So after my little go round with the scout Napoleon I had the boys here all day and decided to take them to the Rec Centre to swim. We have a fabulous Rec Centre (actually it's a Rec Center because of the whole American thing) and by the time we got there it was closing. We were there last weekend with the Dude's sister and her kids and it closed at 7 on Saturday but now it closes at 5 on Saturdays.... awesome.
So we headed to the YMCA where we have a membership. Nothing fancy at the Y but the boys and I could do the free swim thing. #2 is a good swimmer and has passed the "deep water swim test" and can swim in the whole pool but #3 although a fine swimmer for 6 years old has not passed the swim test and so he hangs out in the shallow end. Since it's the YMCA I go into the pool with them when they swim.
We're swimming happily for a while and #3 says "Let's go into the deep end" and we've always been able to take him into the deep end with an adult. So I grab a pool noodle and we start heading for the deep end. The lifeguard stops us and says that they've got new rules and that non-deep-end swimmers can't go in the deep end. So I say "but I'm going to be right with him and I have a pool noodle" he doesn't budge.
Of course, he can't budge...because as my old neighbour Fiona used to say in her thick Scottish accent...Rules are Rules.
I asked why it was that his swim teacher could take him into the deep end and was told that that was because she was a swim teacher...with 6 kids in the class and with me just supervising him...so not allowed to take my own kid into the deep end. Safety reasons and all that.
Enough. Enough protection and for my own good crap. I am sick unto death of all of this nanny state bullshit. I cannot buy beer at the grocery store without ID. I cannot take my own six year old into the deep end and be trusted to supervise him, I cannot be trusted to pick up donations from the streets where the bags were dropped off.
Enough.
Okay, so I'm busy polishing off a bottle of red wine but still...? Doesn't this strike anyone else as absolutely ridiculous? I'm sick of being treated like an idiot. Sick of being treated like a criminal. Sick of being treated this way.
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