I have been overcome with this lately. Not for me, though it would be a horrible way to go. I am good enough as a swimmer that something else would have to go terribly wrong for me to drown, and I’d pretty well already be fucked by the time of submersion. Like in the end of Casino Royale, hot girl in a Bond flick trapped in a locked elevator in a collapsing building in the middle of a deadly nail-gun battle — i knew she was a goner when I saw the trailer!

Threats to G’s water safety are far more benign.

Like every summer in AZ, the pool is too cold too cold too cold then overnight its 1,000 degrees, my pool becomes a swamp, G is in it constantly, and I have to instantly re-learn all the ways I forgot to supervise her around the water. She is so mobile in the water and so confident playing around it, it is really really easy to forget she can’t yet swim. Last year she would not get into the pool zone alone, now I caught her climbing a chair to fiddle with the latch.   She knows better, and she is afraid to be in the pool without me near, but playing near it has become comfortable.

I was cleaning up the house and found some PSA from the City of Mesa about kids and water safety.   Usually I think stuff like this is a waste of taxpayers’ money, but guilt made me skim it.   This line I could not get out of my head:     Drowning is silent. Children will not cry, call for you or splash.

Once last year G jumped for me when I was a couple feet out of reach, and for the few seconds as I moved to grab her I watched her slowly sink underwater.   The look on her face made me sick   – it wasn’t panic, which would have meant she was still fighting, it was resignation.   Helplessness.   *blink* she slipped under, and nothing she could do would bring her up.

The thought of what could have happened if I was not an arm’s length away, how in less than 5 seconds my little girl had strolled into the jaws of death…its making me shake, like thinking about a coulda-been commuting to work when I see someone about to not stop before making a left turn into me.   2 seconds… if I was 2 seconds lazier watching the road…I’d be gone.

I have a healthy fear of commuting. And a recent conversation had me thinking that fear is a learned survival mechanism – your mind and body screaming at you to get the fuck out of here. I think my new-found aquaphobia is a good thing. I also think its time I help G put it all together and start swimming.