August will slip away. It always does…I don’t know why it feels like something beginning and something almost over all at the same time. If someone asked me to describe nostalgia, I would say it feels like August….”
— Josie Balka
One day this past week, I shared a beautiful afternoon with my 6-year-old best friend, my granddaughter, who my sisters tell me is a mirror image of me at that age in the personality department.
What a gift sweet Landry is! She somehow manages to be both comedic and sweet, an unassuming dynamo cartwheeling her way from point A to point B ever since she learned what gymnastics is all about. Why walk when you can flip a tiny body to where you wish to go?
We spent a couple of hours in our backyard swimming pool, as we have done many times, but this particular day, no others joined us. I decided I was going to pretend to be a kid again. Instead of just swimming for exercise, I was going to match Landry in the fun department.
When I did a double front somersault underwater, I wish I could have a photo of the expression on her sweet face.
“Gigi! I didn’t know you could do that!” she exclaimed. “Have you been practicing when I’m not here?”
After I threw some colorful gems into the pool while Landry put her goggles on, she then began the search. There was one in the deep end that she could not find.
“That one is the toughest one to see, isn’t it?” I said, and then told her I would dive for it.
When I came up with the turquoise gem in my hand, the astonished look on this little girl’s face made me laugh. Landry’s love of swimming matches my own.
As a 3-year-old, I was in such a hurry to be the first to jump in when we got to a relative’s pond that I forgot I needed a swimmer’s life jacket. Fortunately, our mom reacted swiftly and pulled me out, coughing up water. Even that scary experience didn’t sway my love of swimming. We were signed up for swim lessons the next week.
It has been pure joy for me to have a pool where I have watched the youngest family members learn to swim and to progress into strong swimmers. There has not been another child as enthusiastic about pool time as Landry, though, and it makes me so happy. This summer, she has mastered so much in swimming and diving, and the surest sign of all that she is part fish is that she never wants to get out when told it is time to go.
“But I need to say goodbye to the water,” she will say, asking for another length-of-the-pool swim.
So, on this day when it was just the two of us, I said this same thing.
Landry watched with interest, as I walked past the towels and on to the diving board and then took a big jump in. I swam the length of the pool, got out and grabbed a towel as this blue-eyed girl stood speechless.
“Gigi,” she started to say, and then just shook her head.
As we headed for the barn later to check on our new filly and colt, Landry suddenly asked, “Can you do a one-handed cartwheel into the pool?” I assured her that was one trick that is hers and hers alone.
“Maybe next summer we can work on that!” Landry said sweetly.
As August nods farewell, I am soaking it all in. This has been a magical summer; I hate to see it go.
