Thursday Afternoon: We've had a lot of super hot days lately ... perfect for swimming. It's not easy any more in Grand Rapids to find a nice place to swim! We have loved Richmond Park pool in the past, but noticed a lot of trouble there last season; but since this is a new year, I reasoned that perhaps (hopefully) some of that undesirable stuff would have gotten resolved. I was sadly disappointed!
Here's the thing though: Kaity loves LOVES LOVES to swim! We arrived at Richmond right about at 3:00 in the afternoon. There was no waiting line and we were very glad about that. It only cost us $4 for admission, so that was good as well. The pool was pretty FULL of kids of all ages and adults as well; but mostly lots and lots of unsupervised young teens (just like last year). I also found out on the website that if you are TEN years old, you can spend the whole day at a city pool completely without adult supervision. I think that is an unfortunate policy. You could pay me almost all the money in the world and I would NOT accept a job as lifeguard at Richmond pool. There are three of them always on duty, and most of them are perhaps 18 at the oldest. There are safety rules posted everywhere--at the entrance, in the shower room, out in the pool area--but people at the pool did not follow them and it just wasn't safe. I'm not being a nambie-pambie here, please trust me. It's just ridiculous to have four children diving off one diving board simultaneously ... on top of each other! It's also crazy to have kids diving off the side of the pool over people's bodies that are swimming. It's also unsafe to be running on the slippery pavement and pushing friends into the pool from the side ... etc., etc.
Thankfully, there was a young girl that was hanging close to Kaity and I. Her name is AINSLEY. She was really a nice girl. She was at the pool all alone for the day. We shared our snacks with her and Kaity and Ainsley played in the pool together. I moved us away from the roughest group of teens, but ... one of the lifeguards who was trying her hardest to maintain some kind of safety, was attempting to give "time outs" to offending swimmers. Most of them completely ignored her warnings. One yelled out--"Who do you think you are?" Another said--"This isn't FAIR!" I wondered ... what if a few of these teens decided to just gang up on one of these lifeguards? One of the three lifeguards was totally ignoring safety infractions right and left ... because I think he just gave up.
SO ... I will not be going back to Richmond Pool--definitely NOT taking my Kaity-Girl there! She will be very sad about this.
We got back to my house at 6:00 in the evening and ate dinner and hung out for awhile. We had a lot of fun looking at past years on my blog to see what Kaity and her siblings were doing years and years ago. I was very thankful for this time with her.
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