Never Swim Alone - Seriously!

Okay. My story comes in the form of humor but the serious underlying issue is truth. Never swim alone.

I am not one that seeks wild abandon or even wild adventure, anymore. I'm just fine being me, at my age now, and that's all.

After swimming all afternoon at my precious friend's, the Conrad's, pool I took a little break to see the nephews and then headed out to Piedmont to spend a nice relaxing evening with my best bud, Heather. We hung out for an hour or so and then decided to swim in her pool.

She got right in. I hesitated. Then I went for it. The water was so warm. Surprising, I know, since it's only been in the three digits all week. Since my middle name is "Grace-ful" and I try to avoid anyone finding out about that, I do all I can to avoid the curse. This event should rank no less.

I go in using the ladder... and immediately slip my leg inbetween the ladder and the side of the pool while falling backwards and down into the water. Usually I'd pop right back up to the surface (we are in three feet of water at this point) but I'm a little concerned about being trapped in the ladder. The entire episode lasted less than a minute but in my quick, genius mind it lasted much longer as I am under water unable to find the surface. Heather bravely reaches into the depths of the three feet of water to rescue me by pulling my arms out of the water. As I come up fighting with the ladder for my leg, I win! I break through the plastic step and pull my leg to safety... NOT!!! I pull my leg through the broken plastic step and gash it open right into the pool. It doesn't bleed... immediately. We think we're in the clear until I pop it up onto my floatation device (raft). OH MY! I did not want to see that and I'm pretty sure Heather didn't want to see that in her pool. When we hit the wide open air, the blood found it's way to the surface. We jumped out of the pool and the rest is left to a scar on my left leg from the knee to the calf in a crested moon slit. Lovely.




I was very impressed with Heather's immediate action in saving my life and doctoring my wound. We did go have it checked out by medical professionals after we calmed down a bit. She did everything correctly and no stitches needed... which I questioned after the ER Tech pulled the now dried wound open to see the depth of it. OUCH! Great! Now it's bleeding again. Heather did her doctoring all over again and even trimmed the hanging skin. Then we shared some popcorn and watched Bride Wars. What a great ending to such an exciting 60 minutes.