“I think you hafta resign yourself to a Pool-less Thanksgiving,” Dashingly Handsome Boyfriend sighed as they sat in the post Thanksgiving Sunday afternoon traffic through heinous San Rafael.
It had been one pool disappointment after another this last weekend. First the Divine Arcata Pool. Then the closed Benbow Inn Pool. Now the out of reach Marin YMCA.
Was a swim for the holiday asking too much?
Evidently.
PP hated that. Why the hell can’t all the pools be open all of the time? Who the hell decides that pools must be closed for holidays? Or the‘season’? It just was not right. And there was a part of PP that was heavily in Denial about the reality of ‘closed pools’. Any sane person, who tried calling the Acrata pool 3 times with no answer on the day after Thanksgiving would just assume that the pool was closed. It was a holiday after all. But no. PP had to conjecture that it was just those good for nothing lazy lifeguards not answering the phone as is their want much of the time. PP had witnessed this transgression time and time again at various pools. For instance. She’d call Mills at the time that it was open for lap swimming, even giving the pool girl an extra five minutes or so. And the phone would ring and ring and ring and then transfer her to voice mail. Now PP couldn’t find out what the all important pool temp was and had to just drive out to Mills only to discover that the Pool Girl had been there all along. She was just too busy reading her goddamn Anatomy Text to bother answering the phone.
Granted, at the Arcata Pool the day after Thanksgiving, this probably wasn’t the case, but PP wouldn’t take no answer for an answer and so had made DHBF drive out to the pool along the lovely ‘safety’ corridor from Eureka to Arcata at only 50 goddamn miles an hour and then, of course, when they FINALLY had gotten to the pool and the parking lot was completely empty, PP had let DHBF get out of the car and check the locked door.
Damn! The pool was inside there! Why couldn’t she just go in and swim? PP could just picture it. All the turkeys who’d escaped their final hour were in there having a fine swimming time, just gobbling away on their little turkey air mattresses, laughing at PP’s plight, feasting on…. what the hell do turkeys eat anyway?
Well, you get the idea. PP just wanted to swim and she knew that it was possible if only…..
And then, the Benbow Inn. PP has been intrigued by this fanciful ‘chalet’ perched on a grassy knoll overlooking the Eel River and the Giant Redwoods ever since she’d been doing the drive to Eureka to visit the folks. So. When the idea to stay there on the way back to Oakland had first entered her mind, the first thing she thought of was, of course, Do they have a pool?
Browsing their web site, she saw pictures of the pool with ‘spa’ and ‘sauna’—all part of the unique resort experience. So when she’d called the morning of their trip back down south and the hotel clerk had been so frazzled that she hadn’t been able to ask about the pool for sure, PP had just shrugged. The web site featured the pool and spa and sauna. Surely they weren’t lying.
Oh, but they were. Goddamn seasons. Why it’s never really winter here in California! So why the hell do all the pools close in November? Do people really NOT swim in the winter? How stupid is that? PP for one, always swims year round as do all of her swimming friends, the Lovely I, and JL and Miss W, and DHBF….well, actually he probably wouldn’t if it weren’t for PP. But you get the idea. Swimming is NOT just a summer recreation!
So, when they arrive at the Benbow Inn, utterly charmed and delighted by the gaudily ornate lobby replete with tea and scones at 4, only to be informed that the pool was closed for the ‘season’—well, needless to say, PP had to hold her tongue. And she did. But she was thinking how very stupid it is that pools are NOT open year around, 24/7 just for her benefit. Hell. It was the least they could do!
So they’d gone on a lovely hike in back of the Inn, past the 8.3 million Julia Morgan home for sale perched above the Eel river and out into the redwoods and tawny hillsides full of cute square cows. And this had been very nice and peaceful and full of nature and all.
But it wasn’t the same as a swim.
Now, sitting in traffic on 101 in San Rafael, DHBF had pointed out the Marin YMCA perched on the hillside, the parking lot full of lucky swimmers. Sighing inwardly, PP wanted to ask him to get the hell offa the stupid freeway and take her to the Marin Y, but then, what would he do? Could she bring a guest to a guest Y?
Now there’s a question and frankly what with her pool-less luck all weekend, PP wasn’t willing to test it out and so they continued on at the pokey pace toward Oakland, knowing that she’d be too late for the Oakland Y at the rate they were going.
Damn. A whole 4 days without a swim! What’s a swimming kitty to do?
Spend the day at the Y on Monday, regardless of the post Thanksgiving neo-swimmers in abundance, the water a chilly 80 degrees, not the usual lovely 83, the lanes full of purple-headed spazes, long-legged sidestrokers, tattooed weight lifters.
But PP is smiling as she’s swimming.
Ah…..who cares about all the Oakland Y’s usual pandemonium. She was in the pool and she was swimming and she was happy! Finally, it was her Season. All she needed was an open pool. Oh, and a little patience at the Oakland YMCA!
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