Simple Sabbath: These Little Wonders...

It was one of those moments...you know, that split second when you are completely in awe and wonderment over how on earth you got yourself into the situation. Then, the wave of terror washed over me as I realized we were in mortal danger.

There I was, suspended above an endless expanse of ocean, the crystal blue water calm and dark. My trembling arm was gripping an invisible cord. It's origin and end, I didn't see nor pause to consider. My seven year old hugged my neck in a piggie-back, clambering for any more space between herself and the water we would surely fall into at any second. All the strength left in my upper body was being used to nestle my three year-old to me with my free arm. She was frightened, burying her face into my chest.

It was then I noticed the occupation of my feet. Cradling my tiny newborn, much like a climbing monkey cradles his lunchtime banana, I felt the desperation of knowing full well the clumsiness of those feet. The tiniest flinching of my tiniest toe could send my sweet Precious plummeting into the deep below.

How long could I hold on like this? Once we fell, how could I keep my children close enough to me to grab them once we hit the water? None of them could swim so how would I keep them all afloat?

My hand began to slip and just as my fingertips released their death grip, there came a moment of clarity. It was then that I realized a very important detail. Lulu hadn't even been born yet.

It may seem absolutely ridiculous now but the mere retelling of such a dream to my therapist sent me into convulsive sobs. What's worse is every time I had it, I couldn't seem to get the message across to my dreamy, acrobat self that it was all a nightmare.

This was years ago. Lulu joined our family shortly thereafter and Ruby, a few years a later. My reoccurring night terror was always in the back of my mind, pressing me to somehow fix the scenario but we were landlocked and had very little motivation to teach our children to swim.



` Soon after, we moved to Neverland, where we were minutes away from sand and surf and nearly every friend had a pool. For a while, I didn't notice that my unreasonable fear of water had affected my children. That is, until my 9 year old sat crying on a lawn chair, frustrated that 3 year-olds were swimming like fish around her.

Thus began a tedious, sometimes heartbreaking effort to reinvent our family's relationship with water. For many, many months (about 2 years worth), little progress had been made. Efforts to give our children one-on-one training were met with panic and mule-like stubbornness.



Recently, what began as a run-of-the-mill impromptu lesson in a neighbor's pool ended as I could hear the wails growing louder and louder. It sounded like bloody murder from two houses down. As I walked across the lawn to greet her, Lulu, with an expression of indignant fury proclaimed between dramatic sobs, “Daddy...(sniff, sniff)..tried...(waaaaaailllll) to drown me!”



Feeling great urgency for our girls to acquire this important life skill, we recently challenged the girls to each make progress during a weekly private swimming lesson. Each girl's challenge would be reflective of her skill level and would require a little bit of courage. We further explained that as parents who love them, our job is to keep them safe. Allowing the girls to participate in water activities without the proper skills would be irresponsible and dangerous. Therefore, if our daughters were to accept invitations to go swimming, they must accomplish these particular tasks. This proclamation was met with some grumbles but they seemed to understand.

Miracle of Miracles..Yesterday brought about a mighty change.

As we attempted to escape the violence of a broken air conditioner during a holiday weekend, we found ourselves in another friend's pool. Armed with our towels, gallons of sunscreen and floatation devices, our little family cooled our sizzling bodies in a nice chlorine cocktail.

I promised Lulu my Costco cookie if she would jump into the water to me. I'm not sure if it was the promise of the super chocolate chunks or the spit-fire in her belly, but she did it, life vest and all.

She ended up repeating this about ten more times.

Ruby must have thought this was pretty swell because she quickly followed her sister's example. In fact, she became the youngest of our children to ever jump into her Daddy's arms (who graciously decided not to drown her).

Of course Sunshine and Bunny were very encouraging but spent much of their time with their own challenge; that of retrieving pool rings from the bottom of the pool. After giving each other a couple of pep talks, they dunked themselves under the water, coming back up triumphant, with rings in their hands. They insisted upon repeating this several more times.

He-Man and I were beaming with pride.

Evening fell as our children soundly slept in our summertime oven, I marveled at the gifts of the day. Who knew that waging war on my beastly reoccurring nightmare from so long ago, the one I was afraid would debilitate my children, could be so delicious. This is where magic and redemption can be found, where our children give us a glimpse of what they are made of.

They proved to me they have courage beyond my own. They slept peacefully, having reminded me of something so sweet and simple. These really are the little wonders.