The little boy stood shivering, his arms wrapped around his skinny frame. He stood at a terrifying height above his surroundings. Around him, everyone was shouting.
“C’mon!”
“You can do it!”
“Just go ahead!”
The boy lowered his arms and swallowed. He bounced up and down slightly on the balls of his feet. The movement caused him to wobble, and he quickly hugged himself again as a means of stabilization.
The cries of encouragement redoubled. “Give it a shot! Don’t be afraid!”
With a quick shake of his head, the boy signaled that it wasn’t going to happen; he wasn’t ready to die. He turned and got off the diving board. There was a long queue of enthusiasts waiting behind him, and the next in line immediately shouldered past. Splashes and happy cries ensued.
“If he’d just try it once –” the boy’s mother said from the comfort of her deck chair to the women sitting around her. Her voice betrayed a flicker of irritation.
“He’ll get it,” reassured another mother. “You wait and see.”
“I know he will eventually,” said the first woman, “but it’s frustrating. He’s so cautious and fearful.”
The other women understood. Nobody admires a scaredy-cat.
The mother of a rather reckless boy considered pointing out that cautious sons break fewer limbs but decided against it.
“I’m sure he’ll be diving in no time,” she said blandly.
A short distance away, meanwhile, the pool was thrashing with the tiny limbs of beginning swimmers. Teenaged instructors waded through their lilliputian midst like giants, putting a palm under a stomach here, guiding a fledgling backstroke there.
Most of the children were gasping and sputtering as they floundered through the choppy chlorine. At least two of them were crying, a fact observed by the maternal cohort in the deck chairs.
“Don’t look now –” said one mother to another.
“I know, I know,” the second woman murmured. Her daughter was one of the miserable novices. She snuck a glance at the pool.
The child had hooked one arm over the edge of the pool and was using her other hand to pull a pair of goggles off her streaming eyes. Her little mouth was open and turned down at the sides, like a tragic mask.
“Should I go to her?” the mother wondered aloud, knowing what the others would say and wanting to hear it anyway.
“No, no, she’ll be fine,” they said, as she expected. “She can work through this. She’ll be swimming like a fish in no time.”
“Don’t look now,” the first mother broke in, “but your little guy is up on the diving board again.”
“I can’t watch,” laughed the boy’s mother, turning her head away. But of course she could watch, and it’s a good thing she did, because she turned back just in time to catch the splash as her skinny scaredy-cat disappeared head first into the watery blue.
A second later, he was bobbing on the surface, yelling.
“Mom! I did it! Did you see me?”
“I saw you!” she yelled back. “You were great!”
All the mothers were smiling. And, because it was a group of mothers, it was only a moment before one of them remarked complacently: “See? Told you so.”
Meghan Cox Gurdon’s column appears on Sunday and Thursday. She can be contacted at [email protected].
