Thankful for my Birthday

Today is my birthday!  I turned 35 today and said good-bye to my early-thirties and am doing my best to embrace my mid-thirties.

Yesterday Matt and I hosted a "birthday swim and cook-out" and had some good friends over to celebrate.  It was the grand opening of the neighborhood pool so that worked out "swimming-ly."  We swam, feasted and laughed while enjoying the supermoon.  It was an absolute fantastic night...except....

There was an incident at the pool in which I was really, REALLY disappointed in myself and I feel I need to share.

While I was sitting by the side of the pool, chatting with my friends and keeping a head count on our own kiddos, I noticed another little boy in the shallow end (about 5 feet from where I sat) bobbing up and down but not ever bobbing high enough for his whole face to surface.  I thought to myself, "why doesn't he put his feet down and stand up?" and also "why isn't he bobbing high enough to get his whole face out of the water?"  After I let myself fully ponder these two questions in my head (no more than 15 seconds) I stood up and said out loud, "Is he Okay?"  At that point his mom (or grandma, I'm not sure) ran and jumped into the pool and jerked this little boy out.  He came out choking on and sputtering out the water.  After a full minute of choke-coughing he was fully recovered.  He never once started to cry but he had nearly drowned in the pool and I just watched.  There was no splashing, no flailing of the arms and no noticeable struggle except for the slight bobbing up and down.  Thank God he's okay.

I am so disappointed in myself.  Instead of questioning why he was doing what he was doing why didn't I just instinctively go jump in and make sure he was okay?  I certainly hope someone would do that for Lauren and Tyler.

You can be sure I'll be watching and ready for action at the pool from now on.

On behalf of my good fortune to celebrate yet another birthday please go read an article on the true signs of drowning. (like this one)  Let's keep the birthdays coming for all of us.