Observer Online | Viewpoints

Posted June 29, 2007

Jumping Forward, With a Splash

There is a point in time when we become masters of our environment, and we look to move up to another level, another challenge. We master our jobs, our hobbies and we need to find that next experience.

For my son, Charlie, that time came last weekend. After months of struggling to avoid the water, our trip to the neighborhood pool last weekend proved to be a break-through day for our 2-year-old.

Although he has participated in swimming classes with his parents as a baby, for the past few months Charlie has loudly protested bathtime and he's been perfectly content to play with the water in the pool while standing or crouching safely from dry land.

His sister, on the other hand, is so over the baby pool at age 4 that she can hardly stand to splash around in it for a few minutes while everybody gets settled. For her, the big pool is where she needs to be.

A few minutes after Audrey and I head to the big pool Charlie decides he just has to get in on the action and begs his mother to take him. Despite months of avoiding the water, Charlie is pleased as punch to bounce, splash, paddle and kick around the big pool while his sister walks beside him, proudly touching her feet to the bottom of the shallow end.

As Charlie begged us to pull him into the water, laughing at the splash and happily going underwater once or twice, he was perfectly comfortable in his new environment, ready to try something new and to grow.

It was a wise person who said that one of the greatest things we can do to keep our focus and keep learning is to bite off more than we can chew, and then start chewing.