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The truth is, you can’t learn to swim
with one hand on your woggle
I wasn’t born to swim. This became evident early in life after habitually swimming into the side of pools, then immediately sinking headfirst to the bottom. A number of factors can be attributed to my being hydro-challenged, beginning with the fact that I can’t actually breathe under water. This traumatic realization was made one morning after watching "Aqua Man" on TV, then, as a test, trying to inhale running tap water from the kitchen faucet. The experience was a wake-up call, and forced me to admit that the closest I’d ever get to being an underwater super hero is if dog paddling and consuming large amounts of pool water qualified as special powers. Needless to say, I wasn’t exactly waiting for a call from The Super Friends.
Twenty-five years later, I’m still not much of a swimmer, which led me to enroll our daughter in swimming classes. Just because I’m not a good swimmer doesn’t mean that my daughter shouldn’t be able to be used as a flotation device.
For those of you thinking of signing your kids up for swimming lessons, there are a number of things you can do to prepare your child—and yourself—for getting the most out of class.
First, swimming trunks that enter a body of water too quickly will deploy like a driver’s side air bag. Add cargo-style pockets, and your child will be lucky to touch the water at all.
Secondly, if your child uses a "woggle" to float on in the water, wean them off of it now. Aside from adding a false sense of security, it’s nearly impossible to swim efficiently with one hand on your
woggle.
One way to accomplish this transition is by trimming away small portions of the woggle in the weeks leading up to the first day of class. This worked well for our daughter, who showed up for her first lesson with a piece of green Styrofoam roughly the size of a Lumberjack Biscuit. We will complete the final step in this elimination process next week, when we replace what’s left of her woggle with an actual biscuit—which will then swell up and break apart in the pool.
Something a lot of people aren’t aware of is that chlorine actually causes temporary deafness in adults. This affliction is an indirect result caused by the fact that your child—along with 20 to 30 others—will be screaming every syllable that leaves their mouths the entire time they are in the pool. Unless you leave the building all together, or are immune to high-decibel sounds because you regularly work on the deck of an aircraft carrier, earplugs aren’t a bad idea.
The most important thing, of course, is that your child learns to swim, especially if they live anywhere near a body of water.
Your children will thank you.
I will thank you.
And, most importantly, The Super Friends will thank you.
Which reminds me; they still haven’t called yet. I guess until Aqua Man hangs up his fins, there won’t be a need for Dog-Paddling Woggle Man to flail into action.
And let’s hope there never will be.
040504
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Ned
Hickson is a member of the National Society of
Newspaper Columnists, and an award-winning humor
columnist for the Siuslaw News in Florence, Oregon.
His weekly column appears throughout the Northwest,
as well as in Michigan, Connecticut, Georgia,
Tennessee and Alabama. He lives on the coast with
his wife, two children, and entirely too many
seagulls.
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