Saturday 6:20 AM: BEEP BEEP BEEP
Ugh. We’d only gotten to bed a few hours before. Friday night, our Canadian pal, Michael Buble, played the RBC Center. We knew going in that we were going to pay on Saturday for the fun of Friday night, but what can you do? The concert was fun, but we decided that it’s not worth sitting in shitty seats. You miss too much of the fun. And, you end up sitting next to smelly people who eat horrible-smelling food all night. Darling, there’s a reason you have to rest your arms on your boobs, it’s that fried slop sandwich you’re inhaling.
Anyway…we had to be at a local pool for 7:00 warm-ups. This meant a 6:45 departure. JewelrySlut stayed behind for a few minutes. She’d have to leave the meet early to go get Chicken from my parents’ house. So, we left and stopped at a local Dunkin Donuts for breakfast. We fuel the child with donuts before her early AM meets. I needed coffee.
15 minutes later, we left with 2 donuts and a coffee. Thanks DD, you suck taint. You really should have more than one asshole working there in the morning. The pool jerk was stupid to begin with but was also manning the counter and drive through. He was pitifully overmatched. My sternly-worded note has been sent to DD. I want me a gift card!
Anyway…we got to the meet and settled in. It was already about 80 and the humidity was just as high. I felt miserable. The kids warmed up and they started lining up for the first relays. Shmuppie was told that she would not be swimming in the first relay. As it is, she swims up with the 9-10 year old girls every week. She used to be on the #2 relay and, this past weekend, moved up to the #1 relay. Of course, the rest of said relay bailed on the meet. Seething, we told her to sit down.
Meanwhile, the coach was pleading with some remaining 10 year olds to swim up in the 11-12 relay. They’d have to be willing to swim a 50 though. They’re used to 25′s. I told the coach that Shmuppie would do it. So, the 8-year old swam with the 11/12 group. She led off the relay and swam a respectable backstroke. In fact, she was leading the race when she finished her swim.
She then went out and won her age group in the Free, Back, and Fly. Her free relay may have won.
On a related note, we recently had her evaluated for the Y’s year-round team (You can’t say “try out” because that may hurt feelings).
Afterwards, I spoke to the coach:
So…what’s the commitment really like on the Green Team (the lowest level)?
Who’s your kid?
Shmuppie
(He laughs). Oh no…she won’t be on the green team
(Head hanging). You’re gonna put her on the White Team, aren’t you?
There’s no need for her to be on the Green Team.
Blerg…The white Team is 4-5 practices per week. From 6:15 – 7:45. We’re not sure how we feel about it for a few reasons.
1: It’s a big commitment and she may not be ready to make it
2: We may not be ready to make it
3: That’s the end of weeknight family dinners. Call us old-fashioned or, if you read the NY Times, trendy, but we believe in sitting down to dinner. As it is, we only get do it maybe 4 times per week because of activities and whatnot. We like meal time, even if, lately, it’s punctuated by Chicken spitting mashed up food at us.
4: Did I mention the commitment? The last thing we want is for Shmuppie to do what I did; give up swimming at age 9. There’s a thin line between fun and burn out. We’d be edging up to it. With this program, if she progresses (and I’m not saying she necessarily will), the goal of the team is to either get you a D1 scholarship or to qualify for Trials. Will she do it? Who the fuck knows? But, that’s the path we would be taking. They’ve been eyeballing her for a few seasons now and she’s only 8! Good Lord help me.
Back to Saturday: We got home from the meet, dead tired and hot. The 4 of us all tried to nap, but Chicken was not in the mood. There were places to explore and things to eat.
We did some shopping and had a swim. The bottom line is that by the time the evening rolled around, we were dead. I hadn’t felt that tired in years. I wanted to cry I was so exhausted.
Chicken slept from 7:30 – 9:00AM
Shmuppie slept from 8:15 – 9:00AM
JewelrySlut and I slept from 10:00 – 8:30AM.
That’s a lot of sleep.
Sunday:
It’s amazing what a good night’s sleep can do for your well-being.
We had breakfast, did the grocery shopping, and all felt better. Shmuppie and I went to the pool while Chicken slept. While there, some neighbors started discussing wine. This, naturally, led to someone running home for 2 bottles and some plastic cups. Sunday at the pool turned into Wine Day.
Then the fun started.
A guy about my age and his daughter had come into the pool as someone else left…the gate had been politely held open.
Well, the Annes (Drunk and Crazy) asked him where he lived. When he waved off in the direction of someplace decidedly not in our community, the fun started. Crazy explained that he really didn’t belong at the pool because it was for the townhouses and not the local apartments. Drunk started yelling. It was explained that this was a private pool and that he didn’t live in the houses that supported it and that he really needed to leave. He responded as we’d all expect: That sounds racist.
Yup…it’s racist. We don’t want you in the pool because you’re black. It’s not because you don’t live in our neighborhood and knowingly snuck in. That has nothing to do with it. We’re all a bunch of white folk looking to keep you down. So, with a fanfare of swearing, he took his daughter and left.
We had more wine.
We left the pool and went home to eat (I’d been slow-cooking pork all afternoon…mmm…pork).
Sometime later, we heard noise from the pool. It seems some people were trying to break in and s few of our neighbors were rebuffing their advances. When told that they could not break in, they, naturally, decided that was the case because we’re all racist. Yes…we’re not letting you bust through a gate because we’re racist. It’s not because you’re trespassing. It’s because we are racist. So, the cops were called by 2 different people, and, hopefully, Antoine was arrested, or if nothing else, spoken to. On the bright side, I’ve figured out how they’re getting in and the gate will be fixed today.
On the bad side, that just makes me so sad.
I hate that the response from these assholes is always “You’re racist”. We’re trying hard this summer to crack down on people sneaking into the pool. It’s 1: not safe (when you see how they behave) and it 2: leaves the pool a mess afterwards. But, you have to be careful about when to call the cops. It can’t turn into “Call the cops any time black people are at the pool”. Unfortunately, the only people misbehaving happen to be black…and not from our neighborhood. I know several neighbors who’d love to call any time anyone with dark skin is at the pool. We can’t do that. But, when the only people who sneak in and trash the place happen to be black, it’s hard not to look twice any time you see dark skin at the pool. And, to knowingly break in and then play the “You’re racist” thing, just makes me sick.
Shmuppie started school last Friday. As I’d mentioned, we’d had it with her old school. Unfortunately, it got to the point where, as I say, the “social experiment” was over. It’s time to get educated. So, she’s at a school that’s about 80% white. Her old school was 80% non-white. Sorry folks, but she was not getting educated at the old school. She was getting babysat for 6 hours a day. So, we did what we had to do, and, in the end, you can call us racist for doing so. But, my kid comes first.
I like to point out to my neighbors as often as possible that class knows no color. Lately, it’s been a hard point to get across to them.
