Summer R&R (That’s Routines and Responsibilities)

My husband brought it home proudly, proclaiming this inflatable pool would make the summer great again. I immediately hated it. The pool was large, it sat lopsided, it was always full of grass, and it was a pain to keep clean.

It’s always Mom’s job to keep the pool clean. Like I have nothing better to do, nothing else to keep clean. Give me a large vat of water you don’t intend to change, leave it outside all the time, throw stinky bodies into it, and let me keep it clean. Sounds like the best summer hobby ever.

We’ve never had a pool before. This was a big upgrade from the plastic ones you use for toddlers and then dump out every evening. This held a bazillion more gallons, and if the EPA didn’t arrest me for dumping it out every night, the water company would.

So the pool sat in the yard. The children gleefully splashed in it for hours upon hours every afternoon.

And the pool got greener, and greener, and greener.

I woke up on the Fourth of July excited about the family cookout we were to enjoy. But one look out the window saw cholera growing in my pool. Not a pleasant view while grilling hamburgers.

We had to drain the pool, I said. This is a health hazard, I said. We should never have gotten the stupid pool, I said.

“Just drain it real quick while I go grab the burgers from the store.” Husband Who Started It All closed the door behind himself and drove away.

Do you know how long it takes to drain a bazillion gallons of water from your green petri dish to the street out the front? The rest of my life. That’s the answer.

We got more than half drained before I could not stand wasting any more of my holiday watching water trickle. I commandeered two teen sons and forced hard labor dumping out the other half-a-bazillion gallons of water across the backyard.

Then I complained why was the backyard so muddy.

As long as the pool was empty, we needed to move it to more level ground. So we lifted up the pool to drag it across the mud puddles . . . and gagged. The underside was growing biochemicals that could wipe out the city.

We finally moved the beloved monstrosity, flattened it out, scrubbed it with bleach, and began slowly refilling it. I could hear the water company going “ca-ching, ca-ching, ca-ching” every second.

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