She was totally psyched walking over there this morning to pay for the classes - mainly because she wanted a swim cap and a wet bag - and was dissappointed, to say the least, when we learned that the store didn't open until 3pm. All afternoon she kept asking if it was time for swimming. That's to be expected, I suppose, but every time she asked made me sad because it reminded me that she is a social creature and just wants to see and play with other kids.* And when we walked back over this afternoon, without her brother, she kept telling me about what a big girl she was. We ended up being about 5 minutes late for the class because the store lady took her own sweet time about opening shop and selling us the suit, wet bag/goggle/cap combo. I probably could have left right then and The Girl wouldn't have noticed she didn't go in the water.
When my kids are confronted with a difficult situation (like The Boy missing the bus home on the first day of school) MH and I often discuss what my reaction would have been at that age. Usually we come up with something like, "If I had missed the bus home on the first day of school I would have peed my pants and then crawled inside my backpack." I don't know what we did right to make these kids so confident and fearless. I mean, it is a bad thing when they are jumping from bed to bed like an Olympian gymnast, but it is a remarkable thing when they walk into a peer group with no fear or hesitation. Their Spanish is passable and their cajones are ginormous.
The Girl walked right up, introduced herself to the teacher and blinked repeatedly when the teacher got in her face and said, "Hell-o.Hell-o.Hell-o." But she jumped right in and started doing stretches like the other kids. I was the nervous one having to climb to the top of the wooden bleachers over all the nannies (and up to the parent seats, apparently). I thought it was funny that the nannies all sat in front because the roof is so low that the top row didn't seem like prime seating. But then a teacher yelled, "Rodrigo bano" and a nanny popped up and escorted a boy to the bathroom. Now I see. And at the end when the teachers called for towels all the nannies again popped up and ran forward and there I was (rookie that I am) "desculpe"ing and "pardone"ing my way down the three rows of bleachers over the parents that weren't poor and trashy like me.
My favorite part of the whole hour occurred in the first 8 minutes. The kids were broken into groups and The Girl and her 5 companions sat on the side of the pool practicing kicking (my girl's splash was the biggest!) while the teacher dropped rings and torpedoes throughout the shallow end. Then she let the kiddos loose. Monkey-toed as I am, I was impressed with the tactic of most of the children. They walked around the shallow end picking up diving toys with their toes. And there was The Girl. She was bobbing up and down in the shallow end in what I thought was a desperate search for a torpedo or dive ring. Five. Six. Seven times. Up and down. I could feel my chest getting tight and I knew at any moment I was going to sob. The poor thing. What a failure. She doesn't understand. She doesn't know what to do. She's not cut out for swim lessons. The teacher called all the kids back in and Sophie passed her two, the pee kid passed her one... they all passed in their rings and torpedoes and The Girl swam over, face in the water (I knew it must have been shame that kept her submerged) when all of a sudden she popped up with eight rings and torpedoes. A few seconds later she turned and across the giant pool she gave a big "thumbs-up" to the bleachers. Have no fear Mommy, this kid was cut from a different cloth, thank the Incan gods.
*When we walk the dog or go to the bread store she asks, "Are we going to make friends?" And when we see kiddos on the road she says, "Let's follow them!"
