Unfortunately, all of this fun and self discovery at Golden Meadows has been overshadowed by one thing…the diving board. I never liked the diving board, and actually when I said that I never liked the pool, I meant the diving board, the high dive to be exact. When I was six, I spent the entire summer watching other kids, from a safe distance of course, plummet to what I assumed to be their instantaneous death, until I saw their head bob up out of the water, after which they would swim over to the ladder, get out and get back in line to try to cheat death one more time before their moms yelled for them to leave.

Masochists…total masochists.

Ironically, I was not comforted by the fact that I spent 12 weeks watching kids bob up from beneath the water and swim safely to the side after jumping from such a height. I even inspected a kid’s limbs when he climbed out one time. He still had all of his toes, and there didn’t appear to be any major bruises or abrasions from the velocity with which he hit the water. I justified my fears though with the knowledge that I didn’t have the proper equipment to inspect any internal damage that may have occurred, and I fully expected the kid to die within a week from an internal hemorrhage. So I spent the entire summer eating snow cones and watching these crazy 9 year olds taking what I thought was their life into their own hands while blue raspberry slush puppy dribbled down my chin, dripped off and collected into a little pool on my foot. I wanted to jump, don’t get me wrong. But I knew that as soon as I decided that I was going to climb that ladder, they would unleash a few dozen great white sharks into the pool along with a few hundred gallons of blood. They would do this, of course, only after I had climbed the ladder and they had blocked off my chance to climb back down so my only option was to take my chances with Jaws in a chum filled pool. I would be eaten for sure.

The next summer, I fully expected to spend it the same way I did the last summer. I would swim for a bit, maybe take in a leisurely game of sharks and minnows if my schedule allowed it, and then spend the majority of my time at the main event, the big top if you will, the high dive. But something was different this year. In fact it was completely different after the eighth diver I saw actually. The kid I saw may be directly responsible for all of the reluctance and misery that would follow me the rest of my life. He climbed the metal ladder of the high dive as naturally as if we lived his entire life 12 feet off the ground. I felt as though he was a silver back gorilla and I was Jane Goodal, privileged to witness an animal like this…he was truly in his natural environment. Once he reached the very top, it looked as though he stopped to collect his thoughts. Perhaps he was contemplating his approach or perhaps he was contemplating life and all of the possibilities therein which were about to be validated by this death-defying stunt. The breeze rippled his swim trunks, yet I could still make out the design. Ninja turtles…Rafael to be exact. I thought, “of course, Rafael is the bravest of all the turtles, it makes sense”. His whole ensemble looked so royal and commanding right down to his nose plug…a very royal looking nose plug and, “what young king would want water in his nose?” I thought. He steadied himself and then exploded forth like a sprinter out of the blocks, jumped, planted on the board, and soared through the air cutting the water with a perfect can-opener. “Wow,” I thought, “a can-opener…perfectly executed, a ten for difficulty”.