pool lady

Soaking in this late summer bliss. I know all my witches out there are trying to manifest fall already (I know I love it too!) but honestly I’m still reveling in summer. And this summer has felt extra special to me.

I’m a pool lady now. So that’s part of it.

As a kid, I spent nearly every moment I could at the local pool. All us kids did. We swam and snacked and swam and frolicked and swam. We went home entirely spent, all bloodshot eyes and suntanned skin.

We joined the swim team and swam some more.

Pool life was life. It was so interwoven.

Most of our first jobs were at the pool. Teenage gate attendants and lifeguards.

Nearly all of my friends I met through swimming. I met my first boyfriend poolside.

Then adulthood happened. And little by slowly pool life receded until it was mostly just wistful memories.

And now decades later, pool life has circled back for me. I couldn’t have planned it this way. I didn’t even realize I missed it.

And pool life looks different these days. Chronic ear issues mean I can’t even submerge my head under water comfortably. Gone are the days of handstands and backflips and cannonballs.

These days, I mostly just float. Listen to the waterfall. Look at the sunlight shimmering on the water. Watch the clouds pass and the trees dance.

What has also come with this new pool life is a feeling of leisure. A remembering. Long summer days spent blissfully unproductive.

Entire days lost to books.

Hours spent staring out the window.

Afternoons too hot to work, must go float.

And it is big work for me not to work. Taskmaster Saturn is in my house of play. Leisure. Recreation. Fun. These are things I always thought I had to earn.

So this is me. 44 year old Dawn remembering there once was a little Dawn who knew an entire day at the pool was one well spent.