March 12, 2006
Jaws
Jacob's been going to swimming lessons for several weeks now.
He has always been crazy about water and disports himself happily in anything larger than an egg-cup full of it with all the enthusiasm and brainlessness of the average upriver-surging-salmon.
It seemed like a good idea then to have all this enthusiasm channelled into some useful activity, like, "swim to shore and mix mum another martini theres-a-good-lad". Unfortunately we haven't found a course that covers this so have had to settle for Torpedo Tots.
For the 'more confident' toddler (read: uncontrollable-in-water) this course promises to teach them to jump in from the side of the pool, resurface, find the side of the pool, dog-paddle to it and then use a kick-board to invade Indonesia.
The first lesson he proved to be a bit more advanced than the other kids qua 'confidence' (read: uncontrollable wildness) and sped through the activities at the speed of light, hesitation or a rational-respect-for-drowning playing no part. Jump into Dad's arms in the deep end from the side of the pool? While the other three toddlers trembled on the edge, knees bent and quivering all over, Jacob indicated that Papa should move further away, 'Nee, weg, Papa!', and then further still before launching himself with a blood-curdling shriek into the air and resurfacing with lungs full of water and non-stop giggles.
The instructor assured us that he'd be more focussed once the others had caught up in confidence and the class moved onto more demanding activities such as dog-paddling. We weren't sure the others were even going to turn up again!
But they did and the swimming lessons are going ......ahem....
swimmingly. There is now a hiatus for three weeks as it the autumn school holidays. Ron just shakes his head. "herfstvakantie? It's going to take some getting used too. 38 C in the autumn holidays".
Posted by Faith