Back when the oldies at my mom's pool died or moved on to an old folks' home, I thought my days of pool entertainment were over. Luckily, I joined this pool near my work and though it started out slow, it now provides all the mystery, intrigue, and colorful characters I could ask for.
First, there's Hot Tub Playboy. He sits in the hot tub every day waiting for his women to show up. Hot Tub Playboy has two main women: Cell Phone Girl and The Quiet One. Cell Phone Girl periodically gets out of the hot tub to yell into her phone for 10 minutes. The Quiet One is, as one would expect, pretty quiet, but one time I saw Hot Tub Playboy pinch her butt.
Then there's Over-achieving High School Girl and her parents, Passive and Aggressive. She showed up in the fall with her Passive father who was attempting to teach her how to swim without creating small tidal waves by way of loving encouragement and plenty of joking around. She's gotten kind of better and joined the school swim team. Enter Aggressive mother. Aggressive mother, it seems, has been trained as a drill sergeant and can often be found holding a clipboard and yelling things like, "You're slowing down!" and, "10 laps left! Hurry up!!" I fear Over-achieving High School Girl takes after her mother as she now meticulously times her laps and yells at her father to keep careful track of them. I can hear her stop watch beeping beneath the water.
And finally there's snorkel guy, who was apparently never taught how to take breaths while swimming so he swims with a snorkel, never lifting his head out of the water. He could likely swim for years straight using this technique.
I'm thankful for all these characters, bringing my joy me with their weirdness and flirting. Without them I'd just be swimming back and forth, thinking only of my next lap. Instead I get to witness tiny pieces of their lives and entertain myself by giving them mildly insulting nicknames. I wonder what they nickname me.
