Pandemic Poolside

It isn’t too often that a deadly pandemic suddenly sweeps the planet, upending all of human life as we know it...

In late March, 2020, with Covid rapidly spreading in the US and forcing the shutdown of life as we know it, I found myself alone in my downtown apartment, isolated, and terrified by everything that was happening. Upcoming travel plans for the tropics were cancelled. Grasping the magnitude of what was happening and seeing it unfold before my eyes felt like living a nightmare. I spent hours and days reading and hoping for better news, but none came. For some reason, or maybe actually just some heavier-than-normal substance (abuse), I decided that I needed to change my situation for the better. It was up to me to be the change that I wanted to see in the world! So I did what few, if any - and certainly none that I knew - would ever do to make proverbial lemonade out of lemons. This time, my friends were not around to talk me out of it either.

If you happen to live downtown in an apartment building in a major city that is suddenly and dramatically very quiet, there's at least one best-in-show Spring and Summer amenity that's always a fan-favorite and sure to never disappoint: the swimming pool.

Since most of the year’s pool season was already looking like it would be impacted by rampant spreading of the 'vid-19, I like to think I was way ahead of the curve when I scored the deal of a lifetime for $29.95 on Amazon (minus Prime delivery due to pandemic delays). The family 'play paradise pool' was delivered in a week's time. Without ever leaving home, except to go down to the lobby to pick up my package, I had 300-gallons of every landlord's worst nightmare to float on a raft in setup in a few short hours.

Laying face-up on an inflatable raft beneath the warm glow of a heat lamp I hung from the ceiling fan in my living room, I couldn't help thinking how really great it was that my pool was filled with hot water that I didn't pay for either. It wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows making my entire vision come to life though, so don't try this one in your own rental apartment living room unless you're a real pro, like me, and unless you also own a tarp, some pool toys, tons of kinetic sand, a few palm trees, 100 beach balls, a "no" life guard sign, a heating sun lamp, assorted pineapple drinkware, an attachable rainfall shower head, 50+ feet of flexible pvc tubing, a decorative water fountain pump, and some large astro turf grass rug from your patio last season to complete the full effect.

Above ground inflatable swimming pools for families of 6 do not offer much when it comes to instructions for setup indoors. That might lead some to assume they are for outdoor use only. In fact, they might even say in the instructions that they are, “intended for outdoor use only.”

To me that just means there is a little more TBD work needed in order to get the pool up and running indoors. Often, some quick Google searches can fill in a lot of blanks. In this instance, my method was simple, I would ignore the setup instructions unless there was something that didn’t work. Just to be clear, I was setting up my pool indoors. It was going in my living room, where I could ride out the pandemic in front of a 4k HDTV and a popcorn machine next to an even wetter "wet bar" that was within perfect reach of my hand grabber claw thingy.

Some people I spoke to about my redecorating plan felt the need to ask me stupid questions, like if I know what happens when a swimming pool leaks? Yes, obviously, I'm not stupid. I actually had a swimming pool that leaked once outside, so it would be exactly the same, only with hotter water that I didn't pay for, faker grass from the hardware store, and polished wood floors. Did I own the home I was putting a pool inside of? No. Of course not. Not at all. I can barely afford renter's insurance and if I did, I would never put 300 gallons in the middle of my living room. That would be stupid.

It's worth mentioning that no one was living below me in the building, so I wasn't really concerned about anyone else. Although that killed any chances of me on a flamingo raft crashing down through the ceiling onto someone's dinner table while they were eating. Which really sucks. Just kidding.

Safety measures were a top priority, so all of the precautions were taken. I already owned a tarp, so luckily I was pretty much half way there in terms of completing safety procedures right from the start. I also made sure I had proper sanitation treatment available like President Trump's recommended chlorine injections as well as other sanitizers waiting on deck. Even though it had a few ripped spots, placing my handy tarp underneath the pool was a key defense strategy. I mean, you can never really be too careful setting up a pool inside.

There was a random contractor who I happened to speak to around this time who also happened to be a real prick. Our conversation was cut off abruptly when he called me a moron and I chose to see past his small-mindedness and instead focused on how kinetic sand could be a great added perk. When I started to explain my plan to him, he expressed concern that there could be possible damages from placing a pool in my living room which had the potential to impact the entire building. He made a few comments using technical terms like "structural stability" which I don't really remember clearly and might have actually been "instability". He basically felt if something went wrong, the fallout might trickle over into my neighbors' lives and make matters worse for them in the midst of a global pandemic. Taking his concerns to heart, I decided to cap off the water level at the 'Maximum Fill' line instead of putting in a lot of extra water to make the pool deeper like I originally planned. Apparently water is also super heavy and it actually weighs a lot more than most people even realize (think about that next time you want to go on a so-called water diet).

Smaller-sized pools were definitely less than ideal for the tropical-themed resort vibe I had in mind. You can’t really float on a raft in the little kiddie pools, let alone dive in. I ended up getting a pool that was big enough to take up most of my whole living room, but wouldn't destroy the whole building. Assuming my rough calculations were somewhat accurate.

Given the complete lack of any instruction for setting up the paradise and play swim center inside a home, I had to figure things out on my own, like how to fill it or empty it without being able to use a regular garden hose or backyard. I knew some tubing would be involved. There is actually something I discovered that you can stick over any faucet to basically turn it into a hose. In order to empty the pool, it seemed like it would be easiest to use gravity. My super sweet and smart friend suggested that I just empty it right out of the window and down onto the street. All I would need to do was have a hose hanging out of my second-floor window. This was super easy, and during the pandemic there were also fewer people to disrupt my drain tube which ran across the sidewalk. It probably looked a little bit weird.

The shipping delays from the pandemic did result in other online ordering issues, including getting essential accessories for my pool, which didn't come until April. Other things that were delayed included: inflatable pineapple and flamingo drink holders, 50 pounds of kinetic sand (because regular sand is messier), and a "no life guard on duty" sign. Adding to these delayed items, there was also a limited number of fans for air flow. Controlling the indoor humidity was a major issue, especially since my pool was constantly being filled with freshly circulating hot water, which I don't pay for, making it pretty much like a giant hot tub with lots of steam. Luckily, I already knew how to manage this kind of thing from some mistakes I made when I turned part of the dining room into a live moss wall back in 2018.

With hardware stores still open during the pandemic, having one located just around the corner proved helpful. It was also convenient that I kept a large fake grass area mat in storage from the previous summer when I had it on my patio. It needed a cleaning, so I put it in the shower little and some nice smelling body wash did the trick before placing it pool-side in the living room. It made a perfect living room picnic lawn too.

My pandemic pool resort was not only a major success and pleasure, but also a huge hit with some of my neighbors who became pandemic friends and even brought their dog that couldn't swim. Eventually, I incorporated a rainfall shower head above the pool, just below the sun lamp, for added extra-ness. There was tons of pvc tubing crisscrossing my home in order to circulate water to and from the bathroom, which was annoying, but also worth it for the cause.

Any time I felt like it, or like several times a day and at night, I would randomly jump, dive, slide, hop, or fall right into the pool. Things got wet, and a cell phone I had barely two months was drowned and lost forever, but I always did my best to ventilate and dry stuff. Of course, once the weather outside got nicer towards the end of May, going outside became more pleasant, despite the pandemic.

The pool which was the centerpiece, or really pretty much just all of my living room - making for an in-home tropical resort stay-cation - was finally decommissioned to be taken out of service just after Memorial Day weekend, in anticipation of summer beach weather. Unfortunately, at the time, I didn't know the beaches were going to be mostly closed the whole Summer. Of course, this just meant that people were told not to go there because they were closed. I still went though, even if I had to go alone and get kicked out. Plus, at least I knew in the worst case scenario, I always had the inflatable swimming pool folded up and tucked away, ready for a rainy day. Or year.

Stay safe, stay healthy, and live your best life.