Monitor

We have been members of our pool since 2014.  Honestly, it has become one of the favorite activities and purchases we've ever made as a family.  Maybe not so high as our boat, but much higher than many of our family activities.  I love the pictures, I love the memories, I love when the kids get to take friends and swim with them, I love that it's never been so busy that we felt like we couldn't swim the way we wanted, I love that most members of the pool are members of our church so the dress is mostly modest.  I just love our pool membership!

One of the things that we've learned over the years is the best time, for us, to monitor.  One night a season, each family needs to monitor the pool from 6:00-10:00pm, to make sure people are doing what they're supposed to, that people aren't letting non-members in, and to generally just make sure all is well before closing up for the night.  For the last three years now, we've arrived early to the sign-up meetings to vie for the last Sunday of the season.  We don't swim on Sunday, obviously, but because of the lateness of the season, that it's a Sunday and most of us are members, and because school has already begun, we have been able to close up closer to 9:00pm.  Like all years, Randy and I bring games and just spend the time together.

Two things made this a monitor night we will never forget.  The fun difference first.

 When the last of the swimmers left at 7:00pm, Randy and I didn't have someone, or something, come through the gate until this cutie crawled under for a visit.

 We were in heaven watching this furry sweetheart.  She just wanted to be scratched and snuggled and adored.  Being extremely allergic, I just watched and admired from a distance, especially when it was tormenting a bug with its cute lightning reflex paw, but Randy was all in.

 It wasn't ten minutes later that the sneezes-- and Randy is a scream sneezer-- started.  He doesn't care about trivial things like watery eyes, sneezing, and hives... he's going to snuggle all the cats.

The scary-to-me difference.

We'd had three kids swim from 6:00-7:00 while their mom and grandma talked at the side of the pool.  They left and Randy and I had an hour of games and nothing else to watch.   Then at 8:00pm, a guy shows up with earpods in his ears and a book in his hand, walks to a nearby picnic table, and proceeds to read.  Being the irrational creature that I am, my mind started to whip into a frenzy.  Who does that?  Who comes to the pool at dusk to read a book?  Then, when he started to stretch out his arms and wring his hands, I was certain, certain he had nefarious intent to do us harm.

I can laugh about it now, but I kid you not, my heart started to race.  I know it's my nature to blow things way out of proportion and to always expect the worst sometimes (can you blame me?), but this was ridiculous, even for me.  But it felt very real in a funny, can this be what my brain is actually imagining kind of way, so I totally ran with it.  Without telling Randy what I was doing (because he may have considered divorce, I was being so idiotic), I practically tip-toed to take a picture of his license plate.  Seriously, it gets better, so feel free to laugh. 

Know this: Randy and I have watched all the episodes of Forensic Files, I started to do all of the techniques we've learned from more than 100 episodes.  I was not going to let this guy shoot us up and not have picture proof!  But I didn't want to tip him off that I knew that he had criminal intent, so I was stealth and ninja about the picture.  He just kept right on reading, the faker!

If I am going to be honest, while I was outside the gate taking the picture, I actually thought, "I broke free.  Maybe I should make a run for it.  I don't want my kids to be orphans, so maybe I should flee now..."  I'm not proud...

When I came back, Randy was quite confused.  When I told him I couldn't figure out what the heck the guy was doing at the pool at that hour with only a book in hand, Randy got on board with my revelations of malcontent.  He loves me enough to go along with my crazy ideas.  Look how well he pretends to be playing our game as I sneak a picture of the guy.  Three can play at the faking, I'm-doing-something-else game, mister!  Now, I know that this criminal genius might be able hack my phone and delete my pictures, so I sent it out to my sisters as absolute proof.  Take that reading man!  And then we continued playing our game for real.  I'm not sure what it was, but my taut nerves had me rolling dice like a Vegas gambler-- I won again and again.

Because no one had shown up to swim in almost two hours, Randy walked over to the guy to ask if he was waiting for someone, and what he was doing.  I have never seen my Mister as more of a savage than when he walked over, without a thought for his very life, to talk with the man.  Like a true companion, I took that opportunity to check the lost and found around the corner, close to the exit.

"Oh, I'm the bathroom cleaner.  I was told to do it either before 8:00pm or after 9:00pm.  I didn't make it before 8:00pm, so I've just been reading until 9:00pm."

Good Times.  Good Times.  Relief felt like cold water being poured over my flaming face after a good workout, which I needed because I felt my face flush with embarrassment and guilt.  As we were closing up for the night, I giggled at myself a few times.  Seriously, I didn't "really" believe it, but my mind kind of did.  Like I was playing a perverse game of "pretend this" with my three-year old Tyson.  You know it's not real, but you're going to pretend like your life depends on it.  Which, clearly, it did in this imagination game!

Monitoring Nights are so. much. fun!  Until next year...