What Lesson Learned?
How absurdly improvident people can demonstrate themselves to be. Lured by the prospect of having their very own swimming pool in their very own backyard, of their very own house in their very own neighbourhood, and the prestige attached to that ownership, they succumb. Within a country with all the intemperate seasons of a northern latitude, where the potential for pool use is restricted to three to four months of a 12-month year.
A costly proposition; its installation and its maintenance. Yet it is a symbol of successful attainment and people are drawn to its symbolism and visions of fun in the sun. Soon enough the shiny new toy is not used as frequently as when it was first installed and it becomes an owner's albatross. The sacrifice of space given over to a pool, above- or in-ground, gardens seen as lesser value. When the family's children are young the family pool, though gated and fenced represents an ever-present danger.
Too many young children are lost each year to the presence of pools and the lack of presence of adult oversight. But then, there are anomalies in the equation as well. As, for example, when the adults in proud ownership of their very own backyard pool are not themselves capable swimmers, though in the particular instance newly reported, their two young girls, 13 and 9 years of age, are. The father, it would appear, never learned to swim adequately.
He normally restricts his pool time to instances when his wife, an able swimmer, goes into the pool with him. However, on a hot and humid day when she was not present, their two daughters went swimming along with their father. Mindful of his lack of aquatic fitness, he normally avoids the deep end staying at the shallow end, but on this occasion he floated beyond to the slope and found himself in water deeper than he was comfortable with.
Imagine, far from the pool's edge or a ladder, finding himself going underwater, flailing helplessly about, while the two girls were happily distracted swimming about competently. Until noticing their father's distress, at which point the 13-year-old dove, grasped her father and swam with him to the edge of the pool, leaving her little sister to keep the unconscious man's head above water, while the older girl dialled 911.
"I thought he was dead because he wasn't moving", said the younger child afterward, hugely relieved that their father was recovered from his brief ordeal. One that, without their presence of mind, would have left them fatherless. How feckless is that?
And how reckless that young adults out for a day of fun in the sun at a lake on the north shore of the Lanark Highlands hadn't the perspicacity to understand that there might be danger in store for someone left alone in the middle of the lake, intending to swim back to shore on her own. Obligingly, two friends of a 19-year-old woman watched while she disembarked from their watercraft in the middle of the lake.
Her intention, to make her way back to the shore on her own. And this was the last the friends saw of their adventurous swimming companion until the following day when her lifeless body was pulled from the lake by search and rescue teams. (Chalk up yet another drowning death in the Ottawa Valley this summer.) In both instances, what were they thinking? Assuming they were capable of rational thought.
In the case of the father whose two daughters rescued him from his own backyard pool, unconscious and perilously close to expiring, he claims he has learned a life lesson: "I'm not going to go near water without a lifejacket". Well, that's quite the solution, isn't it? Mightn't dedicating himself to learn how to swim properly be a more useful vow of intent?
As for the happy-go-lucky friends of a young woman who saw fit to drop her off in the middle of a lake and then continue their zipping about on that lake with never a thought to the woman's safety, one can only wonder what life lesson they've learned?
A costly proposition; its installation and its maintenance. Yet it is a symbol of successful attainment and people are drawn to its symbolism and visions of fun in the sun. Soon enough the shiny new toy is not used as frequently as when it was first installed and it becomes an owner's albatross. The sacrifice of space given over to a pool, above- or in-ground, gardens seen as lesser value. When the family's children are young the family pool, though gated and fenced represents an ever-present danger.
Too many young children are lost each year to the presence of pools and the lack of presence of adult oversight. But then, there are anomalies in the equation as well. As, for example, when the adults in proud ownership of their very own backyard pool are not themselves capable swimmers, though in the particular instance newly reported, their two young girls, 13 and 9 years of age, are. The father, it would appear, never learned to swim adequately.
He normally restricts his pool time to instances when his wife, an able swimmer, goes into the pool with him. However, on a hot and humid day when she was not present, their two daughters went swimming along with their father. Mindful of his lack of aquatic fitness, he normally avoids the deep end staying at the shallow end, but on this occasion he floated beyond to the slope and found himself in water deeper than he was comfortable with.
Imagine, far from the pool's edge or a ladder, finding himself going underwater, flailing helplessly about, while the two girls were happily distracted swimming about competently. Until noticing their father's distress, at which point the 13-year-old dove, grasped her father and swam with him to the edge of the pool, leaving her little sister to keep the unconscious man's head above water, while the older girl dialled 911.
"I thought he was dead because he wasn't moving", said the younger child afterward, hugely relieved that their father was recovered from his brief ordeal. One that, without their presence of mind, would have left them fatherless. How feckless is that?
And how reckless that young adults out for a day of fun in the sun at a lake on the north shore of the Lanark Highlands hadn't the perspicacity to understand that there might be danger in store for someone left alone in the middle of the lake, intending to swim back to shore on her own. Obligingly, two friends of a 19-year-old woman watched while she disembarked from their watercraft in the middle of the lake.
Her intention, to make her way back to the shore on her own. And this was the last the friends saw of their adventurous swimming companion until the following day when her lifeless body was pulled from the lake by search and rescue teams. (Chalk up yet another drowning death in the Ottawa Valley this summer.) In both instances, what were they thinking? Assuming they were capable of rational thought.
In the case of the father whose two daughters rescued him from his own backyard pool, unconscious and perilously close to expiring, he claims he has learned a life lesson: "I'm not going to go near water without a lifejacket". Well, that's quite the solution, isn't it? Mightn't dedicating himself to learn how to swim properly be a more useful vow of intent?
As for the happy-go-lucky friends of a young woman who saw fit to drop her off in the middle of a lake and then continue their zipping about on that lake with never a thought to the woman's safety, one can only wonder what life lesson they've learned?
Labels: Human Relations, Ontario, societal failures
posted by Pieface @ 6:26 PM
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