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July 1, 2009

Lee Ward: 07/05/09 — Observations at the pool

Anonymous The Daily Independent Wed Jul 01, 2009, 03:29 PM EDT

It’s difficult to describe how much I enjoy spending the day at the swimming pool.

Of course I love the warm, sunny weather. I also enjoy getting a tan, within reason and under a good coat of sunscreen.

I love to swim and I love to just float around like a jellyfish.

I love the corn dogs and the Italian ices from the concession stand.

But I also love watching people and meeting people.

I recently met a woman who read my column and had wanted to meet me. (I love that kind of flattery, too, whether it happens at the pool or elsewhere.)

One day this pool season, I watched a little boy and girl interact for a few tense seconds.

She was in the pool with her guardian when she noticed a little boy had taken her noodle and was beating the concrete ground with it. (For those who do not have a pool toy fettish, a noodle is a long, cylindrical flotation device that actually resembles a very large noodle.)

The little girl yelled at him from the middle of the pool, “Hey, what are you doing? Put my noodle down!”

I admired the child, who appeared to be 6 to 8 years old. I would never have had the confidence to confront anyone when I was her age.

With her inflatable ring around her middle, she began paddling toward the side of the pool, at which point the boy put down the noodle.

Now here’s the interesting part.

The little girl pushed forward.

“What were you doing with my noodle?” she asked. The boy ignored her. “I said, what were you doing with my noodle?” she asked again.

This time, he responded, “What?”

This time, the girl asked the boy why he was pounding her noodle on the ground.

“I wasn’t,” he said. “I was hitting a leaf.”

“Well,” she said. “Don’t do that again.”

And that was that.

While I admired her nerve, I wondered if she knew what she had just encountered. It was the typical male response.

If a man is in trouble with a woman and he doesn’t have a good answer for her question, he ignores her. For as long as possible. I suppose he’s hoping she’ll go away.

When she doesn’t he says, “What?” as if he didn’t hear her or understand the question. In truth, he’s just buying more time to formulate his response.

By the fourth round of questioning, the best the boy could come up with is, “I was hitting a leaf.”

What a stupid answer. Yeah, I know, he’s just a boy. But it sounded like a typical man answer.

I hope the little girl put an end to the noodle abuse, but I also hope she realized she was witnessing a pattern that would repeat itself for many years, probably her lifetime. And she can know she handled it the right way: don’t just let it go. That’s what they want you to do.

LEE WARD can be reached at lward@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2661.

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