Swimming (Literally & Figuratively)

Boy Pop has not had any swimming lessons. We wanted to get him lessons last summer, but what with all the rain last summer and his age, we decided against it, saving it for this year. Until then, we reasoned, we will use the floaties. Then something happened while we were on vacation. On his last few days with his grandparents, they took him to a pool with some children who were slightly older and did not wear floaties. Boy wanted to be like them, but my parents would not allow him to remove the protective gear for very long.

Our first day back at the pool as a family, Boy Pop told us that he did not want to wear his floaties and has been swimming (or dog paddling) without them ever since. My child is fearless. He will jump, dive, cannon ball, hold his breath, jump into the deep end, and go down the slide over and over again. He'll try to grab things from the bottom of the pool, with his Daddy's help. He loves to be thrown and flipped and he loves to hang on to his Daddy's neck and swim to the bottom and back up with him.

It is an amazing thing to behold and I sit and watch and sometimes participate.

I had a horrible nightmare last night. I am sure that it was a manifestation of my worst fear... That something terrible will happen to my baby. I'm not sure why I had my dream last night. It could have been the late dinner or the fact that I saw my child dive into the deep end and swim all the way across a swimming pool yesterday. In my dream, he did not drown, although I have these awful images flash through my head at random intervals of my child drowning and trying to get his head above water.

I am so blessed to be a mother to such a wonderful creature. He is equally at home conversing with adults, playing with children, or playing with his toys by himself. He is amazingly self-sufficient and I sometimes take a look at him and am awed by the fact that he is still "only" four years old. His fifth birthday is a short three months from now and I am not ready. He's growing up at an alarming rate of speed. Each day I worry that I am too short-tempered, too impatient, too demanding of him. I worry that I'm not attentive enough and that at the end of the day I don't have enough left for him. I worry that something I say or something I do will scar him for the rest of his life. I worry that he will look back on his childhood and not have wonderful memories of the fun things we do together.

I think I worry too much...