A Story of Being Young and Dumb

How It All Began

I grew up in a very loving and supportive home. My parents would always find activities for me in order to keep me busy. As a young kid I had a lot of energy. During most summers I would take swimming lessons. Every May, I would collaborate with my friends to make sure we all got into the same lesson times. Some of my greatest memories from growing up involved going to the pool with friends. As I grew up, I eventually needed a job. Because getting a job at 16 years old is not an easy task, I decided to become a swimming instructor for the woman I received lessons from. It was perfect! I was getting paid to be in a pool all day. As time went on all of my friends became instructors as well. Working with my friends through my teenage years and early twenties I have gathered a lot of wonderful, crazy, and downright stupid experiences that I will never forget for the rest of my life.

The Incident

It was supposed to be an easy Friday afternoon shift. At the pool, Fridays were easy days where kids would have a little bit more down time to play and have fun. My job was to make sure all the kids swam their laps correctly and safely. As a swimming instructor for kids, safety was always my number one priority. Between the first and second lessons, I and all of my friends got a thirty-minute break to eat, rest, and get ready for the next two hours of work. This time was usually spent competing with my fellow instructors in races, dives, or anything else we could compete in. Since we grew up swimming together, this competitiveness grew more and more every day. On this particular Friday afternoon we decided to have a friendly competition to see who could SUCCESSFULLY dive in the shallowest water. Like I said earlier,” Safety was always my number one priority.” However, we were not on the clock. So safety was thrown out of the window for the sake of spirited competition. We started diving in five feet of water. After we each completed a dive, we would move down a foot. Once we got to three feet of water my coworker gracefully dove in the water like a swan. It was my turn now. I curled my toes around the edge of the pool, and dove in with confidence. I abruptly hit the bottom of the pool with my face. It was so terrifying I immediately went into denial thinking,” Okay, that hurt, but I’m sure everything is fine.” Soon after that thought, I realized that everything was not fine. A cloud of blood surrounded me as I rushed out of the water. I had so much adrenaline in my system the pain was minimal. Out of embarrassment I ran straight to the bathroom to see what exactly is bleeding. I will never forget the terror that came over me as I saw myself in the bathroom mirror with a completely crooked nose bleeding profusely. I was still in shock, so the pain hadn’t set in yet. It was crazy to experience. I saw my face all busted up, and experienced zero pain. After the bleeding stopped I walked back outside to discover that nobody else really saw what happened except for my co-workers. As our 30 minute break came to an end my boss came out to see me. Somehow she found out and wanted to come check on me. The look on her face was priceless. She was completely taken back. I told her that everything would be fine. To my surprise that was not necessarily true. I was taking the situation pretty lightly, and still to this day, I find it both hilarious and embarrassing. She let me continue working through the afternoon because I insisted that I could still teach lessons with a broken nose. My boss then proceeds to tell me that I have a one-on-one private lesson with a child on the autism spectrum. I didn’t think much of it, and I greeted the young boy when he arrived. He was very enthusiastic about the water. He was also very curious about my nose. I guess it was because I had a huge scrape on it. He kept throwing his head forward to kiss the boo-boo I had on my face. As you can imagine, my whole face was very tender. So protecting my face was definitely a challenge. All he wanted to do was play with my nose. At the end of the lesson I was exhausted and ready to go home.

The Moral of the Story

All in all, I am fine and the broken nose never lead to anything serious. I am so incredibly lucky to have not gotten worse injuries. It was a stupid mistake that I will never forget. But, it is also an incredible memory that me and my friends still talk about. It’s the perfect example of what not to do. At the beginning of each session my coworkers are eager to tell the kids why it’s not safe to dive in shallow water. I am currently still at the same job doing what I love. These are the times that I will cherish forever.