Learning and Relearning

Thomas is a fun-loving ball of energy. If something fun is going on, Thomas wants to be in the middle of it–no hesitation, no apprehension, no fear. Some folks wade into a pool–Thomas runs, jumps, and yells “cannon ball.” The only problem is he can’t swim. Which is a pretty big problem for a child with no fear around water. 

But he is getting close. Last week, we took him to the pool at our local YMCA, where he has done swimming lessons each year for the last three years–and this time he actually made good forward progress, kicking his legs and doggy-paddling. I suspect it won’t be long until he basically turns into a fish. This year, he was the smallest child in his group at swim lessons, but the biggest dare devil by far. 

Lifeguard: Who wants to jump off the side?

Thomas: [hands shoots up first] Me! Me! Me!

Lifeguard: Who wants to go down the slide?

Thomas: [hand shoots up first] I do! I do! I do!

Despite being only five, Thomas has gotten a lot of exposure to water, mostly because I have to travel frequently for my day job, which is unfortunate because I hate hotels. The problem is I can never sleep well in hotels because I’m always afraid of oversleeping. I’m not sure why this bothers me because I always oversleep my alarm when I’m at home, where I’m a fourth or fifth snooze type of person. But with hotels, I basically associate them with the fear of oversleeping, missing my presentation, losing my job, and becoming destitute and homeless. 

Thomas, however, associates hotels with swimming pools. He loves hotels. Or mostly he just loves Fairfield Inns because that is the hotel I nearly always stay at–I’m a creature of habit. Most Fairfield Inns have the exact same floor plan, and down the hall from the lobby is a small indoor pool. Despite being an indoor pool, the water feels like it has just been piped in from the arctic, so it takes a few minutes to wade in and get acclimated, at least for me. For Thomas: ”Cannon ball!” 

Sometimes I wonder where his fearless instinct comes from. But deep down in the crevices of my brain, I think I can conjure up memories of a time when I used to be the same way, when I used to be a cannonball, dive-right-in type of child instead of dip-my-toe-and-wade-in type of adult. I don’t know what happens as we get older; it seems like we learn to hesitate, worry, and fear, and fear is a strange thing. It’s good for staying alive but not necessarily for living. 

Maybe I can learn a thing or two from Thomas. Maybe I can learn to reassociate things with fun instead of fear–or at least I could reassociate hotels with something more pleasant than destitution, maybe something like free bacon at the continental breakfast.