edge on the deeper side of the stairs, without a noodle, and had found himself in water over his head. At least, that's what he was telling me, but I never saw it.
"Where was I?"
"You were at the other end of the pool." which would mean I was probably swimming with Jeremy, who had a major floatation device and a noodle, in the deep end.
"What did you do?"
"Aidan's mom came over and helped me."
I was sure Aidan's mom had not got in the pool all day. "She wasn't in the pool, what did she do?"
"She pulled me out."
"You mean she reach in with her arm and pulled you over."

By about this point I was pretty disturb at the thought that Harry might have been in some serious trouble in the pool and I was really peppering him with questions about whether he was having trouble swimming, whether he was scared, what he was doing and where he had jumped from. And he, I suppose thinking I was getting upset with him, started to become less forthcoming and actually told me to just hug him and say goodnight. But, of course, I was just trying to understand what had happened. I told him that since Aidan's mother couldn't have reached him if she wasn't in the pool, he must have done at least some swimming to get close enough to the edge and that meant that he was learning and doing a good job.

Since I got out of the pool long before him, this must have happened long before he got out. And that means it didn't discourage him from swimming. I guess that's good. But, wow, I wish I knew what really happened. I can only assume is wasn't that big a deal since I didn't see any commotion and Harry didn't seem to be bothered by it.


Comments, Opinions?