Wampum

When the far lane opens up, usually occupied by adult lap swimmers, the near lane(s) being used by aquatic exercise, I move Sam and Jonah out of the kids pool (3') and into the big pool (5' to 8') and lead them up and down the length of the pool, periodically shouting "swim Jonah swim" and gesturing forward. He swims fine and could spend significant time in deep water ... spinning. Sam can see linear purpose, he simply goes about linearity with unusual purpose, such as swimming underwater, vertically oriented, as if walking, knees bent, so as not to touch bottom, with his hands sweeping water from in front of his face to behind his ears. It works. It is unusual.

There is the usual friction, adult lap swimmers have minds about the size of a peanut when it comes to non-adults non-standardly non-swimming in lanes. "They're handicapped" I explain, "they swim, they just do laps differently".

Jonah likes me to film him jumping in, he says "Say cheese" to let me know, and he swims better when he sees me filming him, and he watches himself swim and splash on the camera, and on the computer, later. That is part of my evil plan, if the children see them selves they will have a better understanding of how they swim, and what they can do to improve ... or make bigger splashes.

Back and forth along the far side, starting with a splash-entry, shouting "swim Jonah swim" twice a minute to keep him on task, gesturing. But yesterday there was a big birthday party and the near side was was open, with only the middle and far side laned, and Jonah wanted to swim there too. After some splashing about, Jonah the director moved his camara man and camara to the deep end, where he joined two boys doing splash entries. Only he surprised me. After setting up his frame and doing the water entry, he then swam, swam, swam, without prompt or circle spin, steady and as purposeful and as speedy as a Lab in water, the length of the pool.

His swimming speed was respectable, and as I cried out in delight he smiled at me. Its all on film. And he'd like me to stop blogging about it so he can watch it, or write the titles of songs or videos, or find Youtubes.

We're tubed!