Saturday, February 27, 2010

Jr High Swimming=Hell

A couple weeks ago, Zach came home from school and told me something that I have been dreading all school year: The three-week swimming unit in phy-ed is starting.

While I have some pretty crappy memories of junior high, the swimming unit is definitely on the top of that list. Since my school didn't have a pool, I had to ride a bus to a different junior high, which meant that I had less time after swimming to get dressed and dry my hair. I had to use a thick polyester, school-issued "swimsuit," which I'm convinced was sewn together by blind women who also had limited use of their hands. In addition to the shapeless swimwear and lack of post-swim primping time, there was the fact that even though I was good at sports, I couldn't do the survival float. Every single time the teacher blew that fucking whistle, it was like a cue for me to start sinking like a rock.

Besides the fact that junior high swimming still requires kids in various stages of puberty to change together in a locker room, Zach's experience will be much more pleasant than mine. His school has it's own pool, since he wears prescription swim goggles his eyes won't be fried out from the chlorine and the kids now get to use their own swimsuits and bring their own towels.

Wait. What the fuck. The kids get to bring their own swimsuits and towels? This means that, oh holy hell. He's going to be bringing home chlorine-filled, soggy swim trunks and a towel everyday! Like I don't already have enough laundry to do!

Surprisingly enough, the beginning of the week went pretty well even though I had to immediately put his swimming stuff in the washing machine as soon as he walked in the door. There was one day that it sat in a basket for a couple hours and it made the laundry room smell like a junior high pool, so every time I walked in there I started having flashbacks. I do no enjoy junior high flashbacks.

Toward the end of the week I was waiting for him to walk in the door, ready to grab his swimming bag, pinch my nose and stuff it into the washer. Sure enough, that was the day that he said, "Oops. I forgot to bring my swimming stuff home and it's sitting in my locker." Um, gross. I immediately had to forget that he even told me such a horrid fact because thinking about that stinky bag sitting in his locker overnight made me nauseous.

I reminded him no fewer than 372 times the following morning to "think about how much anger he will witness from me if he forgets two bags of disgusting swimming crap in his locker." Forunately for him, he remembered to bring everything home and I couldn't get the washer started fast enough. As soon as I hit the "start" button, though, he said "Hey, is my lock in there? Are you washing my lock?" I opened the door, held my breath and rummaged through the grossness to find...NO LOCK! "Oh, I guess someone stole it. Now I need a new lock." I guess he didn't remember to bring home everything after all, and note to self: when Charlie starts junior high buy a six-pack of locks so that they all have the same combination, because the locks will be lost/stolen/misplaced/eaten by a zombie.

If I haven't mentioned it before, let me just say that OH MY GOD! THIS SCHOOL YEAR HAS GOT TO STOP BECAUSE IT IS DRIVING ME INSANE.

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