Poolside Reflections

The girls and I were having a quiet afternoon in the pool, when the differences between boys and girls became very, very clear to me. At first we were all just calmly doing our own thing - Claire and Beth were cruising the perimeter of the pool, Katie was swimming from one side to the other, and I was lounging and reading. The change came within seconds -- the quiet sounds of gentle splashing suddenly turned to screams and squeals, the calm water of the pool began to violently splash over the sides, the very air was charged with chaos. What made this huge difference? Chris.

He is incapable of #1 - getting into the pool without a big jump and splash #2 - refraining from picking up every body in sight and tossing them around. He even threw me, which is no small feat!

It's fun, I have to admit, to have this overgrown little boy horsing around. But he can't understand why the girls get nervous when he gets near them, and we can't understand why he can't just.....leave us alone. It would be boring without at least this one boy around. But it would be quieter! ;)

On another note:

Claire is a fish. Seriously, she is just a natural swimmer. If you toss her in the pool, she immediately starts to swim. The only problem here being -- she can't actually swim with her head above the water, but man she can zip around anywhere with it undernieth.

(For the life of me, I can't remember how to spell "underneith." Does the i come first or the e??? All those years of spelling lessons down the drain!)

It is just the cutest thing to watch her go, so fearlessly, in the water! It makes us both so happy. Little Larry in her natural element. Except that she doesn't have gills. And she thinks she does.