One of the moms with whom Shannon convenes a regular toddler/baby playgroup arranged a little swim meet today for all the affiliated families and kids. I was happy to see both Julia and Genevieve go totally amphibian. Gigi - who looked like a little lump of swim-diapered Crisco - put her face in the water right away, and then spent a skin-wrinkling forty-five minutes kicking like a tadpole all around the pool (with Shannon holding on tight, of course). When I occasionally drifted by, she gave me one of those old-soul looks that babies can give, saying with her expressionless mouth and wide-open eyes, "What? I've spent more of my life submerged in fluid than I've been out of it, dude."
Julia - clad in a Sesame Street swimsuit - was less adventurous, but she remembered a good deal of last year's swimming lessons, and was happy to jump off the deck into my arms, to "kick and kick and kick" as I supported her chest and stomach, to be tossed and caught in a giant splash, to be pulled by the hands through the water, and to generally get soaked. I knew she was having a fantastic time when she started speaking with this crazy accent that common to natives of Funland: "I am hayayayving sohohohoh muyayayach fuyuyuyuyn!"