Pool

There is a swimming pool out on my back lawn that I got to ease the guilt of my daughter's disappointing and very solitary birthday last year, when we were on lockdown with no support system, and I had just started to come to the realization that I needed to end my marriage. I am not an advocate of guilt purchases, but at the time we had 2 incomes and I was completely overwhelmed and out of ideas. So we got the pool. It came in the mail and it was much bigger than either of us expected. I could not put it together myself, and my husband at the time was not going to help, so it sat there. Finally last spring, after we had found our Covid pod, and after the house fire, when all of the kids were doing school at our house because we were afraid of another fire, the sitters got the pool up with the help of the kids. It was amazing. They played in it every day for a while. 

Then the Covid pod activities shifted back to the first house, because there was much more for them to do there and the threat had moved on. Truthfully, our neighborhood was boring and kind of restrictive. Nobody really felt at home here. Since then the pool has sat, for the most part unused. I've drained and cleaned it once or twice in an attempt to keep it functional. 

Today I pulled my sorry ass up off the couch and stumbled out side to check the pool, see what it looked like and if A and I could swim. It was green with algae, again, which didn't surprise me because I did not put any algae killer in it and it had rained 4x since I filled it. I was filled with a sense of impotence and failure. I looked up to see the unused trampoline, which I had also gotten to try to ease some of the rough edges of the pandemic life, and the weeds that had grown as tall as me behind the trampoline. Failure. I put my hand in the water. It was tepid and not unpleasant. I had the urge to jump in, just to show that I was not a complete failure. Somebody, somewhere was using this pool. I started to climb in, cloths and all, then realized that neighbors might be watching. I have to at least try to appear normal. What if I put some anti-algae stuff in there and cleared it up? Then I could swim without raising any suspicion. I don't think I remember where I put the bottle of anti-algae stuff. Should I care if some unnamed, faceless neighbors think I'm crazy? Maybe I should just get in? But what if that is a sign that they are right and I am crazy? I stood there staring at the green pool. Looking crazy. Then I went back inside.