La Dee Da!

“Do you really wake up every morning thinking what bad thing is gonna happen today?”
Sanctimonious Admonishment Woman gazed at me across the bubbles of the hot tub, serene in her superiority. What the hell?

Sure, I’d just been whining to DL about how some teenage girls had stolen my fins off the deck while I was swimming, claiming that they didn’t know they were mine when the lifeguard who’d so gallantly helped me locate them, asked them. I’d referred to this night of swimming as mayhem, but more on that later. I guess I’d also made some comment about waking up thinking what bad thing was gonna happen to me today, which SAW picked right up on. How do I respond?

I laughed. “Well, I’ve had a run of bad things lately, so it seems appropriate.”

SAW nodded, sagely, “Well, don’t you think that if you woke up every morning thinking ‘What good thing is gonna happen to me?’, that maybe good things might happen?”
Shit. No. I don’t believe this. But I go along with her, cuz what am I gonna do? Start an argument in the hot tub? I glance over at DL whose eyes are wide in engagement at the exchange.

I lied. “Sure, I suppose, you have a point. I’ll give this a try and see what happens.”

She nodded, satisfied, smug. She’d been water walking the entire time I’d been trying to swim amidst the mayhem. She was far away from the chaos of thieving fin teens and throwing ball kids. So, when the mayhem analysis came next, I had to refrain from pointing this out.

“And…” SAW continued, “it’s not mayhem. That’s just normal kid energy. You must not be around kids very much.”
“No,” I answered, thinking, I avoid them as much as possible, but summers in the pools at the YMCA make it difficult. They may be practicing their normal kid energy when they steal my fins, but hell, I don’t appreciate this one bit!

When I mention the fin stealing episode to Sandy later on, telling her about the kid energy perspective from SAW, Sandy had whistled softly, then shook her head, “Were your fins on the side of the pool while you were in the lane?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then they knew that the fins belonged to you no matter what they said. They stole them plain and simple.”

“Thank you!” I breathe out. At least someone else gets that the normal kid energy is undesirable. “I was just so upset, you know?”
“Of course you were!” Sandy exclaims. “Next time someone tells you that it’s just normal kid energy, you just tell them ‘La dee da!’”

I crack up. “Yes, that’s what I’ll do. Thanks, Sandy.”

Nodding seriously, she goes back to her careful lotion application process as DL and I gather up our stuff to head out of the Downtown Oakland YMCA.

And SAW? Where was she?

I have no idea. I’d never seen her before. And I hope I never see her again. But if I do, I’ll tell her how I’ve been waking up every morning and thinking what good thing is gonna happen to me today.

And when she answers with some other nugget of positive wisdom, I’ll just smile and say,
‘La dee da!!!”