The swimming pool

Our first home in the United States was located in Patterson, a town near Modesto in the Central Valley of California. That house came with a large in-ground swimming pool, containing a "shallow end" and a "deep end". The pool was brilliant because 1. the house's AC was faulty, 2. that part of the Central Valley gets 100+ degree Fahrenheit weather pretty much every day during the summer, and 3. swimming is fun in itself. Before we swam in the pool, Dad had to clean it, as it was clear the pool had not been cleaned for several months prior to us moving in.

During one of the early cleaning sessions of the pool, while Dad was walking around it doing the cleaning, I was following him and talking, and if I recall correctly, Dad stopped suddenly, and I kept going, avoided him, but then fell in at the deep end! Fortunately, Dad had got most of the dirt out of the pool at the time I had fallen in, and he was quick to get me out of the pool. My brother and I soon learned how to swim after this incident.

We swam on most sunny days during our time in that house; a few times we used the pool for our parties and occasionally for those of friends: being in the pool and then eating barbecued food was a wonderful thing to do (though we never ate then swam, of course). While we have not swam on a regular basis since we left that house in 1999 nor swam in a pool at all since 2003, swimming is still something that I am fond of, recommend to others, and would like to do again.