Pools and Paradise (not regained)

As any regular reader of this blog knows, I've not grown up in any number of ways.

This fact was driven home to me today when I went to the Plainville YMCA to go swimming.

It was the first time I had gone without my daughters (their having a theatrical engagement at the entity formerly known as Newington Children's Theatre). When they're with me, I play with them, swim a little, play with them, sit in the hot tub, play with them, swim a little bit more...

Alone, however, I had to swim exclusively.

How bloody boring is that, I've learned?!

Growing up, my family had a pool in which I could spend hours alone playing around, splashing, sitting on the bottom of the pool, exploring the sides with goggles, etc... Indeed my favorite game was to play any number of television private detectives/cops (divided into two teams) who then fought one another -- the way they did the bad guys on all those shows I watched: Mannix, Kojak, Cannon, The Mod Squad, Baretta, Banaczek, Starsky and Hutch... Why both sides were technically good guys, I don't know, but I'd throw myself into and all around the pool, pretend I was being punched and almost drowned, and fight back, as well...until I was, well, exhausted.

That's how I'd still spend my time in a pool, if I had the opportunity.
Of course, you've already figured out my problem: None of these activities is really an option for a 47-year-old man in a public pool (even one as empty as the one at the Plainville Y on a sunny Sunday afternoon). I'm not sure what they'd make of a goggled man pretending to be thrown around a pool by an invisible Telly Savalas, but I'm fairly certain they wouldn't allow it for very long.

Ah, youth, who loves ya, baby?